Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[steveklein]

Like many people, I'll be using media center just about exclusively in theater mode but I'm having problems sorting my media the way I'd like to.

Let me present my solution before I present the problem

Solution:
Is there a way that when TheaterView starts and it is taken to the main page the list of Items To Show (Playing Now, Audio, Images, etc.) that I can have the ability to edit this in detail?

What I'm proposing is a way that if I so choose to do so I could click "Full Albums" and it would take me to all my full albums, if I click "Movies" it will take me to my dvd rips. If I click "Wallpapers" it will take me to my directory of 1920x1080 wallpapers. If I click "Recorded TV Shows" it goes straight to that, etc. etc.

This seems to be an absolute necessity from a user interface standpoint. I don't know if it is possible or not, and if it is, I don't know the workaround. I know you can add and remove things from the list, but I have no clue how to use the Parameter line. In my dream scenario, I'd have the following options:
- Billboard Charts (Billboard Top 100s from each year from the 1940s through 2006)
- Browse Full Albums (The rest of my collection is just in full album form)
- Photo Albums (My photo albums from my digital camera pictures)
- Home Videos (Videos recorded from a digital camera)
- Recorded TV Shows (I've got PVR functionality)
- Movies (DVDs)
- Live TV (Duh)
etc etc etc

Problem:
The reason merely clicking Audio or Images or Video doesn't work is because when I click Images, it lumps all my wallpapers, digital camera jpegs, funny images from the net, etc. etc. etc. all into one interface. It's even worse for videos... I've got different ways I'd like to see my recordings of Planet Earth compared to a dvd rip of a movie... which is still different than home videos from my camcorder and digital camera.

I think the real issue is I need to learn how to work the "Parameter" feature as I am sure it is very, very powerful but I am just scratching the surface on how to use it.

[rjm]

In normal (non-theatre) view there is a very nice way to achieve what you want.

Create a new View Scheme for all media types and in this scheme add a pain called say "Media" and populate this pane with a Search List. In the search list you can construct a custom search with an easy to use wizard for each of the items you list. I just learned about this feature and love it!

Now the problem. For reasons I do not understand, Theatre View does not display View Schemes other than the stock Audio/Images/Video, even if you specify your new View Scheme to be visible in Theatre View.

You may be able to work around this by using one of the stock view schemes, such as Audio, and overriding its Media Type qualifier to include all media types. I have not confirmed this will work but it might.

[steveklein]

In normal (non-theatre) view there is a very nice way to achieve what you want.

Create a new View Scheme for all media types and in this scheme add a pain called say "Media" and populate this pane with a Search List. In the search list you can construct a custom search with an easy to use wizard for each of the items you list. I just learned about this feature and love it!

Now the problem. For reasons I do not understand, Theatre View does not display View Schemes other than the stock Audio/Images/Video, even if you specify your new View Scheme to be visible in Theatre View.

You may be able to work around this by using one of the stock view schemes, such as Audio, and overriding its Media Type qualifier to include all media types. I have not confirmed this will work but it might.

well i spent the last hour goofing around with this workaround and didn't have much luck. i wasn't really sure how tosetthe thing up to be honest. i'm also very hesitant to abandon theater view because i will be controlling this entire database remotely without a mouse, so the "normal" view worries me that it may be harder to navigate.

[ThoBar]

What RJM suggests is the only way of doing things at the moment, and it does work for the most part.

When you edit / create a view scheme in Std View, there is a lot of logic that can be applied to a view, which includes (as RJM suggests) overriding media types.

In my setup, under Audio, I have the following view schemes (amongst others)...

 Audio
  ├ Classical
  │  ├ Classical/Genre
  │  └ Composer/Album
  ├ Disk Location
  ├ Music
  │  ├ Artist/Album
  │  └ Genre/Album
  └ Style
      ├ All
      ├ Classical
      └ Educational

Now, the trick for how *I* like things set up, is that..
 - Classical, while it appears in Theater View, does not show any music, rather the Classical/Genre and Composer/Album 'sub folders' are selected to show the music
 - Classical overrides the 'audio only' of the Audio scheme, to show Videos as well as music files (so I can 'Listen' to an Opera video)
 - Music excludes any Classical / Audio Books or anything else that is not contemporary popular music (it actually includes only this, but that involves my tagging setup...)
 - Artist/Album and Genre/Album are seen as sub-folders of Music in Theater View, and similar to the Classical setup, Music shows only these subfolders (ie no music)

Just to give you an idea, my Classical view scheme has the following settings:
 - Populate tree: Off
 - Honor parent scheme seach strings: Off (enables me to include video)
 - Show in Theater View: On
 - Filter in Both Directions: Off
 - Files to Show: [MyMediaType]=[Classical] ~sort=[Composer],[Filename],[MyMediaSubtype],[Other Genre]
 
Hope this helps.

FWIW: I agree with your suggestion. I'd like to be able to place a "Classical" option directly on to the root menu, and have the sub menu directly navigate the tree, with only files displayed in the 'content' area (i.e. no sub-view schemes in the content area). I personally don't really like having to select the "Views" option from the sub-menu to get a list of view schemes which have no heirarchical logic in their display in the dialog. This also fails the wife test.

[leezer3]

Bumping this thread as opposed to starting a new one I'm afraid 
I'm now trying to do much the same thing as the two previous posters (On a HTPC, so I don't really need/ want the audio part of theatre view), and would love the ability to edit the main theatre view menu. FWIW these are my current view scheme settings for video (I'd also like to add various genre specifics in theatre view, these are in the tags ATM but I could do without Director showing up on TV Series/ other etc):

Code: [Select]

Genre
├ Films
|  └ Subgenre
|    └ Artist
├ TV Series
|     └ Artist
|        └ Series
└ Other
       └Artist
          └Series
I'd like to add each of these primary genres to the main menu of theatre view, with the ability to apply the custom viewscheme to each. As of the moment there's no way I can see to get the specific view schemes working for each of these separate bits without breaking things elsewhere.

Cheers

-Leezer-

[glynor]

I haven't fully waded through all of these posts... However, you can display and browse all of your View Schemes in Theater View much like you can in Standard View.  The only caveat is that they can't be "top-level".  In other words, the View Schemes must all "live" underneath either Audio, Video, or Images.  In other words, you can't add your own to the "front page" in Theater View, but you can put them underneath any of the sub-views.

So, you can put specific Movies-only or TV-Shows only View Schemes UNDERNEATH your Video top-level Scheme, and then browse these in Theater View.  Same goes for Audio, or Images.  All you need to do is go into Video (or Audio or Images) inside Theater View, hit the Views button, and choose Video (or Audio, or Images, respectively).  This shows the full contents of the scheme.

I'll post some screenshots of what I have in a few minutes...

[glynor]

Okay.... Here are some screenshots.  I'll try to describe what I have on each one briefly.

From the Theater View Home screen, when I select Video I get this:



As you can see in there, along with some more general-purpose schemes (which could be edited out if I wanted), I have special child View Schemes called things like Movies, TV Shows, Music Videos, and Podcasts.  If I open up the TV Shows Scheme, it shows me this:



I can select the show I want.  When I "drill down" further, the next "tier" will let me choose what season I want.  At any step I can, of course, choose Show Files and it'll simply display all of the files in a list.  So, if I choose Sex and the City from the TV Shows View Scheme, it gives me this:



Similarly, if I want to watch a Movie instead, I'd choose Home --> Video --> Movies, which then shows me a list of Movie genres.  I'm actually at work right now and my library here is old so none of them are tagged with Genres (the only Genre that would show in that screenshot would be "Unassigned"), so I skipped down to the file level on this one (I chose Show Files on the (All) choice in the Genres list).  So this is a listing of all of my movies:



Here's what's inside my Music Videos Scheme (a listing of Artists):



If I drill down into one of those Artists, it'll show me the individual files.  There are many more (Podcasts and other stuff).  All of these are simply Child View Schemes of the main Video View Scheme (the Video "button") in Standard View.  They are filtered (using Step 4 in the Edit View Scheme dialog) to only show files that match one rule or another.  Since they all have their own Panes, then they have their own "drill down" steps in Theater View.  If you don't want some to show (if I didn't want the more "general purpose" one called Genre/Artist/Album to be available in Theater View for example) you just need to uncheck the Show in Theater View box in that same Edit View Scheme dialog!

[glynor]

Next, here is the top level of my Audio View Scheme (from Home --> Audio):



If I choose Genre/Artist/Album, of course, it'll just present me with a list of ALL of my music file Genres.  If I choose "Mixes" instead, it'll take me to my specially built "Smartlist-like" Radio Station View Schemes.  These are (amusingly named) view schemes that are pre-mixed from my full library using percentages and MC's "advanced" ~mix modifier.



I can then choose one of these and open it, and it'll show me the list of Genres inside that mix (because they are set up with Genre/Artist/Album panes).  If I'd rather just see the list of files, I simply choose Show Files on the Mix instead of opening it.

If I want to listen to an Audio-Only Podcast though, you can see I have a special View Scheme for it in the top-level Audio Scheme.  So, I can choose Audio --> Podcasts, and I get this:



If you carefully construct your top-level View Schemes in Standard View with a few sub-filtering View Schemes, you can accomplish almost anything you want.  The only thing that is a bit difficult is if you want one that will let you browse mixed-media.  This can even be accomplished, but you have to "file it" underneath Audio, Images, or Video in the tree (which is annoying but you can do it).

[bbrip]

Glynor, this is all great as a workaround but doesnt really replace the need for a feature of being able to put certain "pre-selected" types of video/audio whatever on the very first screen of theaterview for quick access.

[leezer3]

Thanks for that one.
But I agree though that as a workaround its fine, but its not ideal
I'd really like as little opportunity for confusion etc. as possible.

On another theatre view note- The top level location really ought to be clickable (IE. You can choose to move up levels this way, rather than being forced to use back). Again no biggy, but just something that really ought to be tweaked.

-Leezer-

[bbrip]

On another theatre view note- The top level location really ought to be clickable (IE. You can choose to move up levels this way, rather than being forced to use back). Again no biggy, but just something that really ought to be tweaked.

-Leezer-

good thought. I agree, that would make sense 

[glynor]

I guess I don't really see why it is a workaround... You can do exactly what you want, just not add them to the front "page" of Theater View.  Is there some part of it that I'm missing, other than the front page part?

For simplicity and branding reasons, I can see why they don't want us messing with that "page".

[leezer3]

Its more clicks, isn't it 
Most of the users on here have horrible size custom libraries, and if they're advanced enough to want to fiddle with things like that, then TBQH branding and simplicity can go out the window lol.

With everything there needs to be a balance though, and thats where the problem lies 

-Leezer-

[Jinster]

Glynor, what skin do you use? Looks great.

There are so many features in MC12 that I don't know what a lot of them do. It's nice to see someone showcasing what can be done. Kudos.

[glynor]

That's one of the built-in ones... Starts with an "A"... I forget the name right now.

[Jinster]

Glynor, can you give us an example of how you setup up your views and subviews for your TV series? I am trying to do the same thing but the whole "add view scheme" window just confuses the hell out of me... I tried adding files from a single directory but somehow all my video files show up under the "unassigned" field at the end.

My files are physically stored like this: movies, TV shows, and music each in its separate directory. Movies has no subfolders - everything lumped together. TV shows are subfoldered by the TV series title, with some types of shows like documentaries lumped together like a series.

To achieve your viewing scheme, do you tag all your files first and then do some sort of filtering in the view scheme or do you filter directories instead? For the TV series, do you tag each file with Series and Episode so that you can achieve this viewing scheme?

Thanks.

[Jinster]

Nevermind. I figured it out after following the supplied examples. Just one question though: Do you tag your seasons as simply "1" "2" "3" or do you actually type "Season 1" "Season 2", etc? Coz my subviews just show 1, 2 or 3 at the season level, and I tagged mine 1, 2, 3, but yours say "Season 1", etc. I guess you must have used "Season 1" in the tagging filed?

Thank you.

[leezer3]

In the tagging field here FWIW. If there's a season title, I also normally add this into this tag.

I've also always found it easier to store files in exactly the same way I tag them, this way if the tagging info gets mislaid, I can simply bring back the most significant bits by reading the from the folder info. Obviously, this won't bring back stuff like director, cast etc. but it's better than loosing the whole lot.
Back up the library regularly (Preferably to somewhere completely external; I use my webserver) and with any luck you shouldn't have any real trouble if things go pear shaped.

-Leezer-

[glynor]

Nevermind. I figured it out after following the supplied examples. Just one question though: Do you tag your seasons as simply "1" "2" "3" or do you actually type "Season 1" "Season 2", etc? Coz my subviews just show 1, 2 or 3 at the season level, and I tagged mine 1, 2, 3, but yours say "Season 1", etc. I guess you must have used "Season 1" in the tagging filed?

I did.  I set mine up before there was a specific Season or Series tag, so I used Artist for Series and Album for Season.  I keep meaning to switch it to the proper tags, but never get around to it.

My Album tags are actually filled with "Season 4", etc.