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Hi All,

Warning: Long post

I've been meaning to make this post for a while, when thinking about the long term future of XBMC and how successfully it will integrate into the lounge room and devices for "the common user". This is specifically a feature / thought which I've thought about for my "dummy" friends, family, colleagues, rather than myself. This could infact already be implemented and I don't know it....

On with the show:
So basically, a lot of users seem to keep their movies and TV on USB drives. I'd like to see XBMC handle USB drives and removable media in an easier fasion for simple users.

So I insert a USB disk into Windows for example, and I've configured it in Windows to be D: the volume label is "MOVIES" and there's a folder called "MOVIES"

I can then configure XBMC to have a library type of "MOVIES" on D:\MOVIES and it will perform a scan, identify the movies and I'll have this lovely library of films all identified and rated, as we all know and love
Now, I unplug my USB drive and I insert my other USB drive, the volume label is "TV" and it has D:\TV\ filled with several TV shows. I can then do thesame as the movies, configure it as TV and scan the library, great.



My questions / issues are as follows.
  • Will XBMC "wipe" the TV stuff from the database, when the movie drive is in and it's done a scan?
  • Can we get XBMC across the operating systems to perhaps recognise the USB drive based on serial number or volume label perhaps? Some other identifier rather than just "D:\TV" and "D:\Movies" so it knows which USB drive is in?
  • Can we streamline the process of identifying USB devices and media content? Example:
    A "dummy mode" option in the settings for a standardised folder layout, eg:
    Removable devices with \TV\ and \Movies\ and \Music\ being "auto added" to the library
    (Before anyone gets angry, this feature would be optional!)
    This would allow us "smart" people to simply teach our friends / family to "Just put it in TV" for example or "Just put it in /movies/" etc.
  • Perhaps an autoscan for new content upon insertion of USB / Removable device?



Ultimately, I feel like the entire UI for adding a folder, setting the media type, "nicknaming" the folder and so on is awkward. I 'get it' obviously - but even my mildly tech savvy friends just put it in the too hard basket and ignore the feature, which is such a waste, they effectively use XBMC as a filebrowser and media player in one, never touching the library features.
This particular thing should be considered to be re-written entirely, I can think of a suggestion already but this post is long as it is...


Does anyone else share any similar thoughts and or concerns? I love the program and hey, unfortunately more users isn't going to mean more revenue - but I feel like this could do with improvement and would be beneficial long term.
Thoughts?
1) Only if you use "clean library". There are some ideas floating around related to the improved media import/UPnP sharing stuff about how to handle library items that might not be available all the time, so perhaps that could be used for USB drive content as well.

2) Maybe it's just a windows thing? My USB drives have the same labels across OS X and various linux OSes.

3 and 4) I like these ideas, at least as options. USB drives should be automatically listed as a file source without the "add videos..." step. I'd imagine it would be possible to to auto scan the content using an add-on, and such an add-on could probably be configured to behave differently depending on what directories it sees in the root directory of the drive (TV, Movie, Music videos, etc). I don't know if this is possible with current versions of XBMC/Kodi, though, but I have seen add-ons that can add streaming content to the local library.
Ned, always reliable for informative replies Smile

Where can I discuss the media import /UPnP sharing stuff - where is it being discussed so I can contribute?
I'm not concerned so much with the labels of the disks, I'm suggesting that it could be a viable method of identifying disks easier? A unique identifier? S/N would be more logical though as it's going to be genuinely unique, in theory.

Regarding having it as an addon, yes look that's a good idea to trial it with - but long term, I'd like to be able to say to my Uncle, my mid skill tech friends "Hey, buy this Android XBMC box from Ebay for 99$ - now download XBMC 15.1 - yep that just supports USB drives "properly" - out of the box!"

Now that I've got the room for a new post, I'm thinking the entire add media system could be reworked or a new "simple" wizard added retaining the old one for the nerds?
Example a wizard
"Add new media" button (somewhere)
Box comes up and instead of asking you what folder, it asks you what MEDIA 3 big bright nice looking icons "MOVIES, TV, MUSIC" (or whatever library types are available. Pretty GUI looking icons - hell you could make these giant tablet sized icons.
THEN you point it to what folder or entire device contains your media
"Would you like to perform a scan now, the initial scan will take some time?"
"Finished, your movies are now available under movies in the front page"

etc...
Well, we could do that without a "wizard", since that would just be reording the steps that already happen + skinning. I like it, though.

Not sure if there's a public thread on the media import stuff yet, I don't have a link handy at least.
I really like this idea. Here is my thoughts:

Much like there is a suggested(basically required) naming convention for media files, it could be set up so in the root of the USB, is directories labelled "Movies", "TV Shows", "Music Videos", etc... with the appropriate media files inside the appropriate directory.

Then a udev rule(linux thinking here, but you get the idea) watches for usb drives connected with those directories at their root, scans them based on said directory name, and then adds them to the library. When that usb drive is disconnected, it removes from the library the media that used it as the source.

I feel like I've basically just reiterated what has already been said, but perhaps hearing it a different way might get the creative juices flowing.
(2014-08-08, 09:34)Dalton63841 Wrote: [ -> ]Then a udev rule(linux thinking here, but you get the idea) watches for usb drives connected with those directories at their root, scans them based on said directory name, and then adds them to the library. When that usb drive is disconnected, it removes from the library the media that used it as the source.

I feel like I've basically just reiterated what has already been said, but perhaps hearing it a different way might get the creative juices flowing.


Unless I'm misunderstanding you then no, you've actually completely misunderstood what was posted.
The media that is now unplugged needs to remain in the library for the sake of performance, but be marked as "not accessable at this time / hidden" it DEFINITELY needs to remain IN the library so that when the USB disk is replugged in, indexes it in significantly less time than a first time scan.
(2014-08-08, 12:18)RockerC Wrote: [ -> ]There already looks to be a lot of existing request and suggestion about different ideas for "offline" library support
http://forum.xbmc.org/showthread.php?tid=48895
http://forum.xbmc.org/showthread.php?tid=148331
http://forum.xbmc.org/showthread.php?tid=196545

These 3 threads have certainly raised some questions for me about how I would like it supported, were it to be added and also how should it be implimented.
XBMC removes items due to them not being available, it's a pretty big change to have a flag on an entire set of media that says "never remove from the database, until that disk is returned to the system THEN check for deleted folders / perform cleanup"
Furthermore it never even occurred to me, to have XBMC actually show ALL the persons media and be prompted "hey, please plug in TV USB DRIVE #3" - I was thinking more, that the library wouldn't display those films / TV shows - BUT when it's plugged in, they appear quickly, without the need of a full disk index / scan.

So there's definitely many ways this could be handled and needs some thought put into it, plus there's the difficulty of actually implimenting it.
Interesting idea having it all appear, regardless if the disk is plugged in or not, for the sake of "dumb users" I feel like the default ought to be that the media doesn't appear so they don't get confused and find themselves plugging and unplugging disks all the time.
Any other thoughts or comments from the devs?
I wonder if something like what stub files do - when you try to play a stub file it says "You need to insert the DVD for Avatar" (or whatever) - a solution would be to have a popup saying "You need to connect external drive number 27 to a USB port, then click OK".

M'eh, I avoid this like the plague, everything on the server or you don't get to watch it. I could never FIND the right hard drive or DVD in this household!"
I kinda agree with you, I'd rather not see my full library when media is offline, what I would prefer though is that offline media is detected mounted and library made available without the need for a full scan upon insertion.
Hi guys, long time lurker but registered to offer a suggestion for the Devs.

How about a small local database in the root of removable drives which could be read by XBMC (or Kodi, if you like lol)

I'm not a dev so don't know how practical it would be to code it but this would give the added ability to use drives between different machines. with all the database info intact (and also the mounted drive letter would not matter)

Just a thought!
That's actually not too bad an idea. I don't know how the databases are stored or handled in XBMC generally - if there's a need for it to be in a single file or not but it might be a way of working around the problem.
Mind you there could be permissions issues, space limitations and other issues handling it that way - but I would like to see XBMC improved for USB support in one way or another.
video Databases by default are stored in an sqlite file in userdata/Databases/MyVideosnn, where nn depends on version. Or if you use MySQL on your MySQL server in a database called MyVideosnn.
Hello all.

Now that many of the initial 14.x bugs are mostly ironed out (thank god) is there any more thoughts on the functionality I've suggested for this thread?
XBMC (Kodi) is very close to being something I can recommend to "dumb" friends and family but that lack of being able to plug in a USB drive and have it just mount the library for the drive contents is a shame.

As I hypothesised (somewhere) in this thread, even if it comes down to a convention in place of /TV/ and /Movies/ on drives being required, it seems a good idea.
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