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(How To) Separate Your Kids Media From Your Own on MQ4
#1
Hi Everyone!

****Updated****


I've written this tutorial to try and assist fellow users of MQ4 who would like to be able to split their children’s media from their own, and be able to access each of these easily through the home screen menu.

If you are anything like me then you love your kids, and are more than happy to have their favourite shows and movies available to them; but would prefer not to have these mixed in with your own well maintained library.

In the spirit of XBMC I will in this post attempt to show any new users with similar ambitions how to accomplish this (if you haven't already).

I would also like to thank Macosqui for all his hard work on bringing us this brilliant skin.

STEP 1

If you haven't already, then you will need to separate your children's media files from your own on your storage device.

For example I have the folder structure on my NAS as follows:

Folder 1: Movies – Where I store my Movies.

Folder 2: TV Shows – Where I store my TV shows.

Folder 3: Kids Movies – Where I store the Children’s Movies.

Folder 4: Kids TV – Where I store the Children’s TV shows.

STEP 2

Now we need to open XBMC, and add each of these folders as a separate source so that we end up with 4 different sources named: Movies, TV Shows, Kids Movies & Kids TV. Each pointing to their respective folders we just created on your storage device.

I won't go into any detail as how to do this as it is covered in the wiki guide here.
STEP 3

Next, we need to create 4 smart playlists for XBMC to store. If you are using MQ4 go to the home screen, move along the menu until 'Movies' is selected, press down so that the sub menu appears, and select 'playlists'.

Image

Now select 'New Smart Playlist' and the below menu will appear.

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We will start by creating a playlist for our own movie collection. So select movies as the type, and in the name field type 'Movies'. Now scroll down and select new rule.

A new window will appear and we need to change this so that it reads: Match items where 'Path' 'Contains' and then select the browse button.

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This will then provide us with a list of the sources we created earlier. As this playlist is for our grown up movies (I'm trying my up most to avoid saying adult movies :-P), we need to select the 'Movies' Source.

Accept this, and the playlist rule and this will take us back to the first window. We now need to order the list by title, press OK.

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The final pop up will ask us to again name the playlist.

Now follow step 3 again until you have a smart playlist set up for all four of your sources.

When adding TV shows be sure to select the 'Type' as TV shows, and sort by 'TV Show' rather than 'Title'.

STEP 4

Ok, now return to the home screen, press the down arrow twice and select 'Customizations'.

Once here press the up arrow and select '+VPLAYLIST'.

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This will now produce a window which will list all of the playlists we created earlier. Select one of these.

Finally you need to tell the skin that we want to place the playlist in the Main Menu, so select this option.

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A new button should now be showing on your home screen. It will likely be called 'Menu 1' or something similar.

Again, repeat this step for the remaining playlist categories.

STEP 6

Last but not least we need to rename the newly added buttons to something more appropriate, and disable the original 'Movie' & 'TV Show' labels.

While still in the 'Customization' view, highlight one of the new buttons, press enter and this will produce a list of available actions. Simply select 'Rename', and enter whatever you like. Here you can also change the background associated with this button.

Then scroll across to the original 'Movie' and 'TV Show' lables, select these, and choose 'Disable/Reorder' to remove them.

Fingers crossed everything should now be working, and you have your and your children’s media collections neatly separated.

Cheers!
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#2
nice job.
Win10x64 Pro. Intel Core2Duo E8500 3.26GHz on Gigabyte GA-EP43-UD3L. 4GB DDR2 1066MHz RAM. Nvidia GT240 512MB PCIx16. Multiple displays, including Sony VPL-XW5000ES 4k projector + 100" Da-Lite Cinema screen.
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#3
(2013-01-06, 22:28)curtis-r Wrote: nice job.

Thank you. Anyone who tries to follow the process let me know how you get on so I can see if its explained clearly enough.
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#4
Hmmm, why don't you simply deactivate images and concerts in the customization menu and add 2 video playlists, rename them and change the image?
bye
samurai07

HTPC: ASRock A75M-ITX, A8-3850, 4GB Ram, 60GB SSD, Win7 x64, XBMC Eden
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#5
(2013-01-07, 03:13)samurai07 Wrote: Hmmm, why don't you simply deactivate images and concerts in the customization menu and add 2 video playlists, rename them and change the image?

I see what you mean. Yes that's a goer too!
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#6
easy way is to use tags for ex"kids"
tag the movies for your children
then make a playlist with tag kids only
then make a shortcut in main menu
done

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#7
Yeah, a couple of people have already mentioned that. I guess I just made more work for myself than I needed. I'll amend a few steps later.
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#8
easiest way is 'Path contains' Kids in smart playlist
be kind, rewind
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#9
I replied here too with this:

Quote:I ended up making separate login's for kids and for parents. I started out using smart playlists to separate them but was always annoyed that the 'recently added' section would still include both. Also things like fanart screensavers or 'multiple backdrop' type menu items that I like to use would show adult movies in with the kids stuff which is a no go for me. I believe this all happens because they're all still set as the 'movies' type in the 'set content' area.

What we really need is the option to add more content types. If I could make a custom content type called kids that still uses everything else from movies (imdb scraper etc.) but is separate from non-kid movies I'd be set. I have everything in seperate folders already on 3 different drives (kids movies, kids tv, movies, tv etc.) so I set content per source.

If the recently added function has changed in newer versions of XBMC to include only items in a smart playlist menu item then perhaps I need to look at that option again.

Has functionality of 'recently added 'changed or am I overlooking something here? It's been a while since I changed my setup.
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#10
(2013-01-08, 12:01)dirtymurt Wrote: easiest way is 'Path contains' Kids in smart playlist

Do you mean 'genre' contains kids? I tried this originally but found that not all the movies I have for my children were labeled kids or a similar variant by the scraper.

Putting them in different folders takes 2 seconds and does not have this issues.

(2013-01-08, 15:25)Fatz Wrote: I replied here too with this:

Quote:I ended up making separate login's for kids and for parents. I started out using smart playlists to separate them but was always annoyed that the 'recently added' section would still include both. Also things like fanart screensavers or 'multiple backdrop' type menu items that I like to use would show adult movies in with the kids stuff which is a no go for me. I believe this all happens because they're all still set as the 'movies' type in the 'set content' area.

What we really need is the option to add more content types. If I could make a custom content type called kids that still uses everything else from movies (imdb scraper etc.) but is separate from non-kid movies I'd be set. I have everything in seperate folders already on 3 different drives (kids movies, kids tv, movies, tv etc.) so I set content per source.

If the recently added function has changed in newer versions of XBMC to include only items in a smart playlist menu item then perhaps I need to look at that option again.

Has functionality of 'recently added 'changed or am I overlooking something here? It's been a while since I changed my setup.

On my setup the recently added related to that specific playlist. So it may have changed since you last tried.
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#11
Quote:On my setup the recently added related to that specific playlist. So it may have changed since you last tried.

Excellent, I hope you're right. I'll try that out. Perhaps it's skin specific too and I didn't have MQ4 when I set it up a while back. Thanks.

While this is good to know, I still am not sure I want my kids to have the option of scrolling through any R rated movies though. Currently my 'parents' login requires a password so they can't get in.
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#12
(2013-01-08, 15:55)Fatz Wrote:
Quote:On my setup the recently added related to that specific playlist. So it may have changed since you last tried.

Excellent, I hope you're right. I'll try that out. Perhaps it's skin specific too and I didn't have MQ4 when I set it up a while back. Thanks.

While this is good to know, I still am not sure I want my kids to have the option of scrolling through any R rated movies though. Currently my 'parents' login requires a password so they can't get in.

I can understand that. You may already be able to do it, but if not it would be good future feature request to be able to ask for any movies over a certain rating of your choosing locked by a pin code. A child lock if you will.
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#13
Quote:I can understand that. You may already be able to do it, but if not it would be good future feature request to be able to ask for any movies over a certain rating of your choosing locked by a pin code. A child lock if you will.

That's a decent solution, if it restricted access to the adult movies menu pick itself. I wouldn't want them to even get in there.
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#14
You should propose this as a future feature for the next release then.

I'm sure I and many others would find use for it.
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#15
Is it possible to get like Genre, Years, ect, in the sub menu for the smart playlist menu?

Thanks
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