XBMC Backend

A XBMC backend would be awsome and I'll contribute if i know where to start..

jmarshall Wrote:We can't combine Serviio code and XBMC code given the Serviio license, at least not without permission from the author. Serviio also doesn't appear to be opensource either way, so forking is not an option anyway (besides, we're not really into forking others code - we prefer to work with people).

What about subsonic? May be similar and opensource? No idea whether there is an interest for a cooperation, but may be worth a try.

Interesting, I had never heard of subsonic, but it looks very polished and highly capable. Their music support is great. It looks like a much better and cheaper option to iCloud. And they started supporting video streaming (in its infancy currently)

It is opensource (GPLv3), however it is not free.

Well, there is a technicality. First of all, the web client has ads. And second, there is a required "donation" to enable API access (required for mobile clients) and to remove ads from the web client.

It is a little misleading and I am not really a fan of that.

I am not that knowledgeable about GPL, but isn't that a violation? To require a donation and give license keys to unlock the api and remove ads?? The following is taken directly from gnu.org:

Quote:Does the GPL allow me to require that anyone who receives the software must pay me a fee and/or notify me?

No. In fact, a requirement like that would make the program non-free. If people have to pay when they get a copy of a program, or if they have to notify anyone in particular, then the program is not free.

aptalca Wrote:Interesting, I had never heard of subsonic, but it looks very polished and highly capable. Their music support is great. It looks like a much better and cheaper option to iCloud. And they started supporting video streaming (in its infancy currently)

You are right that video is said to be in its infancy. I am using it both for SD and HD and it is not clear why it is viewed as such. It works brilliantly well without an glitches. The API may open doors to connect it with an XBMC client, but I am not a programmer...

aptalca Wrote:Interesting, I had never heard of subsonic, but it looks very polished and highly capable. Their music support is great. It looks like a much better and cheaper option to iCloud. And they started supporting video streaming (in its infancy currently)

It is opensource (GPLv3), however it is not free.

Well, there is a technicality. First of all, the web client has ads. And second, there is a required "donation" to enable API access (required for mobile clients) and to remove ads from the web client.

It is a little misleading and I am not really a fan of that.

I am not that knowledgeable about GPL, but isn't that a violation? To require a donation and give license keys to unlock the api and remove ads?? The following is taken directly from gnu.org:

I don't think it's a violation since GPL is just a license and it doesn't have any clause about paying or something. So it's legally no problem; morally on the other hand.....

You see this more and more nowadays: people using GPL software to speed up their own development and then they find some shady ways to make money.

But I don't like people missusing the GPL (Free Software) and .org domains for "required donations". Altough, I think it's very nice that he didn't threw in a software foundation. ;-)


Thnx for investigating and sharing this.

I would be so happy for an XBMC server/backend. For some reason my ATV2 just stopped seeing all the files in my SQL and is spitting out generic file not found errors. Having a backend to point everything to would be so wonderful!

A backend is not only about plublishing the media.
In my view step 1 should be to create a headless library manager.

What do it need to be able to do in version 1.0?
1) Scrap media
2) Clean lib
3) Manage DBs in mysql?
4) Web interface
5) API interface

Not very complicated except the scraping?

vikjon0 Wrote:A backend is not only about plublishing the media.
In my view step 1 should be to create a headless library manager.

What do it need to be able to do in version 1.0?
1) Scrap media
2) Clean lib
3) Manage DBs in mysql?
4) Web interface
5) API interface

Not very complicated except the scraping?

These are my thoughts on the matter. 3) depends mostly in what technology is used, uPnP is better for most users IMO but json-rpc could be used (and MySQL). for 4 and 5 it would be smart to use JSON-RPC, as then same webinterfaces could be used and it would be transparent what is server and what is servlet.

And yeah, not extremely complicated but lots to implement.

http://wiki.xbmc.org/index.php?title=Goo...dia_Server

Quote: create a set of libraries which are clean, reusable, isolated, designed outside of XBMC and used outside of XBMC. Some of the libraries which could be created as a part of this project is a VFS, scanning and scraping, URL and database libraries

I think creating a basic set of libraries is absolutly the way to get this rolling. Getting people involved in a server project using these libs will be much easier.

A first version could work with the standard xbmc db model or be completely independent. If I read you correctly you are talking about low level lib not db integrated components. No problem, but a great complement would of course be a sample component working with the xbmc db.

I am interested in this but I will not have time to get oriented in the existing code base. Perhaps I can help with some db stuff when it gets started.

vikjon0 Wrote:http://wiki.xbmc.org/index.php?title=Goo...dia_Server


I think creating a basic set of libraries is absolutly the way to get this rolling. Getting people involved in a server project using these libs will be much easier.

A first version could work with the standard xbmc db model or be completely independent. If I read you correctly you are talking about low level lib not db integrated components. No problem, but a great complement would of course be a sample component working with the xbmc db.

I am interested in this but I will not have time to get oriented in the existing code base. Perhaps I can help with some db stuff when it gets started.

I'm both talking about the possible API which a client (xbmc or server) may use and that which the database backend would (so we wouldn't be tied to a single type of database as sql/mysql). But obviously the most vital part is the API the client would use (and is the one which would be focused upon). using the actual and pre-existing db in xbmc as a source would be a great first step, just clean up the actual getters but in the end making a new database schema would also be very well received. There are lots of possible modules and each module could be a seperate project.

I have somewhat started with the VFS which can be found in my git (not at all decided if it would ever be used within xbmc) and afaik many of the media managers already have partly made scraping libraries, might be good to use one of them to make a standalone scraping library. For example one which takes a bunch of properties (title, date etc. and NOT the filename) and do a lookup on that. With that model stuff like uPnP could also work (where filename is unknown or irrelevant).

Anyone interested in making (or help make) these sets of libraries are more than welcome to ping me and I can help with design and possibly code (in fall hopefully). I would love to see a potential xbmc server (and would use it very much).

We can probably start a thread on each module when a developer has shown interest.