QR Scan Fork/Concept
#1
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Hi!
I've toyed around with the concept of 'linking' my real-world media to it's virtual forms for some time - and this is what I came up with:
Tag it - scan it and play it in Xbmc Wink

I've added a QR-Scan function to the android remote, which allows you
to scan QR-Codes containing an artist & album name to directly play the album.


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Android-XBMC-Remote-QR-Scan-Fork

I've also written a simple QR-Code Generator to quickly print out the QR-Codes:
QR-Code Generator

The code is available as a fork at GitHub

At the moment, it is limited to music, but it would be easy to extend to DVDs etc...

So - what do you think? Smile


-- By the way: Kudos to the app's authors for this extremely well written piece of android code - beautifully designed and structured!
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#2
i dont have a tag scanner on my tablet so i cant test it out but the tag creator seems to work and any feature that someone might use can only make this app more amazing.
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#3
I like the idea, specially if it's extended to videos and smartplaylist or music genre.
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#4
I'm currently not sure what's the best way to structure the json strings to keep the format flexible ...
Currently it contains only 'artist' and 'album':
Code:
{'artist':'The Beatles','album':'Help!'}

Do you think it would be wise to include a 'format' variable - for example 'type=music' or 'type=video'?

@Tolriq:
I haven't used smartplaylists yet - what information would they require in the qr-code?
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#5
I must admit i neither use them, but some friends are. Don't know what is needed to launch them remotely.

For the format, i don't know the limit of chars in standard QR Codes but I'll use a decoupled format like

Code:
{'type':'xxx','properties':{'artist':'yyy' , 'album':'zzzz' , 'genre':'www'}}

Where xxx defines the type so we know what to expect in properties and properties all optionals.

If size is a matter then fields names can be reduced.
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#6
So the QR codes still have to be custom generated, right?

What about some kind of link with Gooooogle goggles (or a similar app) that would allow it to scan pre-existing barcodes, then utilize that info to find similar media in the library?

Or, in a similar realm of thought, what if you built-in some kind of context menu that opened when you selected text and allowed for playback...similar to where google voice detects telephone numbers and provides an option to do xbmc magic with it?

Just throwing a few more ideas out there...I absolutely LOVE XBMC remote, and I think the QR code idea has a lot of potential. I personally think it would be a lot more powerful if it could be integrated more into the phone. Wink

Keep up the awesome work!
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#7
Yep, I agree - the manual generation/printing of the QR-Codes is the main effort ...

I've thought in the same direction and what I came up with is this:
It's now possible to scan the barcodes already on all CDs (EAN/UPC Codes) Smile

But as there are no free barcode databases (as far as I know) - I had to use Google Products to get the corresponding product.
Problem is, Google limits the lookups/day to 1500 per API-Key ...
This way, it won't be possible to implement a ready to use application.
The only solution I currently see is for every user to manually enter his own API Key - and that isn't very user-friendly ...

If you want to test it, you have to remove the installed xbmc app first, as my version is obviously not signed with the official key Wink

ility.de/xbmc/android-xbmcremote-barcode_09022012.apk
This version includes my hardcoded API-Key (limited to 1500 lookups per day)

Ah, and don't be surprised if you get funny results - the best-match comparison algorithm is currently not limited, it always returns something Wink
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#8
xbmzD Wrote:Yep, I agree - the manual generation/printing of the QR-Codes is the main effort ...

I've thought in the same direction and what I came up with is this:
It's now possible to scan the barcodes already on all CDs (EAN/UPC Codes) Smile

But as there are no free barcode databases (as far as I know) - I had to use Google Products to get the corresponding product.
Problem is, Google limits the lookups/day to 1500 per API-Key ...
This way, it won't be possible to implement a ready to use application.
The only solution I currently see is for every user to manually enter his own API Key - and that isn't very user-friendly ...

If you want to test it, you have to remove the installed xbmc app first, as my version is obviously not signed with the official key Wink

ility.de/xbmc/android-xbmcremote-barcode_09022012.apk
This version includes my hardcoded API-Key (limited to 1500 lookups per day)

Ah, and don't be surprised if you get funny results - the best-match comparison algorithm is currently not limited, it always returns something Wink

Brilliant sir! Big Grin

Testing now.

How difficult would it be to just add something in settings that lets you plug in your own API key?
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#9
It's already in the settings & menu Wink
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#10
this is a really cool idea BTW!
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#11
Really nice. Does this work with ics, app stops everytime i try to use QR.
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#12
I have to be honest.. Wouldn't just selecting the album from the android remote's media list be incomprehensibly easier than making a qr code for each album, printing it, attaching it, and having to look through a physical library, then scan a code on the cd to play the album?

Cool concept, but just a bit ridiculous if you ask me.

Now if manufacturers began to put a NCF tag on each album... Thats a different story.
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#13
very clever
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#14
Good work! But not all albums have QR Codes, If it's possible, I hope we can find the album information and music list and play them by scanning its product linear barcode.
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