2009-05-06, 04:19
Hi all, please forgive my obviously noobie question... but I have to start somewhere...
A plugin effectively represents a hierarchical menu / filesystem structure right?... and as such can act as a legitimate 'source' of media for XBMC.
If a plugin was written that 100% mirrored a filesystem... would it be visually rendered EXACTLY the same way as if the data had come from a 'native' source?
What I mean by this is... if I wrote a plugin that literally represented the filesystem and returned strings of the filenames (folder.jpg, movie.avi etc), all skins would render exactly the same as native file system?.. showing the fanart, and movies etc
Actually.. it's more than one question I need to ask...
The strings that the plugin returns represent nodes / files / folders... but at some point, XBMC needs to physically transport the data that those string represent right (needs to pull the files)?... is the plugin responsible for that, or must the string be a URI / URL that XBMC itself can pull the data from?
And finally... once XBMC has rendered list items / nodes that the plugin has supplied... how can the plugin detect that XBMC UI has selected one of the items in order to play it? ( I assume for a folder, XBMC will call the plugin once again with the folder path, but for a non folder... what happens then?)
I reiterate... a total noobie, and I have scanned extensively for help... but there's a lot of it, and much of it not great for the uninitiated!
A plugin effectively represents a hierarchical menu / filesystem structure right?... and as such can act as a legitimate 'source' of media for XBMC.
If a plugin was written that 100% mirrored a filesystem... would it be visually rendered EXACTLY the same way as if the data had come from a 'native' source?
What I mean by this is... if I wrote a plugin that literally represented the filesystem and returned strings of the filenames (folder.jpg, movie.avi etc), all skins would render exactly the same as native file system?.. showing the fanart, and movies etc
Actually.. it's more than one question I need to ask...
The strings that the plugin returns represent nodes / files / folders... but at some point, XBMC needs to physically transport the data that those string represent right (needs to pull the files)?... is the plugin responsible for that, or must the string be a URI / URL that XBMC itself can pull the data from?
And finally... once XBMC has rendered list items / nodes that the plugin has supplied... how can the plugin detect that XBMC UI has selected one of the items in order to play it? ( I assume for a folder, XBMC will call the plugin once again with the folder path, but for a non folder... what happens then?)
I reiterate... a total noobie, and I have scanned extensively for help... but there's a lot of it, and much of it not great for the uninitiated!