UMM (Universal Media Manager), pre-alpha testing and feedback requested!

We have a bunch of folks already signed up, but the amount of feedback and actual testing is very limited right now.

Wanna help us help you?
Run on the bleeding edge?

Come help us with UMM, from development to testing to ideas, we can sure use it.

Here's the latest pre-alpha version. And no it's not ready for general release, but some folks are hard set against signing up to get the builds. It uses a test form that is not the UI that will be bundled with the app, it's what we are using to help debug the core of the program.

Links removed, I opened up the pre-alpha forum on our team site where newer builds are available.
You'll need a forum account, but the requirement to request tester access is no longer in place.
http://www.teamumx.com

for linux and osx, install mono 2.4.2.3 (or higher)
installing mono-complete is the easiest way to install it, we have details on our forums.

Please post all feedback/questions/concerns/help requests in our forums and not here in the xbmc forums.

Thanks!
Team UMX

Can you give some more information on what exactly it's supposed to do before I run and install Mono on my system? "Media Manager" is a bit vague–XBMC already manages my media for me.

Checking it out now. Lots of bells and whistles, I've had my eye on this since the idea was first brought up. =)

paularms Wrote:Can you give some more information on what exactly it's supposed to do before I run and install Mono on my system? "Media Manager" is a bit vague–XBMC already manages my media for me.

paularms,

You can find all about what it does at the site linked in the first post. Mainly this app allows you do create and download the information XBMC (Boxee, Plex, MediaPortal) uses to fill the database. This means you can update XBMCs library offline, always have the same poster and farnart. This is nice for consistency in multiple HTPC setups.

This program functions similarly to Media Info Plus or Ember but it is Multi-OS and Multi-Media Center.

Hope that helps!
Reg

Ok i hae been playing with the test version. Feels good
Remarks :

- i changed settings to fit my needs. They seem to be saved but not used by the client. Changed scraper, removed saved files but not applied when processing.
- if i choose "no nfo" or another i cant go back without reloading the database.
- May be a consequence of above problem but i cant get it to load my nfos.
- What does "ExcludeFileLevelMovies" means?
- For images does it load existing first or does it scrap everytime?
- Would be nice for the client to autoload database during start
- will we have a way of processing newly downloaded files and move them to "database" dir?
- From what i have seen, all umm data is in its own cache. Anyway to share it with xbmc? That way it would be faster, we wouldnt have doubles(i am thinking of actors thumbs).

Great job anyway

Hi Fekker !

I really love this idea. What i missed from other Media Managers are all here:

- Multi platform. This is great because people like me using xbmc or other Media Center softwares on different platforms. Eg. my Desktop PC runs Win7, but my main media-center uses Ubuntu Karmic. In the office i use Win XP. On my home-server it is Linux once again.

- Using the already written scrapers from xbmc is awesome. I am just in a process of developing a Hungarian scraper for xbmc. Which in this case will be usable in UMM i guess. This really is awesome.

I tried the Linux version with mono-complete. At first sight i have two things i noticed.

1. On my laptop where the resolution is only some 1200x720 i have some buttons in the ConfigEditor application not visible and usable. On my higher resolution desktop pc there is no such problem. i ran the util with
$ mono ummConfigEditor.exe

2. There are problem displaying the utf8 encoded Central European characters (Hungarian in my case). Maybe i have to configure mono for this ?

I will test it more and report back.

Thanks for the great work.
Also the Scraper Editor is a GREAT help for me and other scraper writers.

Cheers,

Alan

Been checking on development here on XBMC forums as well as your UMM forums weekly but documentation is really lacking. Unfortunatelly i'm not hip enough to figure out everything on my own so i've been waiting for little more user-friendly version. I work killer hours mon-fri so weekends are only days i get to play with computer.

I still wish you good luck and hope to be able to use UMM one day !!!

The Gui is not running on Mono. I have mono-complete installed and it's the minimum required version.


The ConfigEditor does run!

I've copied over the bugs / questions to our forums (teamumx.com)
More information and details will be provided and updated there (it's easier for the team if we have them all in the same forums)

Thanks for the feedback and comments, with your help UMM will rock!

OK fekker posted this answer in our forum but I noticed that he posted it in the board that is only accessible for signed-up testers so here it is for you guys:

since I have a few minutes, here's some details/info

Quote:1. On my laptop where the resolution is only some 1200x720 i have some buttons in the ConfigEditor application not visible and usable. On my higher resolution desktop pc there is no such problem. i ran the util with
$ mono ummConfigEditor.exe

noted, needs resized/scalable - please add defect to trac

Quote:2. There are problem displaying the utf8 encoded Central European characters (Hungarian in my case). Maybe i have to configure mono for this ?

no idea on this one - please add defect to trac

Quote:i changed settings to fit my needs. They seem to be saved but not used by the client. Changed scraper, removed saved files but not applied when processing.
- if i choose "no nfo" or another i cant go back without reloading the database.

- fixed in svn, wasn't looking to config for scraper to use (svn 498/499)

Quote:- May be a consequence of above problem but i cant get it to load my nfos.

debug log needed, should load the nfo's regardless during a scan
also what format are the nfo files in?
is this for file level or folder level nfo files?
please pastebin one of the nfo files

Quote:- What does "ExcludeFileLevelMovies" means?

some options are not available for file level movies, like movie.nfo, as it would not be unique and would be used for all media in that folder
to exclude movies that are all stored in one folder, the ExcludeFileLevelMovies should be checked (i.e. enabled, set to true)

Quote:- For images does it load existing first or does it scrap everytime?

If just scraping, no images are downloaded.
If using the auto-process option, the default is to only grab 1 image for the movie fanart and one for the poster, and use those (i.e. save them with the movie)
when clicking on available images, if the image is already downloaded, it will display the downloaded image, if it's not it'll use the preview image (if there is one) or the full sized image
(note: the remote client will actually create a thumbnail of the image, compressed and shrunk based on config settings, so that a remote client isn't downloading 30meg of images just to select one)

Quote:- Would be nice for the client to autoload database during start

The real ui will do that, the test one does not

Quote:- will we have a way of processing newly downloaded files and move them to "database" dir?

for tv shows, there's an option already in place for new episodes
for movies, there's not currently an option to do this, but it could be added as well - please add a feature request

Quote:- From what i have seen, all umm data is in its own cache. Anyway to share it with xbmc? That way it would be faster, we wouldnt have doubles(i am thinking of actors thumbs).

actor thumbs will be saved with the movie, and in turn grabbed by xbmc, forgot about this one - please add a defect, actor images are not saved with movie data
we do plan on using xbmc's api and talking with the database directly, however we have not started that process yet.

Quote:Bram77
The Gui is not running on Mono. I have mono-complete installed and it's the minimum required version.

I didn't include the .dll's that are required for that UI, so it bombs out, it's the in process gui that will be included with UMM, it's in the early stages since there's still parts of the core that are a mess (but getting better i think)