A couple of Mediabox questions - maemo.org

Active Topics

The N900 is now 15 years old! (8)
to Nokia N900 by whayong - 9 hrs, 2 mins ago
Sailfish OS for the Motorola Moto G7 Power (XT1955-5) - (ocean) (4)
to SailfishOS by Maemish - 5 days, 5 hrs ago
more...

Page 1 of 15

Next >

Last »

Thread Tools

VulcanRidr	2009-07-31 , 07:16
Posts: 473 \| Thanked: 141 times \| Joined on Jan 2009 @ Virginia, USA	#1

I have a couple of questions regarding mediabox. I have been scouring talk.maemo.org and google for the answers, but have come up empty.

I am trying to convert myself from canola to mediabox, because it seems to require less resources to use.

1. I have about 10 movies on my tablet, in /home/user/MyDocs/.video (which is symlinked to /media/mmc1/user/MyDocs/.video). mplayer sees them just fine, but in mediabox, it comes up with 0 files found. The files are in .avi format. How do I get mediabox to detect them?

2. I have tried to use mediabox in the past, and had a bunch of podcasts on the tablet. I ended up listening to them in canola, and deleted them in the file manager or on the command line. Since I have reinstalled mediabox and started using it again, I find that these files are still listed in mediabox. Is there a way to sync mediabox with the media that is actually on the tablet at the current time?

Thanks,
--vr

Quote & Reply |

	pycage	2009-07-31 , 08:08
	Posts: 3,404 \| Thanked: 4,474 times \| Joined on Oct 2005 @ Germany	#2

Originally Posted by VulcanRidr

I am trying to convert myself from canola to mediabox, because it seems to require less resources to use.

This is a good decision!

Originally Posted by VulcanRidr

1. I have about 10 movies on my tablet, in /home/user/MyDocs/.video (which is symlinked to /media/mmc1/user/MyDocs/.video). mplayer sees them just fine, but in mediabox, it comes up with 0 files found. The files are in .avi format. How do I get mediabox to detect them?

MediaBox uses the filename extension for detecting filetypes (simply because this is the fastest way).
Extension .avi is recognized. Do these files have .avi as filename extension?
Do they appear in MediaBox' file browser when browsing the local filesystem (Video Clips)?

Originally Posted by VulcanRidr

2. I have tried to use mediabox in the past, and had a bunch of podcasts on the tablet. I ended up listening to them in canola, and deleted them in the file manager or on the command line. Since I have reinstalled mediabox and started using it again, I find that these files are still listed in mediabox. Is there a way to sync mediabox with the media that is actually on the tablet at the current time?

Go to the preferences view and select the mediascanner settings. There you can force a rescan of the files.

Note: MediaBox only scan for media in the places that you specify. To add places to this library, go to the desired place with the filebrowser and press the [+] button when you are there. The "Library" tab in the filebrowser lists the folders that are selected for scanning. There you can specify for what media types (video, image, and audio) MediaBox should look for. By default, it scans for all three of them.

Quote & Reply |

The Following 4 Users Say Thank You to pycage For This Useful Post:
jkq, meizirkki, oved_etzot, timsamoff

VulcanRidr	2009-07-31 , 08:45
Posts: 473 \| Thanked: 141 times \| Joined on Jan 2009 @ Virginia, USA	#3

[QUOTE=pycage;307925]This is a good decision!

I like to think so...The interface was originally hard to get my head around.

MediaBox uses the filename extension for detecting filetypes (simply because this is the fastest way).
Extension .avi is recognized. Do these files have .avi as filename extension?

They do. For instance, some of the files that are currently in this directory include

ActionPoint.avi
Beverly_Hills_Cop_II.avi
Enemy_of_the_State.avi
Supremacy.wmv
The_Tuskegee_Airmen.avi
...etc.

Do they appear in MediaBox' file browser when browsing the local filesystem (Video Clips)?

No. I went into Video -> Browser. Under Local Videos (1 items), there is All Videos (0 items).

[quote]Go to the preferences view and select the mediascanner settings. There you can force a rescan of the files.[/qupte]

Under Media Indexing, the checkbox for Always update at Startup is checked and I had hit update index now.

Note: MediaBox only scan for media in the places that you specify. To add places to this library, go to the desired place with the filebrowser and press the [+] button when you are there. The "Library" tab in the filebrowser lists the folders that are selected for scanning. There you can specify for what media types (video, image, and audio) MediaBox should look for. By default, it scans for all three of them.

In my library I have

file:///home/user/MyDocs/.sounds
file:///home/user/MyDocs/.images
file:///home/user/MyDocs/.videos
file:///media/mmc1/user/MyDocs

The last one should, on my system, point to the first three.

--vr

Quote & Reply |

	pycage	2009-07-31 , 10:49
	Posts: 3,404 \| Thanked: 4,474 times \| Joined on Oct 2005 @ Germany	#4

Originally Posted by VulcanRidr

I like to think so...The interface was originally hard to get my head around.

It used to be worse. It's getting easier with every release.

Originally Posted by VulcanRidr

In my library I have

file:///home/user/MyDocs/.sounds
file:///home/user/MyDocs/.images
file:///home/user/MyDocs/.videos
file:///media/mmc1/user/MyDocs

The last one should, on my system, point to the first three.

Do you see errors when running MediaBox from X-Terminal?

Quote & Reply |

VulcanRidr	2009-07-31 , 14:34
Posts: 473 \| Thanked: 141 times \| Joined on Jan 2009 @ Virginia, USA	#5

Originally Posted by pycage

It used to be worse. It's getting easier with every release.

Well keep up the good work!

Do you see errors when running MediaBox from X-Terminal?

Here is what I get:

Code:

[user@equinox .games]$ MediaBox
[]
[]
[<ui.Image.Image object at 0x40df7590>, <ui.ImageButton.ImageButton object at 0x40bf2970>]
CONTEXT INPUT_EV_CONTEXT_BROWSER
[<ui.Image.Image object at 0x40df7370>, <ui.ImageButton.ImageButton object at 0x40bf2970>]
CONTEXT INPUT_EV_CONTEXT_BROWSER
[<ui.Image.Image object at 0x40df7e90>, <ui.ImageButton.ImageButton object at 0x40bf2a50>, <ui.Image.Image object at 0x40dfdd70>, <ui.ImageButton.ImageButton object at 0x40bf2970>]

--vr

Quote & Reply |

belanger	2009-07-31 , 15:19
Posts: 59 \| Thanked: 15 times \| Joined on Feb 2008	#6

Are the hidden directories a problem? Are they explicitly in the MediaBox library (as shown in the Folder Icon/Library Tab)? Using the MediaBox file browser, I didn't see how to explicitly add hidden directories (although I didn't try very hard). As an experiment, I added some directories
~/Test and ~/Test/.hidden
and some videos
~/Test/A.flv and ~/Test/.hidden/B.flv
When I added ~/Test/ to the MediaBox library and browsed my videos, A.flv showed up but B.flv did not. So I was wondering if the hidden directories could be the culprit here.

Quote & Reply |

The Following User Says Thank You to belanger For This Useful Post:
meizirkki

VulcanRidr	2009-07-31 , 22:20
Posts: 473 \| Thanked: 141 times \| Joined on Jan 2009 @ Virginia, USA	#7

Originally Posted by belanger

Are the hidden directories a problem? Are they explicitly in the MediaBox library (as shown in the Folder Icon/Library Tab)? Using the MediaBox file browser, I didn't see how to explicitly add hidden directories (although I didn't try very hard). As an experiment, I added some directories
~/Test and ~/Test/.hidden
and some videos
~/Test/A.flv and ~/Test/.hidden/B.flv
When I added ~/Test/ to the MediaBox library and browsed my videos, A.flv showed up but B.flv did not. So I was wondering if the hidden directories could be the culprit here.

I don't think so, because of the way that the N8x0 (Hildon? GTK?) see these *particular* hidden directories.

If you open the N810's file manager, or any of the Hildon-native apps, you have the hostname in the left pane, which coordinates with /home/user/MyDocs. The icons beneath it work like so:

Code:

Audio clips ==> /home/user/MyDocs/.sounds
Documents ==> /home/user/MyDocs/.documents
Games ==> /home/user/MyDocs/.games
Images ==> /home/user/MyDocs/.images
Video clips ==> /home/user/MyDocs/.video

So either those specific directories or anything under MyDocs are considered special by the OS. Besides, the jpgs in .images and the mp3s and oggs in .sounds are being picked up by MediaBox, but not .video.

--vr

Last edited by VulcanRidr; 2009-07-31 at 22:33.

Quote & Reply |

VulcanRidr	2009-07-31 , 22:28
Posts: 473 \| Thanked: 141 times \| Joined on Jan 2009 @ Virginia, USA	#8

Hey pycage,

I think I have a feature request. Maybe I'm not doing it right, but is there a way to coordinate deletion of items from the playlist when the media itself is deleted?

The problem I had with the media not being there has to do with playlists. The media was gone, but the the playlist didn't reflect the update. I thought you could delete the actual media files from within the MediaBox application, but apparently you can only manage playlists.

Am I wrong here?

--vr

Last edited by VulcanRidr; 2009-07-31 at 22:46.

Quote & Reply |

	pycage	2009-08-03 , 18:28
	Posts: 3,404 \| Thanked: 4,474 times \| Joined on Oct 2005 @ Germany	#9

MediaBox as of 0.96.x doesn't list hidden directories. For the same reason, the mediascanner never sees the hidden directories when scanning.

Links are not recognized as directories, so the mediascanner doesn't follow them either. This is a bug nad I put it on my TODO list.

Quote & Reply |

The Following 2 Users Say Thank You to pycage For This Useful Post:
meizirkki, VulcanRidr

	pycage	2009-08-03 , 18:31
	Posts: 3,404 \| Thanked: 4,474 times \| Joined on Oct 2005 @ Germany	#10

Originally Posted by VulcanRidr

The problem I had with the media not being there has to do with playlists. The media was gone, but the the playlist didn't reflect the update. I thought you could delete the actual media files from within the MediaBox application, but apparently you can only manage playlists.

This is another bug. Currently it's not possible to remove items from a playlist when the referenced file is actually gone. You could edit the playlists manually in /home/user/.mediabox/playlists, though.