[mythtv-users] XBox Media Center Question

Justin Hornsby justin.hornsby2 at ntlworld.com
Wed Dec 7 16:46:56 EST 2005


Michael Tiller wrote:
> To be honest I have a hard time figuring out exactly what XMBC is doing 
> just by looking at the user interface.  It asks for the protocol version 
> but it also wants the video files to be mountable across an SMB 
> connection.  As far as I can tell, it isn't streaming anything (in the 
> mythtv://... sense) but I'm not familiar enough with the internals and 
> the protocol to really say for sure.
> 
> I managed to watch recorded shows but never tried live TV (although it 
> did ask where my ring buffer was stored on an SMB filesystem).
> 
> Based on my very limited experience with XMBC, it looks very 
> impressive.  It would be great if the two communities worked toward some 
> kind of integration.  With the XBox 360 out and prices on used XBoxs 
> falling, I would seriously consider an XBox over a MediaMVP.  The MVPs 
> are OK but their video quality and robustness are a bit of an issue.
> 
> --
> Mike

The XBMC Python scripts for MythTV use MySQL to interrogate the database 
about recording names, channel IDs etc (so you see a pretty name for 
your recorded shows rather than just the bare filename).  The protocol 
information (AFAIK) is only used to determine that it's really a Mythtv 
backend it's connecting to, and that it's there.  As it relies on an SMB 
share to access the files, you can safely assume it's not talking to the 
backend the same way a genuine mythtv frontend would ;-)

The rest of what the scripts do is basically talking to the XBMC API 
(what there is of it) and telling it what files to play.

As for XBMC & Mythtv becoming integrated, even to a small extent - I 
think maybe hell will freeze over first, seen as XBMC needs to be 
compiled using 'borrowed' Microsoft development tools.  That said, work 
has been going on for a considerable amount of time, on a _true_ open 
source development kit.  How work on that will continue to progress now 
attention has shifted towards the Xbox360, is anybody's guess.

Regards,
Justin


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