[Dr.Toxic]

Hello everyone. I posted this question in the 'Night' skin forum before, but have since realized that maybe I was being too specific, and this should be more of a general setup question.

I'm finally getting things pretty much just the way I want them in my HTPC setup, but there is one hurdle still remaining, and it's the biggest one.

See, I have TONS of media on my home server, and because of that, I would like to set up my main home menu in XBMC a certain way so that it isn't way too overwhelming. I have the following categories/home menu options that I want to include in my setup:

Videos
Streaming
Hulu
Educational Series
Specials
Kids Movies
Movies
Anime
Kids Shows
TV Shows
Standup
Music Videos
Pictures
Settings

Currently, I accomplish this by tagging shows with 'segregation categories' and then save searches for those categories to favorites, and point a custom home menu item to the favorite. For example, all of the Kids Shows have a corresponding "Kids Menu" genre tag, and the Kids Shows home menu item opens a genre search for the "Kids Menu" category... kapeesh?

I have several issues with this setup. For one, I lose all of the "Recently added" scripts that I love so much, so I cannot see my most recently scanned in TV Shows or movies. The second issue I have is that this creates a very cluttered home menu.

What I would like to have in the end is a much more organized home menu, but I NEED to retain the rotating fanart background for each item that I love so much. (Or the ability to set a fanart folder as the background for each menu option) After doing some research, I think I have the following options, each with their own pros and cons:

Option 1
Create custom submenus and segregate the menu more. It would be structured like so:

Videos
Streaming
Hulu
Music Videos
TV Shows
Educational Series
Anime
Kids Shows
TV Shows
Movies
Kids Movies
Movies
Specials
Standup
Pictures
Settings

Pros: Structured nicely and simple. The 'recently added' scripts would still function as well. Cons: I lose the ability to set background folders of fanart for the submenu items, so Anime wouldn't show separate backgrounds than Kids Shows. Also, the submenus are mixed in with existing submenus, like 'Genre' and 'Title', etc. So I can deal with that (which I really don't want to do) or edit those submenus out and lose the ability to then sort by genres or titles when I want. (Which I also do not want to do)

Option 2
Create separate profiles for each of the big categories. Selecting, for example, "Movies" would switch you transparently to the 'Movies' xbmc profile, where Kids Movies, Movies, Specials, and Standup would be the home menu options. The structure would be the same as Option 1, with the main categories as profiles.

Pros: Fanart background folders for every item, so I get different rotating backgrounds for Kids Shows than Educational for example. Also, recently added scripts would still work on the main profile home menu. Cons: Complicated. Each of the other profiles would need a 'Back to main' menu option to switch it back to the main profile, and I don't know how or if I could even sync a setup like this to a central mysql database.

SOOOOoooo... end game is that for Option 1, I need to figure out how to set custom fanart folders for submenu items (even if it takes modding some xml or skinning) and I need to know if this will remove my ability to sort by genre, title, etc. OR, for Option 2, I need to know the downside of trying to transparently work with multiple profiles and sync them with mysql....

Any ideas/suggestions/code/skinning tips? Thanks in advance!

[Dr.Toxic]

[ZombieRobot]

edit: don't worry

[ZombieRobot]

I would go with option 1 if you modify the xml you will lose your modifications when you update the skin its been some time since i visited Night is Mcborzu still developing it?

[Dr.Toxic]

Thanks a lot ZombieRobot for your reply. I would like to go with option 1, and I understand that modifying the xml means I lose changes if/when I upgrade ...but do you know if getting custom fanart folders for submenu items is even possible? Can I edit xml to get that?

And yes, I am using Night, it's my favorite skin.

[ZombieRobot]

Its 10:40 at night and its my sons 1st birthday party tomorrow so i don't know how much time i will have to look at it but i will look at the code and see what i come up with i cant promise a fix for you if it looks like too much code i wont have time but at least i will look into it in the morning my brain is not working very good at the moment its been a long day :confused2:

[Dr.Toxic]

Thank you very much - take your time - I really appreciate any effort. If need be, I am willing to learn what I can about skinning and take up a mod of the night skin, if that seems to be the only way something like this could get accomplished.

Thanks again, and please let me know what you find!

[ZombieRobot]

Hey mate sorry i didn't get back to you i had a good look and wont be able to do it just looks like too much code atm i just have way too much going on code wise myself if some time frees up i may be able to look at it again but just not at the moment sorry about that

[Mudislander]

Convergence is half way there out of the box and worth looking at

[Dr.Toxic]

Hey mate sorry i didn't get back to you i had a good look and wont be able to do it just looks like too much code atm i just have way too much going on code wise myself if some time frees up i may be able to look at it again but just not at the moment sorry about that

It's all good, I appreciate you looking into it, thanks.

[Deano316]

Try Aeon MQ3, it will allow you to have rotating fan arts for submenus and can be setup using favourites and smart playlists.