Preferred Streaming Protocol - XBMS vs SMB vs UPnP vs FTP...etc
#16
(2014-08-21, 19:04)meimeiriver Wrote: Sadly, UPnP still (since 2008) seems unsupported for video library scrapers. Which still baffles me. Especially since music scrapers can access the UPnP drives just fine. And why not, even?! All the video scraper needs is a (properly formatted) movie file-name; and it can find that on the UPnP drive.

I believe this is rapidly going to become a lesser problem over the next release or two. Work was done last GSOC (and is continuing) that would allow one XBMC library to talk to another one. So in the future if you just have Kodi/XBMC scrape your one Windows box locally, all the Kodis throughout your network should get the same library info. That's still a ways off, but major UPnP work is definitely on the way.
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#17
(2014-08-21, 22:01)natethomas Wrote:
(2014-08-21, 19:04)meimeiriver Wrote: Sadly, UPnP still (since 2008) seems unsupported for video library scrapers. Which still baffles me. Especially since music scrapers can access the UPnP drives just fine. And why not, even?! All the video scraper needs is a (properly formatted) movie file-name; and it can find that on the UPnP drive.

I believe this is rapidly going to become a lesser problem over the next release or two. Work was done last GSOC (and is continuing) that would allow one XBMC library to talk to another one. So in the future if you just have Kodi/XBMC scrape your one Windows box locally, all the Kodis throughout your network should get the same library info. That's still a ways off, but major UPnP work is definitely on the way.


Well, that's good to hear. Smile Thx.

Would seem I will have cause to use Kodi after all. Big Grin
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#18
Quote:Same issue here. Except that SMB does *not* work like a charm. When Windows boots, you invariably get 'Unable to connect all network driives' error (I presume because the network hasn't initialized yet, and Windoze is too dumb to wait for it to be done). So, you need to use the file explorer and manually click on each of them to reconnect them again, or XBMC can't see them.

I also use TwonkyMedia; and I get the impression its buffering is superior to what a SMB drive offers. Plus, TwonkyMedia turns a collection of video locations, and turns them into a single media source: much, much cleaner than silly SMB drives to every location.

Gee if only there was a way to make Windows "Always wait for the network at computer startup and logon"

gpedit.msc
Local Computer Policy, Computer Configuration, Administrative Templates, System, Logon
"Always wait for the network at computer startup and logon" = Enabled.

I have been using XBMC from various SMB servers over the last 8 years and it has been hard to fault. (Win2003r3, Win2008R2, Win7, Win8.1, UnRaid)

SMB in my experience is way better than UPNP.
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#19
(2014-08-22, 06:01)kortina Wrote:
Quote:Same issue here. Except that SMB does *not* work like a charm. When Windows boots, you invariably get 'Unable to connect all network driives' error (I presume because the network hasn't initialized yet, and Windoze is too dumb to wait for it to be done). So, you need to use the file explorer and manually click on each of them to reconnect them again, or XBMC can't see them.

I also use TwonkyMedia; and I get the impression its buffering is superior to what a SMB drive offers. Plus, TwonkyMedia turns a collection of video locations, and turns them into a single media source: much, much cleaner than silly SMB drives to every location.

Gee if only there was a way to make Windows "Always wait for the network at computer startup and logon"

gpedit.msc
Local Computer Policy, Computer Configuration, Administrative Templates, System, Logon
"Always wait for the network at computer startup and logon" = Enabled.

I have been using XBMC from various SMB servers over the last 8 years and it has been hard to fault. (Win2003r3, Win2008R2, Win7, Win8.1, UnRaid)

SMB in my experience is way better than UPNP.


The "Unable to reconnect all network drives" at startup error, sadly, is not contingent upon the network being present. Naturally the network must be there, but even when it's fully initialized, network drives are, by no means, guaranteed to auto-reconnect on startup.

"Always wait for the network at computer startup and logon" = Enabled is useful for things I auto-start, like STEAM, but I still get "Unable to reconnect all network drives" balloons.
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#20
You could always just try and tell XBMC where the content is directly.

Instead of configuring Windows to mount X: to \\server\movies, then configuring a source in XBMC as X: drive

TRY:

Configure your source within XBMC to point to smb://server/movies/

This will take out the whole requirement for the OS to reconnect the drive.
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#21
(2014-08-22, 08:17)kortina Wrote: You could always just try and tell XBMC where the content is directly.

Instead of configuring Windows to mount X: to \\server\movies, then configuring a source in XBMC as X: drive

TRY:

Configure your source within XBMC to point to smb://server/movies/

This will take out the whole requirement for the OS to reconnect the drive.

Now that's an interesting suggestion. Smile I will try that.
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#22
Did the source change work?

*NOTE*
I have used smb://192.168.0.20/Movies

By using the IP this takes out the whole name resolution step, I have setup a DHCP lease for my "Server" so that the IP is always 192.168.0.20
This also helps when you use a multi XBMC setup, and choose to implement a shared MySQL database.
The pre-req is that all sources.xml files look the same.
You cant use smb://server/movies in one setup and smb://192.168.x.x/Movies in another and expect the sharedDB to work correctly.
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#23
(2014-08-25, 02:08)kortina Wrote: The pre-req is that all sources.xml files look the same.

Actually, that is not correct. If you set up one instance and add your sources to it using network paths, and then scrape your libraries, then those paths are held in the DB's and any clients connecting to MySQL will use those paths to access content.

The ONLY reason you need to duplicate sources.xml across instances is if you want to be able to edit using a different machine. If you don't duplicate the sources, then you can for instance, only change the art etc on the original machine that you set things up with.
Learning Linux the hard way !!
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#24
(2014-08-25, 02:08)kortina Wrote: Did the source change work?

*NOTE*
I have used smb://192.168.0.20/Movies

By using the IP this takes out the whole name resolution step, I have setup a DHCP lease for my "Server" so that the IP is always 192.168.0.20
This also helps when you use a multi XBMC setup, and choose to implement a shared MySQL database.
The pre-req is that all sources.xml files look the same.
You cant use smb://server/movies in one setup and smb://192.168.x.x/Movies in another and expect the sharedDB to work correctly.

Yes, SMB works that way for me. Smile

Not really liking it, though. I just don't like having to add 3 different sources for my movies (all within SMB: there are other directories, inside the SMB realm, that are not media). The beauty of UPnP was, that TwonkyMedia (residing on my ESX server) is configured to hold these various media locations, and turns them into a single movie/music source. Wish SMB could do that too.
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#25
You could combine all your movies directories into one using whatever method your OS supports. I have only 2 SMB shares for video - movies and tv. However using mhddfs those shares are actually combining 3 or 4 partitions each. There are similar technologies for windows.
If I have helped you or increased your knowledge, click the 'thumbs up' button to give thanks :) (People with less than 20 posts won't see the "thumbs up" button.)
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#26
(2014-08-25, 12:15)nickr Wrote: You could combine all your movies directories into one using whatever method your OS supports. I have only 2 SMB shares for video - movies and tv. However using mhddfs those shares are actually combining 3 or 4 partitions each. There are similar technologies for windows.

Thx. Good tip. Smile

I actually found an excellent tool for the job!

Link Shell Extension

Super-easy, and works like a charm. Smile
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#27
(2014-08-25, 17:57)meimeiriver Wrote:
(2014-08-25, 12:15)nickr Wrote: You could combine all your movies directories into one using whatever method your OS supports. I have only 2 SMB shares for video - movies and tv. However using mhddfs those shares are actually combining 3 or 4 partitions each. There are similar technologies for windows.

Thx. Good tip. Smile

I actually found an excellent tool for the job!

Link Shell Extension

Super-easy, and works like a charm. Smile


Sigh. And now it turns out XBMC does not honor symbolic links. Sad So, spanning across multiple volumes is a bust, after all. Sad
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#28
Well it's up to the server whether it honours links.

I have certainly seen threads on here that describes spanning across multiple partitions/directories on windows, probably in the hardware thread. However I don't care enough about the whole concept of windows as a file to have paid enough attention to find it again.

Definitely not a bust, or else you could try a different OS.
If I have helped you or increased your knowledge, click the 'thumbs up' button to give thanks :) (People with less than 20 posts won't see the "thumbs up" button.)
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#29
(2014-08-26, 10:36)nickr Wrote: Well it's up to the server whether it honours links.

I have certainly seen threads on here that describes spanning across multiple partitions/directories on windows, probably in the hardware thread. However I don't care enough about the whole concept of windows as a file to have paid enough attention to find it again.

Definitely not a bust, or else you could try a different OS.

Well, I can put the movies on the other physical drive all in a folder, and then do a hardlink 'Junction' to said folder. That works, but is a bit ugly (as the non-categorized movies this way no longer all appear in the same directory). But I guess I can live with that.

All-in-all, direct paths to the SMB locations seems to suit me better than the UPnP stuff, and assigning drive letters.
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#30
(2014-08-26, 10:36)nickr Wrote: Well it's up to the server whether it honours links.

Actually, this is not entirely true. Which is to say, Mrcrosoft itself honors its own symbolic links, of course (which are just shortcuts, really). XBMC, however, while it can scrape on them (!), sees the symlinked movies all as having 0 Bytes length, and refuses to play them. My guess is that XBMC somehow tries to localize the path-names inside the links (and subsequently can't find the file).
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Preferred Streaming Protocol - XBMS vs SMB vs UPnP vs FTP...etc0