[phil65]

his request from "kodi devs" is odd to say the least.

That might the uneducated opinion from someone who doesnt know the technical side of things
I explained things in more detail here: https://github.com/xbmc/repo-plugins/pull/771
On next estuary update some more viewtypes will be enabled for "videos" content type. (Wall and InfoWall)

[jdf76]

his request from "kodi devs" is odd to say the least.

That might the uneducated opinion from someone who doesnt know the technical side of things
I explained things in more detail here: https://github.com/xbmc/repo-plugins/pull/771
On next estuary update some more viewtypes will be enabled for "videos" content type. (Wall and InfoWall)

Phil,

You're correct, i honestly don't know whats going on with the technical aspect, so this is completely on me. I appreciate you helping me out with answering these guys questions because i'm completely at a loss.

I have a temporary request would you mind hanging out here just to help me with these type of questions if i don't know.

I appreciate your help

Thank you,
Jeff

[anxdpanic]

@phil65 ( or any team that reads this and can help out )

I believe I understand the reasoning myself;

• youtube videos are not episodes and the tvshow breadcrumbs are 'incorrect/inaccurate' of sorts and may present in unintended ways in any number of skins
  
• views are the responsibility of skins/core
  
• and guessing the team would like add-ons on the official repository to have consistent, expected behavior as Kodi ages
  

What seems to have happened, is a disconnect between this and the user impact for this change in the current ecosystem (helix-krypton).

I'm going to try to sum up the user side of this to hopefully help with some clarity on this.

Core/skins lack a default view per content type. (override view)
'Mark as Watched/Hide Watched' is not available to videos (wasn't aware of this until users presented it)

Then there is the lack of views, this extends backwards to Helix and to ALL skins users have the choice of. This is a hobby for myself as well, I just don't expect that any let alone the majority of skins will see these additions backwards to Helix. This leaves users now with little to no information regarding the video they are presented with in most cases.

So from a users perspective at least, all that has been done is the removal of 2 features and view choice (especially pre-Krypton) from them.

I want to connect the above reasoning to the resulting impact for users, but am unable. Can you help with making that connection for users?

Understand you're all busy and doing this on your time, so thank you in advance for also taking any time to help us out here.

[jmh2002]

Thanks anxdpanic for jumping in on this. I apologise that subsequent to our PMs last week I haven't yet had the time or will (this is a hobby for me too, and we also lose a lot of hours to Kodi and to helping users, even if we arent Team Kodi members) to touch base with phil65 to get these type of definitive answers and add them to the FAQ here.

Whilst I appreciate that these changes might be 'correct' from a development point of view the immediate negative impact on users today, right now, is enormous, especially since these are effectively Krypton changes, but Krypton is still in beta and not even officially released yet and most of us will continue to remain on Kodi 16 for many months still, and even thereafter won't necessarily use the default estuary skin on Kodi 17.

Also, this won't just be for YouTube but many other streaming video addons in the official repo will eventually be affected too.

Unless I understand incorrectly, what this really comes down to is that this enforced change by Kodi will require all skin developers to add some type of appropriate/custom views to correct the situation for streaming video addons (of which there are more than 300 in the official repo)?

Basically an episode type view needs to be created by the Skin developers, since even though the thought is that these are not "episodes", in most cases this type of view is the one that works the best and provides the most information.

@phil65 - can you please confirm that this basic thinking is correct?

If this is ultimately the correct solution can you also please post or point to the technical details somewhere, so that users can start petitioning skin developers to make these changes and referring them to the appropriate Team Kodi post that specifies the necessary standards?

THANKS

[larchen]

Here is how the authentication scheme works.

there are 2 Auth requests (if you use my subscriptions and is enabled)

....

After I have authenticated (x2) this add-on,
what information does get send (and when and how often) while using it (signing in and while being signed in) regarding username and password and perhaps other similar sensitive/private information?

Grateful for help/information!

Thanks!

[jmh2002]

EDITED my previous post with more info / questions. Waiting on @phil65 now.

[Martijn]

@phil65 ( or any team that reads this and can help out )

I believe I understand the reasoning myself;

• youtube videos are not episodes and the tvshow breadcrumbs are 'incorrect/inaccurate' of sorts and may present in unintended ways in any number of skins
  
• views are the responsibility of skins/core
  
• and guessing the team would like add-ons on the official repository to have consistent, expected behavior as Kodi ages
  

What seems to have happened, is a disconnect between this and the user impact for this change in the current ecosystem (helix-krypton).

I'm going to try to sum up the user side of this to hopefully help with some clarity on this.

Core/skins lack a default view per content type. (override view)
'Mark as Watched/Hide Watched' is not available to videos (wasn't aware of this until users presented it)

Then there is the lack of views, this extends backwards to Helix and to ALL skins users have the choice of. This is a hobby for myself as well, I just don't expect that any let alone the majority of skins will see these additions backwards to Helix. This leaves users now with little to no information regarding the video they are presented with in most cases.

So from a users perspective at least, all that has been done is the removal of 2 features and view choice (especially pre-Krypton) from them.

I want to connect the above reasoning to the resulting impact for users, but am unable. Can you help with making that connection for users?

Understand you're all busy and doing this on your time, so thank you in advance for also taking any time to help us out here.

Thanks anxdpanic for jumping in on this. I apologise that subsequent to our PMs last week I haven't yet had the time or will (this is a hobby for me too, and we also lose a lot of hours to Kodi even if we arent Team Kodi members) to touch base with phil65 to get these type of definitive answers and add them to the FAQ here.

Whilst I appreciate that these changes might be 'correct' from a development point of view the immediate negative impact on users today, right now, is enormous, especially since these are effectively Krypton changes, but Krypton is still in beta and not even officially released yet and most of us will continue to remain on Kodi 16 for many months still, and even thereafter won't necessarily use the default estuary skin on Kodi 17.

Also, this won't just be for YouTube but many other streaming video addons in the official repo will eventually be affected too.

Unless I understand incorrectly, what this really comes down to is that this enforced change by Kodi will require all skin developers to add some type of appropriate/custom views to correct the situation for streaming video addons (of which there are more than 300 in the official repo)?

Basically an episode type view needs to be created by the Skin developers, since even though the thought is that these are not episodes, in most cases this type of view is the one that works the best and provides the most information.

@phil65 - can you please confirm this?

If this is the ultimate correct solution can you also please post the technical details somewhere, so that users can start petitioning skin developers to make these changes and referring them to the appropriate Team Kodi post that specifies the necessary standards?

THANKS

Do not forget the function to correctly set content was already available since 2015 which is pre-v16 so not only v17 Krypton. No one actually took our advise except a few. So now we felt it was time to actually start "enforce" this cause if you don't nothing changes. If there is indeed an issue now with watched/unwatched we'll have to fix that and not hack around the problem. There are still skin updates coming out for v16 Jarvis so i'm sure if the correct information provided most skinners will fix this and request an update.

Here's the announcement:
http://forum.kodi.tv/showthread.php?tid=...pid2319280

2015 expand existing option - ListItem().setInfo(type=XXX, infoLabels={"mediatype": XXX})

Expanded existing options for xbmcgui.ListItem().setInfo() method to allow setting the mediatype of a listitem. This option already exists in v16 "Jarvis" and should not cause problems if added to any plugin before v16 so please make sure you add it.

• xbmcgui.ListItem().setInfo("mediatype", xxx)
  

allows addons to set the correct mediatype of a listitem.

Available options are:

PHP Code:

""
"music"
"artist"
"album"
"song"
"video"
"set"
"musicvideo"
"movie"
"tvshow"
"season"
"episode" 


Kodi source code: https://github.com/xbmc/xbmc/blob/master....h#L28-L39
Pydocs: http://mirrors.kodi.tv/docs/python-docs/...em-setInfo
Example of plugin change: https://github.com/BigNoid/service.libra...ee02122b13

[jdf76]

Here is how the authentication scheme works.

there are 2 Auth requests (if you use my subscriptions and is enabled)

....

After I have authenticated (x2) this add-on,
what information does get send (and when and how often) while using it (signing in and while being signed in) regarding username and password and perhaps other similar sensitive/private information?

Grateful for help/information!

Thanks!

The oauth is your credential code provided to google. It's encrypted like in all google login websites/apps. Unfortunately youtube's authentication is completely done by google so you have to use a google account to login.

Jeff


Sent from my iPhone

[jmh2002]

Do not forget the function to correctly set content was already available since 2015 which is pre-v16 so not only v17 Krypton. No one actually took our advise except a few. So now we felt it was time to actually start "enforce" this cause if you don't nothing changes...

Thanks Martin, most appreciated. I guess most of us here didnt forget, because we probably never knew in the first place given that ultimately it seems to be a skin issue (and also that most of us are users here, not skin developers).

But it does appear that we have been caught out by skin developers not 'actually taking your advice' and being ready for this evolution, and/or Team Kodi not communicating this change in an effective way, and contemplating the immediate negative effective on users.

In any case, we appreciate all the help to get to the bottom of this. I for one will now point the developer of the skin that I use (Xonfluence) to this page of posts and hopefully that will make sense from a technical point of view.

However as anxdpanic referred to, this is a hobby for everyone, and many of us are trying to minimise the burden, so Im not sure how enthusiastically this new enforcement will be received as far as the retroactive effect is concerned.

I know that the Xonfluence developer prefers to only do minor bug fixes for Jarvis now, and instead focus on Krypton requirements going forward, and I fully support this to minimise his burden too, and prevent the burn out which seems common with developers of both addons and skins.

[rodalpho]

Since it's broken in Confluence I guess you weren't kidding that nobody took your advice.

[jmh2002]

On a separate note, perhaps Team Kodi would be agreeable to this change not being enforced for addons in the pre Krypton repos?

Because 2015 or not, it seems that the skins are somewhat behind with the necessary changes, and regardless of whose fault this is it still has an immediate serious negative impact on everyday Kodi use for existing users who haven't actually done anything wrong.

[anxdpanic]

Thanks Martijn,

This also applies to xbmcplugin.setContent('videos') . This was what was initially changed based on Phil65's request, not the mediatype infolabel.

Based on pydocs for 14-16, I don't even know if setContent has 'videos' pre-krypton or how that works in core, so all I could do was take Phil65's word for this. So do skinners know to use the 'videos' content type at all? (not the mediatype infolabel)

[phil65]

We´re trying to improve awareness now.
http://forum.kodi.tv/showthread.php?tid=299107

That´s the part for skinners, I will probably do sth similar for plug-in authors when I find some more free minutes.

And yeah, you´re right, our documentation is incomplete at lot of places. W´re trying to improve this.

[jmh2002]

Thank you very much @phil65

It's always good and pleasing to see dialog and a path forward somehow

What do you think about my previous comment, or some variation as an interim solution?

On a separate note, perhaps Team Kodi would be agreeable to this change not being enforced for addons in the pre Krypton repos?

Because 2015 or not, it seems that the skins are somewhat behind with the necessary changes, and regardless of whose fault this is it still has an immediate serious negative impact on everyday Kodi use for existing users who haven't actually done anything wrong.

Currently we have now ended up with an 'unofficial' version of YouTube because of the all the upset caused to end users, but we know that is never a good solution, and is even extra work to maintain for developers.

If not totally ignoring pre Krypton repos, maybe at least a delay on the enforcement policy to give skinners a chance to get themselves up to date with this new 'awareness' of what is required? And thereafter a move to fixed enforcement?

In the meantime, now that everyone is more aware, users will petition their various skins to make the required updates during this delay period.

Does this seems like an acceptable way forward to achieve everything for both Team Kodi and Kodi Users?

[daledude]

his request from "kodi devs" is odd to say the least.

That might the uneducated opinion from someone who doesnt know the technical side of things
I explained things in more detail here: https://github.com/xbmc/repo-plugins/pull/771
On next estuary update some more viewtypes will be enabled for "videos" content type. (Wall and InfoWall)

I haven't kept up with dev after v16 but I still understand the issue. "uneducated" isn't accurate. "not properly informed" is more accurate. Regardless, a very popular addon has been requested to be broken for an already stable release entirely for the purpose of a future unstable release. I've never used a default skin provided with Kodi so an update to Estuary won't help. I honestly appreciate people spending their time on what they hopefully enjoy for others so please don't take this as "bashing".

Can we please get an option to toggle the view for v16 users since it's perfectly fine with this release in the "official" version of the addon? I appreciate, and agree, with "enforcing" something that has been warned about in a future change but IMO that should be enforced, and cause breakage, at the time of the new release and not break previously working ones. Some skinners may have abandoned their skin but it still works perfectly fine with the current, or previous, stable release.