[User 224999]

There is one think I noticed, a few of my radio stations broadcast the artist name in all Caps, and SHS create a folder also in all caps, just for cosmetic reasons I would preferre do create "normal" folders, Instead of QUEEN, Queen, I know its nip picking, sorry

Well, that's going to be difficult to fix as some artist names are intentionally in caps.
At that point of the code I have no clue wether the artist name originated from a radio station or library source or whatever.
I'll see what I can do but I guess it's too much trouble to fix.

[User 224999]

I use the cast listing a lot and noticed that it will not populate after a while. The log don't throw any errors, but I assume that it has something to do with the caching. Is there any way to bypass it?

It's more probably a skin issue. What are you using to call the cast listing ?
Can you give it a try with Titan skin as a test ?

And fetching the cast by ListItem.TvShowTitle (for example) does not work, if the item has a numeric name. I guess the script think it's a DBID. Maybe creating a different argument to select DBID or By Name would solve the issue.

You're right... I should never have used the same argument for both dbid and title ;-)
I will take a look if there's still hope to change it. In the meanwhile take a look at the VAR I'm using for Titan which kind of works in almost all use cases (and doesn't have your problem mentioned above). Just use this var in the content tag for your cast list.

PHP Code:

<variable name="castInfo">
        <value condition="!String.IsEmpty(ListItem.DBTYPE) + !String.IsEmpty(ListItem.DBID)">plugin://script.skin.helper.service/?action=getcast&amp;$INFO[ListItem.DBTYPE]=$INFO[ListItem.DBID]&amp;downloadthumbs=$INFO[Skin.String(actorthumbslookup)]&amp;castaction=$INFO[Skin.String(videoinfo_castaction)]</value>
        <value condition="!String.IsEmpty(ListItem.DBTYPE)">plugin://script.skin.helper.service/?action=getcast&amp;$INFO[ListItem.DBTYPE]=$INFO[ListItem.Title]&amp;downloadthumbs=$INFO[Skin.String(actorthumbslookup)]&amp;castaction=$INFO[Skin.String(videoinfo_castaction)]</value>
        <value condition="!String.IsEmpty(ListItem.Property(DBTYPE)) + !String.IsEmpty(ListItem.Property(DBID))">plugin://script.skin.helper.service/?action=getcast&amp;$INFO[ListItem.Propery(DBTYPE)]=$INFO[ListItem.Propery(DBID)]&amp;downloadthumbs=$INFO[Skin.String(actorthumbslookup)]&amp;castaction=$INFO[Skin.String(videoinfo_castaction)]</value>
        <value condition="!String.IsEmpty(ListItem.Property(DBTYPE))">plugin://script.skin.helper.service/?action=getcast&amp;$INFO[ListItem.Propery(DBTYPE)]=$INFO[ListItem.Title]&amp;downloadthumbs=$INFO[Skin.String(actorthumbslookup)]&amp;castaction=$INFO[Skin.String(videoinfo_castaction)]</value>
        <value condition="!String.IsEmpty(Container.Content)">plugin://script.skin.helper.service/?action=getcast&amp;$INFO[Container.Content]=$INFO[ListItem.Title]&amp;downloadthumbs=$INFO[Skin.String(actorthumbslookup)]&amp;castaction=$INFO[Skin.String(videoinfo_castaction)]</value>
     </variable> 


[User 224999]

In widgets, can you condition to display all top250 movies and tvshows?

Offcourse, just set the limit to 250.

Or do you mean a widget which simply shows all top250 movies ?
That's going to be difficult if items are not in your library

[sualfred]

It's more probably a skin issue. What are you using to call the cast listing ?
Can you give it a try with Titan skin as a test ?

Def. not a skin issue. I'm facing it on all of my devices since month. No matter if I use the DBID or the title of the item and with enabled/disabled downloads etc.
I also noticed it in my fTV implementation. Sometimes it simply won't populate. Only a restart of Kodi helps in that case.

Edit:
You could try my dev version of Embuary by yourself by walking through the season and episode views of different TV shows. It will stop to work after a few minutes.

[Angelinas]

thats widget...right
Have you set widget container number ?

Code:

    <onload>SetProperty(SkinHelper.WidgetContainer,###)</onload>

Try to avoid $INFO[ListItem.Propery(DBTYPE)] for episode...not working good.
use fixed

Code:

<value condition="String.IsEqual(Container(510).ListItem.Property(Type),episode)">plugin://script.skin.helper.service/?action=getcast&amp;tvshow=$ESCINFO[Container(510).ListItem.TVShowTitle]&amp;downloadthumbs=true&amp;castaction=extendedinfo</value>

You can use condition same for tvshows and episodes in widgets

Code:

condition="!String.IsEmpty(Container(510).ListItem.TVShowTitle)"

@Marcel I don't have info or Art if play Episode from library(Kodi version Leia)
Can you check ...or it's normal to have only Kodi info and art
ListItem are populated and working.

[User 224999]

It's more probably a skin issue. What are you using to call the cast listing ?
Can you give it a try with Titan skin as a test ?

Def. not a skin issue. I'm facing it on all of my devices since month. No matter if I use the DBID or the title of the item and with enabled/disabled downloads etc.
I also noticed it in my fTV implementation. Sometimes it simply won't populate. Only a restart of Kodi helps in that case.

Edit:
You could try my dev version of Embuary by yourself by walking through the season and episode views of different TV shows. It will stop to work after a few minutes.

I never noticed it gets broken but I guess I'm not using it a lot.
Does it only break with season/episode views ? Not with movies/tvshows views ?

Oh and yes, you can PM the dev version of Embuary so I can have a look

[sualfred]

I'm using it on season/episode and video player info dialog. Sometimes it only breaks in one of them and it works on another screen. It's completely random, but it will happen. Another thing is, that the container will be set to Container.IsUpdating for forever, even if the content is already populated. But that' a very very rare issue and I only had it a few times in the last weeks.

I'l sent you the link.

[meowmoo]

There is one think I noticed, a few of my radio stations broadcast the artist name in all Caps, and SHS create a folder also in all caps, just for cosmetic reasons I would preferre do create "normal" folders, Instead of QUEEN, Queen, I know its nip picking, sorry

Well, that's going to be difficult to fix as some artist names are intentionally in caps.
At that point of the code I have no clue wether the artist name originated from a radio station or library source or whatever.
I'll see what I can do but I guess it's too much trouble to fix.

If its trouble to fix dont waste your time!, like i said just nip picking, and no issue at all.

I also noticed that names with period on the end dont work (anymore?) I deleted my R.E.M. folder to test it on kodi 18 nighly and the last SHS from beta repo, and it now shows up as RP85G1~P, also not a big deal, just wanna let you know

[redglory]

Hi Marcel,

I'm having some issue with cache and next episodes.

I use "path" parameter to restrict next episode's search to a defined path and every time I get a list of episodes, it gets stored in the cache regardless of the path I'm passing as an argument.

Example:
1. clear simplecache.db
2. navigate to "Stand Up" menu item
3. next episodes widgets loads with path "nfs://192.168.1.77/standup"
4. navigate to "Tv Shows" menu item
5. next episodes widget loads episodes list from cache pointing to standup next episodes.

I think you are missing some kind of 2nd parameter to identify cached items. I suppose you just seek MEDIATYPE and ACTION regardless of the path

EDIT: went looking inside simplecache.db and cache string used is using exactly only MEDIATYPE and ACTION:

"SkinHelper.Widgets.episodes.next"
"SkinHelper.Widgets.episodes.nextaired"

What could be done with this?!

EDIT2: Perhaps add checksum to cache string as a suffix?

example:

"SkinHelper.Widgets.episodes.next.730"
"SkinHelper.Widgets.episodes.nextaired.730"

EDIT3: Just fixed it myself and made a pull request

Thanks

[sualfred]

It's more probably a skin issue. What are you using to call the cast listing ?
Can you give it a try with Titan skin as a test ?

Def. not a skin issue. I'm facing it on all of my devices since month. No matter if I use the DBID or the title of the item and with enabled/disabled downloads etc.
I also noticed it in my fTV implementation. Sometimes it simply won't populate. Only a restart of Kodi helps in that case.

Edit:
You could try my dev version of Embuary by yourself by walking through the season and episode views of different TV shows. It will stop to work after a few minutes.

I never noticed it gets broken but I guess I'm not using it a lot.
Does it only break with season/episode views ? Not with movies/tvshows views ?

Oh and yes, you can PM the dev version of Embuary so I can have a look

I'm using it on season/episode and video player info dialog. Sometimes it only breaks in one of them and it works on another screen. It's completely random, but it will happen. Another thing is, that the container will be set to Container.IsUpdating for forever, even if the content is already populated. But that' a very very rare issue and I only had it a few times in the last weeks.

I'l sent you the link.

Ok, it's not a caching issue. I removed the cache check from the code to give it a try. Same problem. But as soon as I remove the visible "<visible>Integer.IsGreater(Container($PARAM[id]).NumItems,0) | Container($PARAM[id]).IsUpdating</visible>" it works. For some reasons Kodi don't update these condition after while for that list. But this only affects the getcast feature. The other ones (like similar movies) are working without any problems. Is that something you can fix in your addon or is it a Kodi issue and I'm forced to always show the container?

Edit:
SkinHelper.ListItem.Cast won't be filled in that scenario, too.

Edit2:
Ok, it seems to be a Kodi issue. I've added a window property to check if the script is going to be triggered. It won't be filled anymore as soon the issue appears. I think it has something to do with the MyVideoNav.xml behaviour. Maybe I find a way to force a trigger visiblity.

[Mike_Doc]

@Edworld,

If you are after an IMDB top 250 list, try this playlist:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" standalone="yes" ?>
<smartplaylist type="movies">
<name>IMDB Top 250</name>
<match>all</match>
<rule field="top250" operator="greaterthan">
<value>0</value>
</rule>
<order direction="ascending">top250</order>
<group>none</group>
</smartplaylist>

May not be correct as I've created 2 or 3 over the years and can't recall which one I'm using, but it does work so if you have problems let me know

[redglory]

@Edworld,

If you are after an IMDB top 250 list, try this playlist:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" standalone="yes" ?>
<smartplaylist type="movies">
<name>IMDB Top 250</name>
<match>all</match>
<rule field="top250" operator="greaterthan">
<value>0</value>
</rule>
<order direction="ascending">top250</order>
<group>none</group>
</smartplaylist>

May not be correct as I've created 2 or 3 over the years and can't recall which one I'm using, but it does work so if you have problems let me know

Mine is like this

Code:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" standalone="yes" ?>
<smartplaylist type="movies">
    <name>IMDB Top 250</name>
    <match>all</match>
    <rule field="top250" operator="greaterthan">
        <value>0</value>
    </rule>
    <order direction="descending">rating</order>
</smartplaylist>

[ryadre]

Hi there, just recently I keep getting error notification pop-ups saying skin helper service widgets error and skin helper backup error etc. I looked in the log and the error says about a cannot import name extend dict. Any one else come across this? Everything seems to work, just these notifications are annoying

I had this happen once because I had the beta repo for skin helper installed and somehow the version of skin helper got out of sync with another addon (metadatautils I think). I ended up uninstalling skin helper and every dependency I could find for it, disabling the beta repo, and then reinstalling from the main Kodi repo. That took care of my problem.

Yea I looked at this, but as soon as I switch back to arctic zephyr skin it asks me to download skin helper service and straight away it throws up the error.

[ryadre]

If you're using the default Kodi skin, then you can safely uninstall Skin Helper. If you're using another skin, the skin might require it.

Thanks, I'll remove it and maybe try to add it again.

I have the same issue once I am on 17. As soon as I use another skin that needs skin helper it throws up the error.

[Edworld]

@Edworld,

If you are after an IMDB top 250 list, try this playlist:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" standalone="yes" ?>
<smartplaylist type="movies">
<name>IMDB Top 250</name>
<match>all</match>
<rule field="top250" operator="greaterthan">
<value>0</value>
</rule>
<order direction="ascending">top250</order>
<group>none</group>
</smartplaylist>

May not be correct as I've created 2 or 3 over the years and can't recall which one I'm using, but it does work so if you have problems let me know

Mine is like this

Code:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" standalone="yes" ?>
<smartplaylist type="movies">
    <name>IMDB Top 250</name>
    <match>all</match>
    <rule field="top250" operator="greaterthan">
        <value>0</value>
    </rule>
    <order direction="descending">rating</order>
</smartplaylist>

I have a similar playlist, but it requires to continue to update the top250 movies...

Skinhelper widgets has a widget to display IMDB top250 in library movies/tvshows but I am unable to display all the top250 in my library.

I was asking if it was possible to display all of them, not sure where I can change the settings from 25 to 250.