[bjhille]

I have a 1st gen AppleTV (and 4 other gen 3's) that has been working great for years.  As I'm sure you've heard, Apple has dropped the ability to sync the original AppleTV since the iTunes 12/7 update.  So, instead of having a brick, I loaded OpenElec and Kodi from here: http://chewitt.openelec.tv/appletv/   Rolling back to a previous version is not possible since I upgraded my mac to High Sierra and iTunes 12.7.

The install went great and have been getting used to the customization's.  My challenge is the media tagging.  In iTunes, all of the media information is stored in the video file.  Kodi wants to redownload the metadata.  I like how my movies/TV Shows are organized/named now (one big movie folder and one big TV Shows folder with subfolders for each show (not season).  I only use this appletv to transport my collection while traveling.

There seems to a lot of plugins/addons to stream media and to find tag information online, but I can't seem to find one that will read the existing tag information off the media file and either create nfo files for Kodi or to load the information directly into the Kodi database.  Does this exist?  Is there somewhere I can add this request?  With Apple no longer supporting the original AppleTV, I can't be the only person in this boat, but everything points to using a different media manager (I used MetaZ now).  I just want to use the tags that I've already created.

Thanks in advance.

Brian

[Karellen]

Hello bjhille

The short answer is that Kodi does not read tags inside video files and there is no workaround for this. It does read tags within Music files which is the base for creating the Music library.

The request for video file tags has been raised previously and can be found in the Feature Requests part of the forum. The number of people who have requested this feature is negligible relative to the Kodi user base. One issue is that Artwork is not stored in video files, so contact online is required anyway, and the artwork will create more traffic than a few lines of text of metadata.

In my signature below are the following links...
NFO Files with a guide to create NFO files,
Import-Export which will guide you to export your library to nfo files once your library is created, so you will never need to make online requests if you rebuild or transfer your library and
Artwork

You should also be aware of correct file naming conventions to ensure proper scraping. It is important that the files or folders are named exactly as they are at the scraper site- TVDB for TV Shows and TMDB for Movies (and TV shows if you prefer)

See our beginners guide for naming files...  http://kodi.wiki/view/Naming_video_files

[bjhille]

Thanks Karellen.  I guess I assumed it stored the "album art" in the video file because when I' done tagging in MetaZ, the output is just the .mp4 file.  When I bring that into iTunes, everything I put in MetaZ is there.  Wonder how that works as sometimes I've used pictures stored on my local hard drive and iTunes brings it in just fine.

What about an addon that allows Kodi to use iTunes as an "internet source"?  In other words, when I load a movie/TV Show into Kodi, have an add-on that will talk to iTunes (running on the same network) to search the filename in iTunes then load that information in Kodi's database?

I know when you look at the userbase for Kodi compared to the number of people requesting this feature, that number is much lower.  I get that.  I think the userbase of Kodi would increase if there was some sort of way to make it work.  Anyone that has a mac is probably tied to iTunes (for one reason or another - ipad, other appletv's, etc).  Redoing the library (essentially tagging everything twice) so that the video files are tagged (to work in iTunes) and have another copy that uses .nfo files (for Kodi) is a little overwhelming.

Thanks again and I apologize if I'm bringing up stuff that has been flushed out before.  I don't mean to beat a dead horse.

Thanks.  Brian

[Karellen]

No problems, they are just questions easily answered. As long as you don't get upset when you don't receive the answer you want... which happens so many times igh:

You can add to the Feature Request, but you must understand this is a volunteer project. If developers have no interest in creating an interface, then it won't be done. But it is open to the community to create one if they want. Anybody can contribute as long as the coding meets the Kodi standards. I know, you are not a coder, neither am I. But just trying to explain how it all works.

There is no interest in increasing or decreasing the user database. The product "is what it is". Users can either choose to use it... or not. If they choose to use it, then they need to be aware they will need to adjust their perspective if they are moving over from other software.

You mentione "Album Art". Sorry, I thought we were talking about Videos- Movies and TV Shows. Are you referring to Music?

[bjhille]

Definitely not upset as I understand this is all volunteer work, but still hoping that someone takes pitty on an old soul like myself.  lol!

Yeah, I said album art because I don't know what to call it.  I am talking about videos as I have no use for a large portable music player...I have an ipod for that.  I only need/want to be able to take my movies and tv shows with me when I travel.  I'm still married to iTunes because of my ipads/ipods/other appletv's.  That's why I was really hoping for a slick solution to be able to use my existing tagging (it works for everything else I do).

All I want, is be to able to load (via FTP/iTunes/whatever) videos (movies or tvshows), go through some type of scan to update internal databases with information from iTunes or the file itself.  In MetaZ it's just referred to as an image.  I don't need want trailers, additional information, screenshots, etc.  I don't need the solution to work with music or pictures....just videos (simple ask, right??).  Seems to be more complicated than I thought!  I didn't realize what I had while the Gen 1 AppleTV was supported until now it isn't.  lol!

Thanks for your help.  I really appreciate it.

[bjhille]

For what it's worth, I did determine that the poster art is indeed embedded in the MP4 file.  I can use ffmpeg to extract it, so implementation of this feature would remove the need to have an internet connection.  Now, you wouldn't have the fan art, etc. but at least you have the same tag information in Kodi as you did in iTunes.