[Salomon]

Hi guys,
This request is really simple, and I find it very unusual that is not out there.
There are some of us that buy TV shows by dvd or bluray discs. Transferring them to hdds in iso format preserves all contents and data... but the naming conventions force us to have definitions of multiple episodes embeded into the iso file names.
Adding and scraping them into the tv shows library creates multiple entries for a single disc, which is not very pleasing to the eye specially if one is looking for simplicity in the navigation.
Rather, may I suggest, it will be better to have an option to scrap tv shows by disc. For instance, say I have “John Adams” show that comprises 3 discs, two or three episodes per disc. The really simple way to see it in the library would be:
TV SHOWS
— JOHN ADAMS
—— DISC 1
——— EPISODE 1 name or number
——— EPISODE N
—— DISC 2
...

Out of which, the only playable items should be the discs, while the others are selectable to view information. And even better, there should be an option to not display season/episode info at all, just simply select a disc or part to play. Why not select an episode directly to play, with the advantage of kodi knowing the right disc image to play? Well, because playing the disc takes you to the main menu, from which you have to select the episode again anyway which is confusing and misleading, and after a few times, gets boring.
Context: I am using powerdvd as external player, simply because bd playback is not yet a quality feature in kodi, and honestly cyberlink has a better quality of playback. Ask me for my integration with kodi-powerdvd-flirc-logitech Ir remote, which makes my htpc a trully keyboardless/mouseless appliance. I can contribute a lot because I’ve mapped tons of functions for this!

Kind regards, and thanks in advance!

[Karellen]

It sounds like a nightmare.

First you must realise that Kodi does not provide any content. That also includes metadata and artwork. So you need to first convince TVDB, IMDB, TMDB and others to support disks. (won't happen).

Then once those database have the disk entries, you then need an add-on developer to upgrade the scrapers.

And then how do you handle release versions which can (but not often) vary by country?

Kodi is not about replicating the DVD/Bluray (annoying) experience. It is about presenting the title to you directly.

Nice suggestion but nowhere as simple as you are implying. It won't happen.

[Wimpie]

I was working on an addon that gives this fuctionality. Work has stalled for the moment, but I might start working again on it when I have time (real life is busy).

You can see a demo here: https://youtu.be/IOmNMreRB98

The demo plays directly from the iso's! No ripping has been done...

This is for a movie, but the same result is possible for a tv-show (just as if those episode are mkv's instead of on a bluray).

You would have a  following directory structure:

TV SHOWS
--JOHN ADAMS
---- S00E05.strm
---- S01E01.strm
---- S01E02.strm
---- S05E09.strm
---- ...
---- BIUfiles
------ johnadams_S01D01.iso
------ johnadams_S01D02.iso
------ ...

Using this file structure, Kodi is able to scrape the episodes. You would also go directly to the episode, if you select this episode (only using Kodi's own internal player, NO EXTERNAL PLAYER SUPPORT!).

You would have to enter the correct br playlist for the correct episode. Won't work 'magically', but I was thinking about a solution to solve that (would require community support).

Steps done/todo:
- At the moment the service works, but you have to manually make a XML file that links the episode/movie/extra to a .mpls file
- working on a GUI to build these XML files more user-friendly (= almost done, this is where I am atm)
- make online db that contains this xml data. Each disc is identified by an unique hash (derived from Unit_Key_SO.inf and 2 other files). The GUI would retrieve the xml from the online db, if available. Otherwise the user has to enter this data himself (and hopefully upload for other users to the online db). This is still very much a work in progress...


Look at: Bluray Iso Utils in sig (warning: is at the moment for 'advanced users' (read not yet user friendly, you need to know something about computers/how Kodi works/...))

[Salomon]

Mmmm... not really.
Hear this out. By keeping the file name conventions as they are right now you are telling kodi what seasons and episodes are in each disk. Then, no need for the websites to support discs. The scraper should pick up all the metadata as it does today... what I am impliying is that kodi can present the info by disc, rather than by season/episode. And by enabling in settings a choice on wether to present episodes at all, you can increase the usability and simplicity because, lets face it, wifes and sons only care about playing disc x or y.

[Av3nged]

Is that similar to the using bookmarks method?
https://kodi.wiki/view/Naming_video_file...i-Episodes

[Salomon]

Mmmm... not really.
Hear this out. By keeping the file name conventions as they are right now you are telling kodi what seasons and episodes are in each disk. Then, no need for the websites to support discs. The scraper should pick up all the metadata as it does today... what I am impliying is that kodi can present the info by disc, rather than by season/episode. And by enabling in settings a choice on wether to present episodes at all, you can increase the usability and simplicity because, lets face it, wifes and sons only care about playing disc x or y.

@Karellen

[Wimpie]

Mmmm... not really.
Hear this out. By keeping the file name conventions as they are right now you are telling kodi what seasons and episodes are in each disk. Then, no need for the websites to support discs. The scraper should pick up all the metadata as it does today... what I am impliying is that kodi can present the info by disc, rather than by season/episode. And by enabling in settings a choice on wether to present episodes at all, you can increase the usability and simplicity because, lets face it, wifes and sons only care about playing disc x or y.

 Great idea, but you need 'magic' to get it to work.

How does Kodi know that 00000.mpls is episode 1, or is 00850.mpls episode 1?

Some discs contains episodes with a recap of previous episodes, and also the same episode without this recap.

Some discs have 1 .mpls file per episode (approx 45 min long), some discs have all the episodes concatenated to 1 big .mpls file (approx 3 hours long for 4 episodes), and the bluray player knows through it's java program/menu where episode x ends and episode y starts.

How does Kodi even know that this disc contains 5 episodes (or 6, or ...)?

Kodi can do a lot, but again, it needs 'magic' to handle all of this...

Just naming the disc "Great show_s01e01.s01e02.iso" isn't enough info for Kodi to do what you want.

[Wimpie]

Mmmm... not really.
Hear this out. By keeping the file name conventions as they are right now you are telling kodi what seasons and episodes are in each disk. Then, no need for the websites to support discs. The scraper should pick up all the metadata as it does today... what I am impliying is that kodi can present the info by disc, rather than by season/episode. And by enabling in settings a choice on wether to present episodes at all, you can increase the usability and simplicity because, lets face it, wifes and sons only care about playing disc x or y.

 Kodi works with episodes, metadata is scraped for episodes.

If you want to display a 'discview', then this disc contains eg 4 episodes. For which episode should Kodi display metada? the first? what if the disc contains extras (season 00)?

The closest to what you want is the video/files view. Just go to the directory that contains the disc and select the disc you want to play. You can recognize the disc by name, eg "Great show_s01e01.s01e02.iso".

This way you just play disc x or y (but you wont get the metadata).