2008-09-07, 12:19
Hi Billy,
Thanks for an excellent tool! I'm using the latest rendition v1.731 now and I must say that you have put a lot of thought and effort into this through the generations. You are the reason I've started using the library feature. You certainly have put power in our hands...
If I may be so bold as to put in some requests for once you're done with the bug-fixing:
1. A previous poster suggested a 'Lock' option to guard against changes to existing nfo files and prevent a future IMDb scrape from overwriting a 'personalised' nfo file - if I could add my 2c, I would propose at least to lock/archive the IMDb ID 'tt#' to prevent the scraper from assuming that another movie title is ranked higher and overwriting previous labour) - I had this issue for example with 'All the King's Men' where a 1949-title kept overwriting the 2006-title data when I hit 'scan folders for new movies'. I read an earlier post that if this program found an existing nfo file then the scrape would be skipped but through an unfortunate experience I didn't find this to be the case (much to my dismay). I haven't tried it since as I am too afraid to risk losing the fruits of my customised labour without a 'Backup' facility, so I just exclude my 'scraped' folders - problem is I lose the benefit of updates but movies aren't too serious.
2. A 'Lock All' toggle feature so that, once scanned, one could lock all scraped nfo's and proceed to unlock and update one at a time for 'fine-tuning' or drop additional movies into the movies folder and scan only for those new ones...
3. Possibly a 'Lock' for the cover art to ensure that a (precious, custom) tbn file isn't overwritten in future scrapes?
4. A 'Stop Scraping' button to abort a scrape (obviously) - only current way to abort at the moment is to end the process from what I can gather.
5. A 'Backup' and 'Restore' feature so one can play with new features without risking the hard work put in to date in customising earlier scrapes. Possibly this would come in with the move to your previously-mentioned single xml database?
6. An option not to download series fanart - this takes a lot of time when setting up one's series folders one-by-one. Would it not be possible to have the first lookup just get the basics such as Title and TVDb ID? The rest of the lookups could come through with the actual episode scrape? Same for actor thumbs - a toggle switch to include/exclude would be 'nice'.
7. The Series banner display - could this have an option to scrape from banner.jpg rather than folder.jpg? I don't know how others do it, but I tend to use folder.jpg as a folder thumb in Folder thumb view in poster-format and reserve banner-format media art for the banners of Series.
Thus:
folder.jpg (poster/portrait format)
banner.jpg (banner/landscape format) - possibly cycle through banner#.jpg
Or:
Movie/SeriesFileName.poster#.jpg for posters
Movie/SeriesFileName.banner#.jpg for banners
No pressure...
Thanks for an excellent tool! I'm using the latest rendition v1.731 now and I must say that you have put a lot of thought and effort into this through the generations. You are the reason I've started using the library feature. You certainly have put power in our hands...
If I may be so bold as to put in some requests for once you're done with the bug-fixing:
1. A previous poster suggested a 'Lock' option to guard against changes to existing nfo files and prevent a future IMDb scrape from overwriting a 'personalised' nfo file - if I could add my 2c, I would propose at least to lock/archive the IMDb ID 'tt#' to prevent the scraper from assuming that another movie title is ranked higher and overwriting previous labour) - I had this issue for example with 'All the King's Men' where a 1949-title kept overwriting the 2006-title data when I hit 'scan folders for new movies'. I read an earlier post that if this program found an existing nfo file then the scrape would be skipped but through an unfortunate experience I didn't find this to be the case (much to my dismay). I haven't tried it since as I am too afraid to risk losing the fruits of my customised labour without a 'Backup' facility, so I just exclude my 'scraped' folders - problem is I lose the benefit of updates but movies aren't too serious.
2. A 'Lock All' toggle feature so that, once scanned, one could lock all scraped nfo's and proceed to unlock and update one at a time for 'fine-tuning' or drop additional movies into the movies folder and scan only for those new ones...
3. Possibly a 'Lock' for the cover art to ensure that a (precious, custom) tbn file isn't overwritten in future scrapes?
4. A 'Stop Scraping' button to abort a scrape (obviously) - only current way to abort at the moment is to end the process from what I can gather.
5. A 'Backup' and 'Restore' feature so one can play with new features without risking the hard work put in to date in customising earlier scrapes. Possibly this would come in with the move to your previously-mentioned single xml database?
6. An option not to download series fanart - this takes a lot of time when setting up one's series folders one-by-one. Would it not be possible to have the first lookup just get the basics such as Title and TVDb ID? The rest of the lookups could come through with the actual episode scrape? Same for actor thumbs - a toggle switch to include/exclude would be 'nice'.
7. The Series banner display - could this have an option to scrape from banner.jpg rather than folder.jpg? I don't know how others do it, but I tend to use folder.jpg as a folder thumb in Folder thumb view in poster-format and reserve banner-format media art for the banners of Series.
Thus:
folder.jpg (poster/portrait format)
banner.jpg (banner/landscape format) - possibly cycle through banner#.jpg
Or:
Movie/SeriesFileName.poster#.jpg for posters
Movie/SeriesFileName.banner#.jpg for banners
No pressure...