[Cyberdom]

Just out of interest, does anyone else have an nVidia Shield they are using with the Amber skin?
If so, then how is yours performing?

I'm also using a Nvidia Shield TV (2017 model) but I haven't updated to Android 11 yet, with Kodi 18.9 and Amber 3.2.152.

I also noticed that when opening a menu item for the first time (Movies, TV Shows, Music or TV), the display is slower than before.
Then, during the following accesses, the display is faster.

[Joeyrub]

Hey, Good Sunday morning all.
Quick question for you Bart (or if anyone else knows the answer...).
In the Skin Settings, Advanced, "Enable Special Features". What is that exactly? And how come when I click on it, nothing happens, it doesn't change from No to Yes.
So I'm kinda curious what these special features are. And how come I can't enable it? I'm assuming it's probably cause I'm missing a add-on or something like that? I'm just curious what that would enable if it worked.
Thanks..
Happy Sunday.

[bsoriano]

Hey, Good Sunday morning all.
Quick question for you Bart (or if anyone else knows the answer...).
In the Skin Settings, Advanced, "Enable Special Features". What is that exactly? And how come when I click on it, nothing happens, it doesn't change from No to Yes.
So I'm kinda curious what these special features are. And how come I can't enable it? I'm assuming it's probably cause I'm missing a add-on or something like that? I'm just curious what that would enable if it worked.
Thanks..
Happy Sunday.

@Joeyrub , happy Sunday to you as well.  You are correct, this was there for an addon called "Special Features" (https://kodi.wiki/view/Add-on:Special_Features), which did (does, just not for Matrix) pretty much waht the Extras addon (https://kodi.wiki/view/Add-on:Extras) does.  I will remove this from the Matrix version of Amber, since the addon does not work in Matrix.

Regards,

Bart

[Joeyrub]

Hey, Good Sunday morning all.
Quick question for you Bart (or if anyone else knows the answer...).
In the Skin Settings, Advanced, "Enable Special Features". What is that exactly? And how come when I click on it, nothing happens, it doesn't change from No to Yes.
So I'm kinda curious what these special features are. And how come I can't enable it? I'm assuming it's probably cause I'm missing a add-on or something like that? I'm just curious what that would enable if it worked.
Thanks..
Happy Sunday.

@Joeyrub , happy Sunday to you as well.  You are correct, this was there for an addon called "Special Features" (https://kodi.wiki/view/Add-on:Special_Features), which did (does, just not for Matrix) pretty much waht the Extras addon (https://kodi.wiki/view/Add-on:Extras) does.  I will remove this from the Matrix version of Amber, since the addon does not work in Matrix.

Regards,

Bart

Oh ok ok. I thought it was something like that.
But I guess I'm glad I mentioned it so you can at least remove it from Matrix at least.
Thanks for clarifying it

[billyrene]

on the startup background video setting would it be possible to choose a folder with multiple intro videos so a random video appears at kodi startup?

[dawsonjw]

Hi Bart
Just wondering if the Backup/Restore menu options on the Amber Setting menu are supposed to do anything. I have the backup addon installed which works fine.

Cheers

John

[fsurfer]

Hey, Bart.  Just wanted to ask about git updates.  When you make a Matrix update, is that also uploaded to the Nexus branch?  Also, kind of a dumb request.  In music list views, would it be possible to have the artist's name on the right be an on/off toggle.  If I'm looking at an album, I know who the artist or album artist is.  Thanks.

@bobrap , I have not been updating the Nexus branch with the Matrix updates.  And for the second label in list views, you can turn it off by going to Settings, Amber Settings, Media Views, List Views Options, and setting "Hide Second Label in List Views" to Yes:



With that, you should not see the label on the right in list views.  Please note that this affects ALL list views, not only music.

Regards,

Bart

Hi Bart,

can I ask when Leia branch will be updated? Github is showing 18 days since last update.

Thanks in advance

[bsoriano]

on the startup background video setting would it be possible to choose a folder with multiple intro videos so a random video appears at kodi startup?

@billyrene , I do not know how that would be possible from the skin side.  What you can do is create a playlist (.m3u or something like that) that has your intro videos, sorted randomly, and then you can point Amber to that playlist as your startup background.

Regards,

Bart

[billyrene]

on the startup background video setting would it be possible to choose a folder with multiple intro videos so a random video appears at kodi startup?

@billyrene , I do not know how that would be possible from the skin side.  What you can do is create a playlist (.m3u or something like that) that has your intro videos, sorted randomly, and then you can point Amber to that playlist as your startup background.

Regards,

Bart

ok great this worked perfectly thanks. one more thing. the intros i have are of different lengths. between 5 and 10 seconds. now if i put the setting on 10 seconds and it shows an intro that is 5 seconds long it plays another 5 seconds of another intro. is there any way around that?

[bsoriano]

is there any way around that?

@billyrene , not that I know of, since from the skin side I need to make it a fixed amount of time.

Regards,

Bart

[bsoriano]

Just wondering if the Backup/Restore menu options on the Amber Setting menu are supposed to do anything. I have the backup addon installed which works fine.

@dawsonjw , yes, they will launch the backup addon if you have it installed.  If you have both the script.xbmcbackup and the script.skin.helper.skinbackup addon installed and enabled, then Amber will use script.skin.helper.skinbackup, since it specifically backs up/restores skin settings.  If you only have script.xbmcbackup, then Amber will use that.  If you have neither, then Amber should prompt you to install script.skin.helper.skinbackup.

Regards,

Bart

[billyrene]

is there any way around that?

@billyrene , not that I know of, since from the skin side I need to make it a fixed amount of time.

Regards,

Bart

ok thanks very much

[dawsonjw]

Just wondering if the Backup/Restore menu options on the Amber Setting menu are supposed to do anything. I have the backup addon installed which works fine.

@dawsonjw , yes, they will launch the backup addon if you have it installed.  If you have both the script.xbmcbackup and the script.skin.helper.skinbackup addon installed and enabled, then Amber will use script.skin.helper.skinbackup, since it specifically backs up/restores skin settings.  If you only have script.xbmcbackup, then Amber will use that.  If you have neither, then Amber should prompt you to install script.skin.helper.skinbackup.

Regards,

Bart

Hi Bart
  thanks for your reply.  I only have script.xbmcbackup installed but the buttons do nothing.  I uninstalled it and tried again and the buttons ask for the addon to be installed.  You install it and once again they do nothing.  You can however run all the options from within addons menu.  Could you possibly try click one of the buttons too see what happens.  Any other thoughts?

cheers

John

[shedrock]

@bsoriano - Hey Bart,

I applied the latest Git changes to Amber Leia last night, but I've noticed that I no longer see the "Update Library" text in the sub-menu of the Home screen. It appears that you have added an option to hide this? If so, the I don't see the option in the skin settings, or maybe I am missing something here.

Also, since Artwork Downloader doesn't work anymore, at least for Leia, then why is there an option to use it in the Context Menu?

I usually make a backup of the skin before I apply git changes, but I actually forgot for the 1st time.

Regards,

Shedrock

[bsoriano]

I applied the latest Git changes to Amber Leia last night, but I've noticed that I no longer see the "Update Library" text in the sub-menu of the Home screen. It appears that you have added an option to hide this? If so, the I don't see the option in the skin settings, or maybe I am missing something here.

Also, since Artwork Downloader doesn't work anymore, at least for Leia, then why is there an option to use it in the Context Menu?

@shedrock , thanks for pointing this out.  The option is there, if you notice the label is blank.  I guess there is some issue with skinshortcuts that the new VARs which have the labels are not being shown correctly. 

The easiest fix without having to start from scratch with your menu/submenu/widget configuration is to go into the menu configuration dialog, and then change the label of the submenu item for updating the library to "$VAR[VideoScanLabelVar]" , without the quotes.  Do the same for the submenu items that were for updating the music library, in this case, change the label to "$VAR[MusicScanLabelVar]", without the quotes.

What I am doing differently now is that I separated the labels for the video library from those of the music library.  Before, if you were scanning/updating the video library, the music library "Update Library" submenu items would show "Stop Scanning", even if you were not scanning/updating the music library.  As you know, they can both be updating/scanning at the same time, or one can be updating while the other one is not.

I apologize for the inconvenience of having to go and change the labels yourself.

As for Artwork Downloader, I just removed the references to it from the Leia version.  There is a working version for Matrix which is being maintained.

Regards,

Bart