[jctennis]

I don't see this behavior using the "Recommend Channels" import... which channels do you see this issue with? FYI; To my knowledge, this "bug" is limited to manually created plugin channels that use the t1m common module as a dependency (in this case tubitv).

It was manually created channels based upon one TV show each. I can't imagine you would want to add those to the recommend section because there would be literally THOUSANDS of options [emoji23].

Here is my use case, in my effort to pass the wife test I need to have a bunch of murder shows available for her (what is it with people and wanting to hear stories about real life serial killers and murderers?) But simply choosing Crime TV for Tubi doesn't exactly do it because in my experience the default channel behavior does not shuffle the shows up in any way and more or less seems to play all of the first listed series, then all of the second listed series and so on and so forth. I also have no way of excluding shows from that channel because they have to be about real murders and not fictional ones for some reason (I am afraid she watches Forensic Files so much so she knows how to get away with it when she inevitably kills me in my sleep.) I assume both of those problems will be able to be solved when advanced channel rules are fully implemented but this was my attempted workaround for the time being.

Just thinking out loud here, but what I really wish is that I could use an add-on to add these shows from Tubi, Crackle, Pluto and the like to my kodi library as strm files and just create smart playlists. However no add-on exists that I am aware of that can do that and actually can provide the duration information with an .nfo file or something so PTVL is able to use it. If anyone is aware of one, please correct me on that.

Unfortunately, any plugins that use the t1m module will have these issues regardless of how you use them... generate strm's, skin widgets, PseudoTV... it has to do with the way this module provides information to Kodis VFS. I do not plan to rewrite TubiTV, only to simply revive the old project.

For your use case, I would create a node that links to all the plugin paths you want to include and choose random sort... again, this won't fix plugins that use the t1m module; however, it will pool your "murder shows" into a random list.

I didn't even think of using a node. That is brilliant! Thanks for that.