2015-12-23, 22:20
It's great to see this plugin be maintained and updated in some form by others! Advanced Launcher is too important to Kodi to let it disappear. Thanks to everyone who's keeping it alive.
To the people questioning about viewtypes available for Advanced Launcher: It all depends on the skin. AL is identified as a Program Add-On, so the viewtypes that are available for it are only the ones that have been made available for use with Program Add-Ons in that given skin. Whether or not they support extra information like release year and developer depends on how those functions are coded in on a per-skin basis.
As for scrapers, I'd like it if they still existed. Considering all of the main aspects of Kodi (movies, TV shows, music) all have various scrapers for them, I think it's only right for AL to have some, too. Mainly for various data, though. Like descriptions, dates, and publishers.
This brings me to a question: Does the GameFAQs scraper not work anymore? I always used it for game descriptions because most of them for each game come from the back of a given game's boxart. It's my ideal source for information. If it currently works, can anyone help me with it? I've already tried reinstalling AL and that doesn't work. If it doesn't, can it possibly be fixed? I'd really appreciate if it was working again.
I'd be fine art scraping wasn't carried over. Unlike other forms of media, games images are just a hodgepodge in terms of consistency of sources and quality for the vast majority of systems. Also:
Even when fanart is available, it tends to be exactly that: art done by a fan, typically in a hastily-done manner. All of the artwork I use for my games are official artwork released for them. Whether that be game covers from various regions, official wallpapers, fleshed-out concept artwork, or promotional material, I've got something for every game in my collection.
Of course, I have to spend a lot of time searching for the best available image to use as fanart. They're not something easily available from a single source. It's for this reason that I'm fine if scrapers no longer search for artwork online.
To the people questioning about viewtypes available for Advanced Launcher: It all depends on the skin. AL is identified as a Program Add-On, so the viewtypes that are available for it are only the ones that have been made available for use with Program Add-Ons in that given skin. Whether or not they support extra information like release year and developer depends on how those functions are coded in on a per-skin basis.
As for scrapers, I'd like it if they still existed. Considering all of the main aspects of Kodi (movies, TV shows, music) all have various scrapers for them, I think it's only right for AL to have some, too. Mainly for various data, though. Like descriptions, dates, and publishers.
This brings me to a question: Does the GameFAQs scraper not work anymore? I always used it for game descriptions because most of them for each game come from the back of a given game's boxart. It's my ideal source for information. If it currently works, can anyone help me with it? I've already tried reinstalling AL and that doesn't work. If it doesn't, can it possibly be fixed? I'd really appreciate if it was working again.
I'd be fine art scraping wasn't carried over. Unlike other forms of media, games images are just a hodgepodge in terms of consistency of sources and quality for the vast majority of systems. Also:
(2015-12-16, 15:45)Wintermute0110 Wrote: Regarding fanart... unfortunately fanart is only available for popular games. Most games do not have fanart no matter where you look for.
Even when fanart is available, it tends to be exactly that: art done by a fan, typically in a hastily-done manner. All of the artwork I use for my games are official artwork released for them. Whether that be game covers from various regions, official wallpapers, fleshed-out concept artwork, or promotional material, I've got something for every game in my collection.
Of course, I have to spend a lot of time searching for the best available image to use as fanart. They're not something easily available from a single source. It's for this reason that I'm fine if scrapers no longer search for artwork online.