Media Center suggestions?

[kenj70]

I have to talk about this somewhere...

I want to build a very small, separate media center PC. But not just your typical media center PC. I want a set top box that is able to present video listings from websites featuring news and commentary. This is something all the current, well-known media center softwares either don't support or don't support very well. I want to create a tile, on screen, of user "channels" from not only YouTube, but also sites such as Bitchute, Dtube and Brighteon. No one (NO ONE) is doing this.

This presents two problems for which I am seeking advice:

1. I need what is often called a "ten foot interface." This is designed to be used on the living room HDTV from your easy chair or couch. That means you won't be able to read the text unless the on-screen tiles are real big. This is especially true for us seniors.
2. And, that interface needs to be "smart" or programmable. I tried using a current android TV device recently and the TV launcher is called the "Leanback Launcher." It's pretty good and the best so far. It orients tiles in three horizontal rows and when you hover or select within a row it automatically puts that row in the center and magnifies the size of the entire row by about thirty percent! Pretty neat, but not programmable enough for me. You have minimal control over the rows/tiles you see.

The reason I posted here is searching KFN there is an aging project named "LinuxMCE" which is based upon Kubuntu. Does anyone here remember LinuxMCE or has anyone used it?

Unfortunately the last stable release is five years old. That's 500 PC years - I think

KDE has lots of tweaks but making over sized tiles doesn't seem to be one of them. That's why I am looking for a TV oriented DE. One that is compatible with the underlying Linux I know.

In search here I also found something named "KDE Plasma Media Center." This looks to be about six years old since the only version 1.0.0.1 release. Anybody play with this, or hear about it even?

LinHES, Linux Home Entertainment System is another possibility. It shows a very recent release, but the components in it are likewise long in the tooth and not really supported anymore.

One good answer for my cobble version I have found so far is the SSB, Site Specific Browser, created by the Peppermint OS group. It is available separately as a .deb file and it works great in KDE Neon. For instance, I can paste in the address for the Linus Tech Tips channel on YouTube and it opens it up directly in my choice of Chrome, Chromium, Firefox or Vivaldi, sans the browser header and scroll bars. Those controls are still available at any time if needed. Pretty neat!

My impression is that those who want to play their home media collections have well established market leaders such as Kodi and Plex. The others I just mentioned don't have the critical mass to foster development.

So - - that leaves me to cobble something together that meets my (special) needs. And since I am not a programmer I have to make do with what I can find. I would appreciate your suggestions since it is so easy to overlook possibilities. And you KBN folks have been mighty helpful in the past.

-=Ken=-

[WWDERW]

I'm interested in this as well.

I tried to do something a few months back, but I found nothing that had everything (which my needs don't appear to be like what you need) that I needed and if I could add in bits to get what I wanted/needed, I was a little leary of the source (and I couldn't find an easy way to vet the underlying code).

In the mean time, I just used a regular Linux OS, but I would swap it for a media center based version if there is such a current (and complete) beast out there.

[claydoh]

Are you sure that Kodi can't do this, with some plugin or theme and configuring, and using Favorites I am most positive it can.


Then there are Android TV boxen (Mibox, Nvidia Shield, ChannelMaster Stream+), which are a bit less flexible, and may or may not have apps for bitchute, et al. But these can also run Kodi, and usually have a remote already. They aren't always as flexible in the UI due to the sofa-sitters UI, and do depend on the individual Android app developers to support the 10 foot interface, Many don't, and a lot need to be side-loaded anyway, which is awkward on this sort of UI. Of course thse require a hardware purchase.

I would poke around Kodi's forums and see what they have to say, someone probably has done exactly what you are looking to do.


My PC and Android TV boxes are still packed away till I move into my new place, so I can't quickly show you any screenshots, to see if this is similar to what you want, or if I can have Kodi set up in a way you might like.

[claydoh]

I'm interested in this as well.

I tried to do something a few months back, but I found nothing that had everything (which my needs don't appear to be like what you need) that I needed and if I could add in bits to get what I wanted/needed, I was a little leary of the source (and I couldn't find an easy way to vet the underlying code).

In the mean time, I just used a regular Linux OS, but I would swap it for a media center based version if there is such a current (and complete) beast out there.

Stick to the official Kodi forums and repos , check dates, and you avoid most of the sketchy pirating junk and the like. And ask questions

[WWDERW]

Stick to the official Kodi forums and repos , check dates, and you avoid most of the sketchy pirating junk and the like. And ask questions

I agree 100%, unfortunately, that eliminates Kodi as the only way to extend functionality for what I would want would be through a 3rd party as the Kodi project doesn't provide it officially (and from what info I got, they don't plan on it).

Oh well. Desktop Linux works, I'll just stick with that.

[kenj70]

Hi claydoh.

Thanks for suggestions. I guess I should have given a little more history of my quest. I have dabbled with Kodi and other media center applications for a number of years now. I am not looking for a conventional media center. And, current popular media center software does NOT do what I want! I have pestered people on the Kodi forums until they told me NO, Kodi will not do that. I also don't want a home automation system nor a IP phone system which some of these offer.

I want web browser links so big I can see them across the room and control them with a simple, Roku style remote control. The wife likes Roku so it has to be simple and easy, just like Roku.

I have been playing with my KDE DE and found I could make the desktop icons very large. That is a step in the right direction. I can also increase the font size substantially. However, I think this is going to be pretty crude and I am looking for a real TV interface. Have you heard of the Kubuntu based LinuxMCE?

-=Ken=-

[Bings]

Maybe stupid question but it doesn't work if you use a normal browser and zoom in?

[kenj70]

Maybe stupid question but it doesn't work if you use a normal browser and zoom in?

Hi Bings.

Yes - sort of. Just not real well. I have tried various things that worked pretty good such as a Chromebit dongle and they all require a wireless keyboard. Not wife friendly! She really likes the Roku because it is a simple remote. There are no workable web browsers in Roku and you can't get a reasonable link list either.

What I want is a "Leanback Launcher" for Linux. In the following photo notice that the highlighted row of tiles is about 30 percent bigger than the other rows.

https://i0.wp.com/androidtv.news/wp-...5536.png?ssl=1

Edit: Here is a video featuring Ubuntu TV. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jq_WaOLjdyQ&t=23s Note that this app doesn't have an obvious option for web video watching either. Sigh. Everything I am finding is old. Abandoned after a flurry of activity 5 - 7 years ago. I would really like to see an interface like this that is compatible with current release software.

-=Ken=-

[kenj70]

Website TV browsing in the Living Room

Maybe I didn't title this topic correctly! Ask a poor question - get a poor answer.

As I continue to research - I thought, "Website video is 'media,' so that means I must want a media center." Now I think there is a better question - with possibly better answers. That's why I changed the title of this post.

Simplifying the requirements is likely to help. I need to watch videos on video websites on a living room TV using a simple remote control. And, nothing else.

To that end I discovered (while wading through a half-dozen abandoned web TV projects) that there is a way to modify web browsers through extensions to work properly on an HDTV. And, although the original extension is no longer supported the author recommended a current extension named "Zoom Page WE" that works quite well with Chrome/Chromium, Firefox and - - Vivaldi, and likely any other browser built using current innards. Very nice indeed!

https://lifehacker.com/set-up-a-fire...ly-sur-5515323
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/fir.../zoom-page-we/

I don't know how many people have the same interest as I do, but combining this extension with a Site Specific Browser gets me closer to web videos on the living room TV than I have ever been. I don't have a rig for the TV yet so I am testing on my main rig. Now, if I could only get huge web links on my desktop...

-=Ken=-

[woodsmoke]

Hi
This is an interesting thread and is near and dear to my heart. really.

But... I may have some bad news.

A) I recently, due to all the retired and part time teachers nationwide having lost most of our classes, been FORCED to actually drop cable. And I'm not the only teacher doing it, for my cable provider, Suddenlik, it is a "system wide problem'.

But...be that as it may...

I have spent the last month, give or take, using "internet" exclusively to watch t.v.

Suddenlink actually recognizes that the teachers are not dropping cable because they want to and... generosity will be repaid...they quadrupled my band width and gave me more gigs of use...for free. Really... kind of amazing.

So...all well and good for internet...except...

Although the stations SHOUT LOUDLY that they want people to use "streaming" services, actually the do a LOT OF SUBTLE things to get one so irritated that one eventully goes back to cable.

TO THAT END ...

any kind of "linux" thing that gets between them and your "tv" is pobably going to have problems such as the browser "spinning" ... it is not the browser it is the station doing it on purpose, the only realy way to alleviate it is to remove cookies...

BUT...if you do that then they still have you ISP and can, I think, just automatically search a database and figure out who you are and set the thing to spinnin...

Logins... they will let you have a "preview" but then will kick you out saying that you need to "Authenticate" your provider...like NBC says you need to authenticate Suddenlink and you have to go through multiple screens to do it and then it still does not work.

This is not the cable company it is the stations themselves

And...I really do think that when they detect that you are using one of the mentioned apps or...Operating Systems they might...MIGHT just not interact with it.

Other stations such as Fox News, AND LET US NOT GO THERE... Fox has created a whole NEW thing called Foxwhatever and you cannot view anything unless YOU PAY A FEE TO FOX... not to Suddenlink but to FOX...

So...who wants to do that...and if it works...then I think that ALL stations will immediately jump on it to collect more filthy luchre...

So... I applaud your efforts but am just saying that it all may be for naught...

HOWEVER...here is my suggestion as to a "thing"...

IS...maybe look closer to home and that simpler might be better.

Since I made the tweak of KDE NEON for my home media center, i wrote about it in a thread that is now buried in the dungeons about "Kparadigm Shift"...

I have every single media player, music player, video player there is on the computer and the big screen t.v.

HOWEVER I DO NOT HAVE THE TELEVISION BOX, whatever, itself running INTO the computer so that i have never been able to test the following list.

Freetux TV is designed to do precisely what you want. It is supposedly not being well supported but it does play a lot of stuff and also some "streams".

Kaffein has an actual TAB in the GUI for television and also when you just open it there is a box in the screen, number 5 for "digital t.v.".

Xine has a button for playing "analog t.v." in settings. It might also work for a digital setup.

VLC has an option for a "capture device" one of which is "digital t.v.".

There are also apps which do not hook into a t.v. box but will stream certain channels.

There is an app called "Streemio" which is hooked into folks in other countries that post episodes of various t.v. series and films. It ACTS like a t.v. but... not everything is necessarily provided. you have to enable different sources but once it is set up things work hunky dory.

Musique has an absolutely astounding number of "songs" and "artists" that PRE LOAD... but not things like NBC or CBS.

I have been using the KDE media player which is...called... Plasma Media Center...it takes a LOT of different formats of stuff and might actually hook into a television IF it can "find" it...but since I do not have a t.v. hooked in do not know.

The only reason that I do not use it exclusively is that it does not recognize a USB stick, but it PRESENTS like a television!! and it indexes every single video, music and IMAGE file on the computer and presents them with nice big graphics.

So, the point here is that just MAYBE one of the above can actually hook into the television device...

THEN the problem is whether the "station" will actually accept "going out to you" or will it balk.

so, anyway, I would really at least give Plasma Media Center a look for just the sheer DISPLAY...it is a sight to behold.

Sorry I could not help more AND I WILL watch this thread because I really am very interested in it.

woody

[TWPonKubuntu]

@woodsmoke,
Thanks for the recommendation on media software. I gave up TV long ago (20 years?) but do occasionally run videos (downloaded, not streamed) on my computers. We have a cable internet connection, but had to argue with the cable provider to NOT include the television feed in the package. It was an option to go only internet, but the provider tried to claim we would save money (not true, just advertising hype).

As a general rule, I find video information presentation to be too intrusive and uncontrollable. Add to that that it is sometimes (often) too fast (my aging brain). Hence I tend to stick to text presentation of news reports. I have disabled most scripts (javascript, java) in my browsers to prevent automatic running of video feeds, gifs and ads. I use the NoScript browser extension to do that blocking.

Thanks again, I'll look into the tools you discussed.

[kenj70]

Hi Woody!

Thanks for your interest. In my quest I have established accounts on some other forums but none of them have the participation of KFN. It does help to just to talk about these issues.

Sorry to hear about your problems with your Internet provider. I, too, am retired and got real tired of the outrageous cable fees which, somehow, they seem to increment over the span of a year or so, until you are paying $200 a month. That much money for mostly stuff we never watch, and ultimately subsidizing channels of which we do not approve. So, about four years ago, with wife's approval, we became "cord cutters." Not completely, since we need Internet. But for local channels I put up the best UHF deep fringe antenna I could find, and Channel Master's excellent mast mounted amplifier because there is a 40 db attenuator, in the form of a ridge, sitting between us and Seattle. We get ~8 decent channels along with their subchannels. It cost about one month's cable channel fee, so paid for itself quickly. However, after about a year or so we find that we seldom look at the local channels. There seems to be a "weaning away" process.

What also helped is finding the Roku stick device. Roku has an excellent YouTube channel app which works very well. We can get much of our news and commentary as well as entertainment from just YouTube on Roku. There are reportedly over 3000 channel apps available! You can buy in for as little as 40 dollars. The Roku is "agnostic" as far as sponsorship. A worthy competitor Firestick is oriented toward Amazon purchases and that is another monster we try to avoid. The only problem with YouTube on Roku is that YouTube lately has been censoring some of the content providers we prefer, causing them to relocate to other websites such as Bitchute, Dtube and Brighteon. And since Roku doesn't have a channel "app" for those websites we are forced to find other ways to view those videos on the living room TV.

Woody, you have been most helpful in pointing out the software, some of which I had already found but some which I had not.
Freetux TV allows you to watch IPTV. Not exactly what I wanted, but interesting.
Kaffeine is a media player which I plan to check out.
Xine - I set to DVB and it promptly locked up. I had to Kill the process!
VLC - I tried the Capture device/Digital TV but, no dice. Interesting!
Stremio - is a simple streaming channel that offers various Videos/TV programs. There are numerous of these apps, especially on Roku. Not interesting to us.
Musique - not interesting to us.
Plasma Media Center - I thought I had already looked at this and had found it was a long-in-the-tooth media center project but, NO! It is currently supported and I found it in Discover - of all things. I will check this out.

On another front, I had been contemplating buying a Raspberry Pi to run this Internet web TV experiment. The Pi would end up costing about $100 usd. Building a new mini ITX rig with a Ryzen APU would cost about $200. The market leader in web TV performance is the Nvidia Shield Android TV box which costs about $180. I don't want to pay that much. So I went to my local PC repair shop this afternoon and they had a used Gateway small form factor PC built in 2012 for just $100. A working PC with suitable horsepower for $100! I'm going to have some fun now, trying out all these options. I will of course keep this topic going with my results.

-=Ken=-

[kenj70]

I installed 'Plasma Media Center' in Discover. I am severely underwhelmed! It finds all my local audio, photos and videos. Fine, but how do you configure the durn thing? I tried numerous shortcut keys, function keys and so on but no cigar. I hooked up one of my air mouse remote controls and the D-pad right and left arrows work - slowly. The air mouse is very efficient for selecting a file though - if that fits your requirements.Typical KDE project, no documentation, no user guide and no support. I searched through the KDE forums and found some references - five years old. The only shortcut I found is Alt-F4 exits the program. Since PMC has NO application for Internet video I am done with it.

I made an interesting discovery, just messing around with widgets. I added the Quicklaunch launcher widget and started adding website links. I was looking for a way to layout a grid of very large web links that would fill the screen so they would be visible from 15 feet away. The Quicklaunch launcher can be resized to fill 95 percent of the screen and show three rows of four links for a total of twelve. That ought to be enough for me. Each link would then open a Site Specific Browser to the desired website channel videos. I guess this launcher was intended to permanently stay somewhere on the desktop because, once created, it stays there until you delete it. The only way to work with the rest of the interface/DE is to shrink the size real small and then expand it again when you want it big. This will work. Not a true TV interface, but a cobbled one until something better comes along.

Next post I will describe the Site Specific Browser. Those are kinda neat. -=Ken=-

[kenj70]

Now for a reveal of the Site Specific Browser

The Site Specific Browser (SSB) looks like it is ideal for a so-called 10-foot living room interface. The SSB concept isn't new but has been well implemented by the folks who distribute the Peppermint Linux OS. The application is named 'Ice" and is freely distributed and appears to run properly on most any distribution. It is a .deb file. Note: download links are hard to find!

The only link I can find to download the latest version of Ice is in this YouTube video. It is the link to launchpad.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_c...&v=vOsoi4mKcQM

I tried looking on github and simply could not determine the proper location of this file. Go figure - I must be missing something. Meanwhile, here is the link from that video which will immediately download the proper file:

https://www.youtube.com/redirect?redir_token=K_Wj7KQ-pPEYAjI6XkyhOapsMDl8MTU1NDg1ODk4NkAxNTU0NzcyNTg2&v=vOsoi4mKcQM&q=https%3A%2F%2Flaunchpad.net%2F%7Epeppermintos%2F%2Barchive%2Fubuntu%2Fp9-release%2F%2Bfiles%2Fice_5.3.4_all.deb&event=video_description

In addition to that video here is a link to how to use the Ice application on the Peppermint OS website:

https://peppermintos.com/guide/ice/

Essentially many modern web applications offer much advanced functionality and SSBs allow these apps to be more directly integrated with the desktop. Ice now supports SSB's through four web browsers, Chrome, Chromium, Firefox, and Vivaldi so feel free to install whichever of these browsers you prefer, and rest assured you'll still be able to use Ice to create your SSB's.

SSBs allow an application to function in more of a standalone method than running them directly through the web browser. In addition they allow for the user to take advantage of additional screen space as they don't include all the functions and menus of a browser.

Time now to go put together my little web TV computer.
BTW, I am using one of three air mouses (mice?) that were used during my Android TV box experiments about four years ago. If you turn them over they reveal a complete, tiny keyboard. They work real well.

-=Ken=-

[Snowhog]

Hmm. Well, I just copied the .deb file name from the youtube video link you posted (ice_5.3.4_all.deb) and it found as the first two hits:

ICE on Debian - Peppermint OS Forumhttps://forum.peppermintos.com/index.php?topic=7559.0
Ice ssb from Peppermint « SliTaz Forumforum.slitaz.org › English Support › Packages