new plugin: ViewStatus (see if file played before)

[SeeSoubleYou]

Hey all,

Sorry to break an old post open, but I wanted to wait for some time to see whether taconaut was right:

... I'd like avoiding to add a plugin system for thumbnails to the current code, as it will become obsolete in the not too distant future (we're talking months and not years anymore).

He wrote this almost 8 months ago and nothing has changed for thumbnails, so I guess he may have been wrong. Although I do think he has a point so I'm hoping to open the discussion a bit. I've been using my plugin for quite some time now and for me it works like a charm. The way it is implemented could be better though. For one, PMS should offer a way ta have a plugin handle thubmnail creation.

I think of a general class that has methods to create the thubnail as PMS does now in DLNAMediaInfo.parse, so it would contain at least getThumb (which returns the final thumb), getMPlayerThumb (to get the thumb via mplayer) and getFmpegThumb (guess). The latter two can be called within getThumb (which would be the default). In a plugin, this could be overwritten so that either a completely differrent thumbnail can be created, or, as in my case, the default thumbnail can be altered, so that it can have an overlay for example.
Let me know what you guys think. I would really like to be able to release a plugin that is ready to go, without people having to dive into the code.

If you know one of the developers of PMS, please point them towards this post, I would really value their input.

[chocolateboy]

The current thumbnail API is far from optimal. At the very least, getThumbnailInputStream() should be passed the current renderer. And ideally thumbnail generation (along with the thumbnail MIME-type) should be fully asynchronous, with PMS falling back to the default thumbnail unless/until the requested thumbnail has been generated.

[SeeSoubleYou]

The current thumbnail API is far from optimal. At the very least, getThumbnailInputStream() should be passed the current renderer. And ideally thumbnail generation (along with the thumbnail MIME-type) should be fully asynchronous, with PMS falling back to the default thumbnail unless/until the requested thumbnail has been generated.

Thanks for your reaction chocolateboy. What you describe, is that a milestone for PMS? I could take some time to work something out here, but it would be a waste of time if someone is allready working on this.

[chocolateboy]

Patches welcome. I started on both of these but didn't get very far and I no longer even have the unfinished code.

[SeeSoubleYou]

Patches welcome. I started on both of these but didn't get very far and I no longer even have the unfinished code.

Ok, I'll see if can do something. You obviously have thought about this before. What are your thoughts exactly? In the sense, what should be moved and what should be created in your opinion.