Desktop Integrating Web Video grams and subscriptions. For content de- livered via live broadcast, it is a neces- sity. MythVideo In previous generations of MythTV, all video content that was not recorded from hardware tuners was accessible only through a separate plugin, Myth- Video [2]. MythVideo could play back almost any media type, but the integra- tion it provided with the rest of the sys- tem was poor. It used a separate storage directory and a separate database table, and it was buried in a separate part of the menu structure – as was its comple- ment of settings and preferences. It even used a different interface for navigating between videos, more akin to a simple filesystem browser than MythTV’s user- friendly Recordings screen. If you ©Todd Arena, 123RF.com Arena, ©Todd wanted to associate metadata with your files (i.e., “cover” images, dates, or syn- opses), you had to add that for each in- dividual file. That said, one good thing that Myth- Video brought to the party was support for any and every media type: It didn’t matter where the video came from, how it got to your computer, or whether it Integrate web video with MythTV was from a series, a standalone work, or even something you shot with your phone. MythTV’s Recordings interface is built around items that can be associated DVR meets web with an “air time” and a source channel. As I’ll describe, several of the web video With MythTV and a couple of plugins, you can merge Internet-delivered solutions find ways to cope with that set of constraints, with varying degrees of video right into your DVR playlist. BY NATHAN WILLIS success. Besides handling the lack of a “chan- nel” for web video, the list of require- eb-delivered video has come a with your MythTV system. With some ments for web video integration should long way in a few short years plugins and helper applications, you can probably include merging the new con- W– and I don’t mean user-devel- merge Internet-delivered video right into tent into the same media browser as oped, self-published content, either. your playlist, regardless of whether you your television recordings as much as Major television networks now offer a receive it via a BitTorrent, RSS, or Atom possible, so you can sort through all of substantial portion of their programming feed. your video in one place, search it, and online, enough that it can supplement To be fair, I should note that some even delete it when you’re done. Al- the traditional broadcast media (cable, Linux “media center” applications make though the ability to add or subscribe to over-the-air, and satellite). But, although web video a priority, like XBMC and new content from within MythTV would these content sources are effectively Boxee. If most of the programming you be nice, it is not absolutely essential. video-on-demand, they typically are not need to watch is available through feeds available in a way that lets you easily in- or websites, you might find it easier to MiroBridge tegrate them into a broadcast-centric install one of these applications and run Next, I’ll look at the most predictable of DVR system, like MythTV [1]. merrily along. For the average user, how- all video sources – those that come As always, though, the open source ever, no other open source media center through a standard RSS or Atom feed. community comes to the rescue. I’ll take application offers MythTV’s robust sup- This list includes video podcasts and a look at the different ways you can port for delivering live TV, scheduling re- quite a few Internet-only programs, but seamlessly merge online video sources cordings, and managing recurring pro- not just indie productions or niche top- 72 ISSUE 09 UBUNTU USER WWW.UBUNTU-USER.COM 072-076_webvideo.indd 72 4/26/11 12:11:36 PM Integrating Web Video Desktop ics. Some popular outlets, like The but you should Onion, make a standard feed-based understand what video source available. These feeds are a they do. To begin, big win for MythTV users because they configure Myth- serve up the same content regardless of TV’s storage di- the application used. The broadcaster rectories for might be targeting iPad owners, but the graphics. In the standardized delivery mechanism makes MythTV front that assumption irrelevant. end, open Utili- Currently, the nicest option for feed ties/ Setup | Setup sources is a plugin named MiroBridge | Media Settings | [3]. MiroBridge uses the cross-platform Video Settings | video podcast client Miro [4] to manage General Settings. feeds and download videos in the back- You can choose ground, but it also implements a “virtual directories for recording device” to MythTV. The core movie posters, functionality comes in a Python script screenshots, ban- Figure 1: Mythbuntu’s MiroBridge setup tool simplifies the named mirobridge.py that quietly runs ners, and fan art. installation and configuration process. the Miro app to check your subscribed Whichever direc- feeds for new content in a background tories you choose, make sure they will By default, MiroBridge assigns the vir- process, downloads any new videos also be accessible to Miro. tual Miro Channel to channel number available, then shuts down Miro and in- Next, you will want a “Miro Channel” 999. If you have a real channel 999 in serts the new videos into MythTV. The icon – Mythbuntu Control Centre installs your lineup, you can change this setting result is that subscribed videos appear in one for you automatically, but you can with the mirobridge.py script. To assign the Watch Recordings list alongside nor- also grab it from the MiroBridge site and Miro to channel 12345, run: mal television recordings, complete with save it somewhere on your MythTV back the appropriate program and episode end. If you use channel icons for your /usr/share/mythtv/contrib/imports/U names. They are marked as originating other channels, the easiest solution is to mirobridge/mirobridge.py -c 9999:12345 on the Miro Channel, which, of course, save the Miro icon in the same directory. does not appear as a live TV source. Then, run the MiroBridge script from a In this example, the 9999: corresponds Many MythTV distributions (including command prompt, passing it the loca- to the internal XML channel ID, which Mythbuntu) now package MiroBridge as tion of the icon with the -C flag. For ex- you probably do not want to mess with, a standard option (Figure 1). Mythbuntu ample: but the -c flag requires it. even provides a configuration tool in its Now, you can launch Miro and find Mythbuntu Control Centre, but if you in- /usr/share/mythtv/contrib/imports/U some feeds. You can browse the Miro stalled your own MythTV package or mirobridge/mirobridge.py U project’s Miro Guide directory, which is don’t use Mythbuntu for other reasons, -C /home/nate/icons/U filled with popular and recommended don’t worry. Most of the effort involves miro_channel_icon.png sources, and subscribe to those you configuring Miro’s storage and feed pref- want to record regularly (Figure 2). Be erences to be compatible with MythTV’s Because the path to mirobridge.py might sure to remove any unwanted feeds that expectations. vary a bit depending on your distro, run come pre-selected in the app’s Video At the time of writing, the current re- locate mirobridge.py to find yours. Feeds list, though – it can be overkill. lease requires MythTV version 0.22+fixes or later, but you should check the project’s homepage before proceeding. You will need to install Miro itself on your MythTV back end (remem- ber, Miro acts as a recording device, so it must be accessible to the back end). Any recent version should suffice. Also, you will need Python 2.5 or greater, Im- ageMagick, FFmpeg, and the pyparsing Python library. All of these components should be available through the package manager. Next, I’ll walk through the setup pro- cess. Mythbuntu Control Centre abbrevi- ates several of the steps into a series of buttons and drop-down selection menus, Figure 2: Subscribing to video feeds in the Miro application. WWW.UBUNTU-USER.COM UBUNTU USER ISSUE 09 73 072-076_webvideo.indd 73 4/26/11 12:11:36 PM Desktop Integrating Web Video When you’re finished adding and re- The following daily cron slot: MythMediaMonitor to watch a Down- moving subscriptions, right-click on any loads directory and, if your BitTorrent that include non-alphabetic characters or 45 02 * * * /usr/share/mythtv/U client supports moving completed files have a very long feed name; then, choose contrib/imports/mirobridge/U to it, your completed downloads will au- Rename. You want to rename these feeds mirobridge.py U tomatically appear in your MythTV Re- to a shorter title without extra parenthe- -V "/tmp/mirobridge.log" 2>&1 cordings list. ses or punctuation marks, because they Also, if you own a movie or a series on can confuse MythTV’s media browser. will run the mirobridge.py script at DVD and want to rip the video into When you are done, quit Miro. 2:45am every day, logging the output to MythTV for easy viewing, you can have You also get to select how MiroBridge /tmp/mirobridge.log. MythMediaMonitor watch that directory treats videos. The default is to keep un- MiroBridge is a bit of a hassle to set as well. Certainly some people will pre- watched videos in the Recordings group up, certainly, but a large part of that fer the separate “archival” features of and move watched videos into Myth- stems from its reliance on an external MythVideo for that sort of long-term Video (hence the need to set MythVideo application (Miro itself).