Plugin Suite Wishlist

[jimbruskalski]

Hello,

I am pretty new to GB-PVR, although I am most defintely NOT new to programming, so I am not completely sure what plugins are out there already and what ones are currently being developed. Not wanting to re-invent the wheel, or step on anyone else's toes and steal their thunder, let me know if you are currently developing or have already developed a plugin that is functionally the same as what I am proposing to make. If it does exist, pleae also let me know how I can help you make it better. Here is my proposed list of ideas:

• Calendar (ability to integrate with Google Calendar)
  
• Email notifier AND reader (integrates with Gmail)
  
• Parental controls for DVD's and videos. Not only locks from being viewed, but actually hides them from site
  
• A better interface for dealing with your music. Tagged based.
  
• Way to integrate with DVD profiler (collection.xml) to add all sorts of meta data to your DVD and video collections. Would also be nice to be able to use free web services to automatically either look up information or give links to more information (about actors, etc.) and to movie trailers.
  

Comments, suggestions, etc. gladly accepted.

[reven]

we have lots of music plugins, some are directory based, some are tag based, some are both/either.

my videos has the ability to protect items from viewing via pin numbers, but are displayed to the user still (i put everything protected in their own folder protect that).

a calendar plugin is being developed now.

theres a couple of email plugins, i dont know much about them.

there was the movieDB that used dvd profiler, but never finished. seems annoying to have to use a computer to get the dvd info and then use a plugin, i think thats why no one has finished a plugin that does this. easier just to integrate it into the plugin itself and lookup from imdb.com or something. you get most of the same info.

[jimbruskalski]

Hmm, several good ideas in there.

I might just scrap DVD profiler and integrate it directly. However, I found some of my obscure DVD titles not in the imdb, but were found when using DVD profiler. I do not know what sources DVD Profiler looks for its information. I will need to do some research on that end. That sounds like a good idea. It would also be nice to have links to trailers and such. Cross referencing of actors that played in other movies you own, etc.

I will have to do something about hiding locked content (videos and music alike).

I have played with a few of the music plugins and none were exactly what I wanted or had everything I needed in one. I might try to improve on them.

The calendar I have now thought to expand to a PIM. An email checker and reader that integrates with a contact mangement part, that also integrates with a calendar (of which integrates with Google Calendar. More could follow, but that is my main thing since that is what I use). With that could come a way to IM/chat with video and audio. I have not checked, but integration with existing buddylists (AIM, MSN, Google Talk, Yahoo, ICQ, IRC, etc.) would be nice. Clients like Trillian do it, so I am sure it is possible.

My biggest thing is I would like to see some of these plugins integrate with one another. I think that is one thing I have seen with some other plugins is that they truly are stand alone when it would be so much richer if several them could talk to one another and integrate in some way (like the PIM I mentioned above).

[reven]

dvdprofiler uses its own database, and thats just maintained by users manually entering the dvd info (so there will be errors). just the same as freedb/cddb.

it has a lot of info, but i dont think you can (well not legally) access their database. imdb is a lot easier to do (still not sure about the legals though).