International Cinema Listings plugin version 6.0 BETA - comments

[McBainUK]

BETA testers - post all your comments on this thread, easy to manage then.

Note that this is invite only. PM me if you want to get invloved.

[kayak4ever]

I am using zap2it in Canada and it works really well.

Good things first: I really like the screen that displays on the TV advising you that the update is in progress. However, because my first download took a long time, the screensaver came on and cancelled the popup window so I thought it was finished (my bad, since there was still a second message on the computer monitor advising that the update was still in progress).

The config panel and the popup instructions for obtaining on getting the codes are easy to follow.

Minor problems:
Although I have checked download trailers if available, the movies that have a trailer listed won't play. Could it be that I need a different program than before to play the trailers? When I checked on zap2it.com directly, I noticed that when you press "view trailer", you get a message asking you to choose between "700k Windows Media Broad Stream;300k Windows Media Broad Stream;56k/28k Windows Media Dual Stream;700k Real Media Broad Stream
300k Real Media Broad Stream; 56k/28k Real Media Dual Stream". would that be the cause? [edit: I just looked at the 5.0 thread and realized that there is a known problem with the trailers. I checked my trailers directory and they are all there: they just don't play. I hope this information is useful in resolving the issue eventually. I am not in a hurry.]

When looking at movie information, if there is a trailer, the button for "close" does not show up until you scroll down. Not a major problem as you can always scroll down or press "back" on the remote.

Formatting: not a big issue but the listing of cast has large spaces between the cast members but it doesn't really line up. It looks as if there is a "tab" instead of a "return". On the listing of times that display when you press "film times" from the information screen, would it be possible to list each day separately? It works well as it is, but it might be easier to pick the time you want to go if the times for each day were on a separate line.

When viewing by film, it can be a bit confusing at first when you press enter on a particular film and get a list of cinemas but that is the list of cinemas playing that film and a press on any of those cinemas will give you the information about that film. Just something that a new user might need to have explained.

One odd thing happened. On one film only (the 11th hour, about Mikhail Gorbachev), the list of cast was actually the list of cast from Shrek3. I checked zap2it and their listing of cast was correct and it only happened on one film that I noticed (& that was because it was really obvious)

Thank you very much.

[kayak4ever]

I checked out "fandango" codes as well as at least one theatre is also listed on the fandango site and it couldn't play the trailers either. My computer can play the trailers directly from the site so the fact that the zap2it site asks additional questions isn't the problem.

For those of us who prefer zap2it over fandango or vie versa because the site doesn't list all of our theatres, I have good news. Once I determined that the theatre code for "silver city, Gloucester" was the same for both fandango and zap2it, I was able to add the missing theatre codes (the Orleans Empire theatre) to the fandango site. The result was, that although fandango won't display the theatre on their website, it will show up as a separate theatre in the the cinema plugin! This means that you can enter the same code in the config panel for both sites and then check out which one provides better information. Canadians should note that the same does not apply to IMDB. Or, if one site changes the format and goes "down" while McBainUK readjusts for the new format, you can still get the listings from the other program! I also noticed that Fandango provides a longer synopsis than zap2it.

new potential issue: As I currently have both fandango and zap2it theatre codes in my config panel, I am having a problem with listing the films by theatre: regardless of the theatre chosen, I get one of 2 lists, even though I have 5 different theatres listed. I will see if the problem still exists when I delete the fandango codes. [Note that the formatting for the list of cast from the show information page is working well in Fandango]

Would you like me to post logs and if so, which one or should I post all?

[kayak4ever]

When looking at the movies by theatre, the list of movies playing for each theatre includes the list of all movies showing for the previous theatre. For example, I have 6 theatres listed (2 main line theatres, 1 discount theatre, and 3 unique theatres -showing mainly independant and IMAX films). The list for the first theatre is what I would expect showing about 6 films. The second list is twice as long and has Harry Potter listed twice (thei first time with times identical to the 1st theatre in the list and the 2nd time with new listings. When I got to the final theatre in the list from the Museum of Civilization that shows IMAX films, Harry Potter again topped the list. I was able to figure out by comparing to the previous theatre in the list what films where showing where.

I then tried searching by film and the problem was carried forward. The time listings for each film shown in a theatre other than the top of the list included the times of all previous theatres in the list. Thus, for the second mainline theatre, I needed to look for the second set of times to get the correct times.

[McBainUK]

Note that since that earlier email, the screensaver doesn't come on until the listings are updated so I no longer have a problem with not realizing that the update is not yet complete (without reference to the actual computer monitor). I assume that this is something you fixed.

Do you have download trailers turned on? If so the first time you update the listings it will take MUCH longer as it will download all the .mov files. The 2nd time and later it will only download those it hasn't got already, if a new film comes out for example.

[McBainUK]

When viewing by film, it can be a bit confusing at first when you press enter on a particular film and get a list of cinemas but that is the list of cinemas playing that film and a press on any of those cinemas will give you the information about that film. Just something that a new user might need to have explained.

This kind of thing could go in the wiki manual you where thinking about.

When looking at movie information, if there is a trailer, the button for "close" does not show up until you scroll down. Not a major problem as you can always scroll down or press "back" on the remote.

Woops forgot to include the updated skin - unzip attached to gbpvr\skin2\Blue\InternationalCinemaListings\

new potential issue: As I currently have both fandango and zap2it theatre codes in my config panel, I am having a problem with listing the films by theatre: regardless of the theatre chosen, I get one of 2 lists, even though I have 5 different theatres listed. I will see if the problem still exists when I delete the fandango codes. [Note that the formatting for the list of cast from the show information page is working well in Fandango]

One odd thing happened. On one film only (the 11th hour, about Mikhail Gorbachev), the list of cast was actually the list of cast from Shrek3.

What cinema IDs and source(s) are you using - I want to try and replicate this here.

Formatting:...On the listing of times that display when you press "film times" from the information screen, would it be possible to list each day separately? It works well as it is, but it might be easier to pick the time you want to go if the times for each day were on a separate line.

Again, post your cinema IDs and I will check this out. Formatting is something I'm interested in testing due to the web scraper change.

When looking at the movies by theatre, the list of movies playing for each theatre includes the list of all movies showing for the previous theatre.

Hmm, will look into this.

[McBainUK]

My computer can play the trailers directly from the site

Remember the trailers all come from daves trailers page and apple, not from the local sources.

What happens when you try to play a trailers? BTW, have you seen the Trailers section on the wiki page. You may need a codec to play trailers via GB-PVR.

[kayak4ever]

Trailers: I do have download trailers clicked in the config panel so you are right; it is only the first time you download that you need to watch the computer monitor rather than the TV to see if the download is complete. When I click on the trailers, the screen goes blank for one second and returns to the inf page. On one occasion, the screen went blank for 4 seconds before returning to the info page. I went to Dave's Trailer site and saw the following message."You need to upgrade your Flash Player
or you may have disabled your Javascript. To enable it, go to Tools, Internet Options, select the Security tab, Custom Level,scroll down to Script ActiveX Controls Marked Safe For Scripting, and select Enable, click OK and then Apply." I use firefox so I don't have a custom level on my security tab. I will ask my son to come by and find out how to activate Script ActiveX on firefox. I also have a firewall by Sygate. If I have quicktime, does that mean I have the right codexes that are in quicktime alternative?

I think I extracted the FilmInfoPopup.zip file. I have two skin directories: skin and skin2, each of which has a file with this name (minus the zip) in the International Cinema subdirectory of blue that is a subdirectory of both skin and skin2. I still get confused when downloading a zip file to a subdirectory. If I open the subdirectory before clicking on extract, then it typically creates another subdirectory of the same name within the subdirectory but if I stay one level up, then it might not put the file in the correct subdirectory. This is my problem of not understanding how to extract from zip correctly. Bottom line, after I made sure the file was in the subdirectory and rebooting, I still don't see the close button if there is trailer unless I scroll down. Not a big problem as I can work around it by scrolling down to exit with the close button.

Formatting issues and duplicate listings, These are my theatres in the order I have listed them from zap2it. AACIR,AANEH,AACIS,AAOJN,AAOJB,AATJM
AACIR and AANEH are main line theatres and AAOJB is the IMAX theatre at the Museum of civilization.From the Museum's site (& zap2it), this is the list of movies currently playing at AAOJB

Alpes Sun (09/16):4:00 Mon (09/17):4:00 8:00 Tue (09/18):1:00 7:00
Wed (09/19):4:00 Thu (09/20):1:00
Cavernes: Dangers et mysteres Tue (09/18):4:00
Dinosaurs 3D: Giants of Patagonia Sun (09/16):10:00 2:00 Mon (09/17):2:00
Tue (09/18):2:00 Wed (09/19):2:00 7:00 Thu (09/20):2:00 7:00
Dinosaurs: Les Geants de la Patagonie Sun (09/16):1:00 Mon (09/17):1:00 7:00
Journey Into Amazing Caves Sun (09/16):5:00 Mon (09/17):5:00 9:00
Tue (09/18):5:00 9:00 Wed (09/19):5:00 9:00 Thu (09/20):5:00
Le Premier Empereur de Chine Wed (09/19):1:00
The Alps Sun (09/16):12:00 3:00 6:00 Mon (09/17):12:00 3:00 Tue (09/18):
12:00 3:00 8:00 Wed (09/19): 12:00 3:00 8:00 Thu (09/20): 12:00 3:00 8:00
The First Emperor of China Sun (09/16): 11:00 Mon (09/17): 11:00 Tue (09/18):11:00 Wed (09/19): 11:00 Thu (09/20): 11:00

Note that the first theatre listed has no problems since it is not picking up the theatres higher in the list and theatre AANEH has Harry Potter listed twice, the first time with times identical to AACIR and the second time as the "true times for Gloucester Silver City.

For the issue of the wrong cast, check out the films of AACIS that follow "the Brave one". We have Russell Crowe in 3:10 to Yuma, John Travolta in Hairspray and Mike Myers as Shrek in the 11th hour about Michail Gorbachhev. the cast of Shrek and Pirates of the Caribbean are correct as are all the films show at the first theatre listed, AACIR

[McBainUK]

When I click on the trailers, the screen goes blank for one second and returns to the inf page. If I have quicktime, does that mean I have the right codexes that are in quicktime alternative?

It's nothing to do with Firefox or internet settings as GB-PVR plays them from the trailers folder, not from the web. The 'going blank' behaviour is what happens when you don't have the correct codec. Quicktime alternative has Microsoft DirectShow codecs which is what GB-PVR uses, standard Apple Quicktime doesn't use this. If you download and install Quicktime alternative trailers should play (it has a nice installer so you should go on ok with it)

I think I extracted the FilmInfoPopup.zip file. I have two skin directories: skin and skin2, each of which has a file with this name (minus the zip) in the International Cinema subdirectory of blue that is a subdirectory of both skin and skin2.

It needs to go in gbpvr\skin2\Blue\InternationalCinemaListings\ (assuming you're using the default Blue skin ofcourse).

[kayak4ever]

Close button: I extracted the zip file to the skin2\international cinema directory, replacing the previous file with a 2kb file created 6/7/2007 at 11:40pm (same file as it replaced). The close button is still missing from film information pages that have trailers.

Inability to display trailers: I downloaded quicktime alternative, I updated the adobe flasher player and I made sure that dave's trailer site could use Script ActiveX (my son said it was unwise to allow all internet sites to have access to script activeX) The trailers will still not play. I wondered if it could be a problem with Dave's trailers webpage so I looked at what was being said in the thread for 5.0 version. Then I decided to check to make sure the trailers were actually in the directory gbpvr\internationalcinema\trailers and found out that I didn't have the subdirectory "trailers". I created one myself, checked my config files to make sure I had asked to download trailers and then refreshed again. My newly created trailer directory is still empty. I guess that is likely the main reason I can't play the trailers! [edit: not the solution. Somehow (my inexperience with winzip) I ended up with 2 International Cinema directories, one as a subdirectory of GBpvr and one as a subdirectory of gbpvr\plugins. I have now deleted the extra directory that is a subdirectory of gbpvr but nothing changed.]