Channel Issues & Questions

[FriendOfEntropy]

Thanks again for this. You've inspired me to get the SDK and see if I can improve my Microsoft Channel 9 feed experiences. I aggregated some of that MS CH 9 developer content into a custom channel on MediaFly as soon as it was available so I could catch up on architecture and other programming goodies on the big screen, but it has never performed well for me in MediaFly.

Nasa was choking this morning as I tried to watch the latest Hubble stuff. Bar got to about 20 percent then the Roku started repeatedly rebooting. The first trouble I've ever had with the box, lol. It eventually came back to the main screen. I didn't have time to try other Nasa shows, I switched over to CNBC.
The latest Mad Money didn't crash anything, but you got only a millimeter or two of progress bar and it gave up and went back to the episode menu with Play highlighted. Pressed play a few times, same result.

Finally, I watched the next to the latest Mad Money over breakfast with no problem. Maybe I'll go back and try one of the NASA shows tonight and choose the next to the latest episode and see if it's just a problem with the newest in each show.

[trksh22]

"rmilner" wrote:
I would live to see more kids content to keep my kids happy. I have not been very popular since I dropped cable. I see PBS Kids is on the requested list I wonder if Nick Jr and playhouse Disney could be added they have shows that they stream from their web site. Thanks a lot for the great work. My wife is now happy she can watch the national news shows after the kids go to bed. She used to DVR it and watch it when we had cable now she can just go to it and watch it.

I agree. I am really looking forward to PBS Kids but would love to see more kids content added. It would also be extremely cool to see some railway content. Thanks for doing this! Is it easy to learn? Maybe others can add to it??

[nowhereman]

"dellsweig" wrote:
I just added archive.org - one of the BEST web sites on the net.....

I will check it out when I get home BUT have you given any thought to accessing their stremaing library of live music - specifically their Grateful Dead archives (thousands of shows from the sixtys to 1995 - many of them origional soundboard mixes)

Glad you like it. Archive.org is one of my favorites too. I love the vintage cartoons.

Funny you ask about the audio stuff... Last night I added an audio player to my channel template, so yes, the live music archive can be added soon and we will now be able to include pretty much any audio podcast in a channel in addition to video. NPR is first on my list, but I will definitely try to upgrade the archive.org channel soon.

[nowhereman]

"rmilner" wrote:
I would live to see more kids content to keep my kids happy. I have not been very popular since I dropped cable. I see PBS Kids is on the requested list I wonder if Nick Jr and playhouse Disney could be added they have shows that they stream from their web site. Thanks a lot for the great work. My wife is now happy she can watch the national news shows after the kids go to bed. She used to DVR it and watch it when we had cable now she can just go to it and watch it.

I haven't looked at Disney yet, but I've been running into a lot of issues with PBS Kids and Nick. Nick has a handful of podcasts, but none of them have been updated in almost a year, so I didn't think they'd be worth publishing. PBS Kids just plain doesn't work. I don't know if it's something about the way the videos were encoded or what. Dragonfly TV is the only PBS Kids feed I have been able to make work at all. Kid friendly content is definitely on my to do list. just have to find some worthwhile stuff to include.

[nowhereman]

"FriendOfEntropy" wrote:
The latest Mad Money didn't crash anything, but you got only a millimeter or two of progress bar and it gave up and went back to the episode menu with Play highlighted. Pressed play a few times, same result.

I see this more often than I'd like. Usually it's associated with the box throwing an error like "the stream was in an unsupported format or the data was corrupt". Unfortunately there's no way to weed those dud episodes out of an otherwise compatible feed. The dud videos are mp4's and usually work in iTunes or on other devices. Hopefully Roku will address at least some of these issues in a firmware update.

[nowhereman]

"trksh22" wrote:
I agree. I am really looking forward to PBS Kids but would love to see more kids content added. It would also be extremely cool to see some railway content. Thanks for doing this! Is it easy to learn? Maybe others can add to it??

I have been approached by a few other developers to help in the effort. Anyone who has a basic knowledge of what a podcast is and who has at least downloaded and tinkered with the Roku SDK could probably build their own channel from my template without much trouble.

[trksh22]

"nowhereman" wrote:

I haven't looked at Disney yet, but I've been running into a lot of issues with PBS Kids and Nick. Nick has a handful of podcasts, but none of them have been updated in almost a year, so I didn't think they'd be worth publishing. PBS Kids just plain doesn't work. I don't know if it's something about the way the videos were encoded or what. Dragonfly TV is the only PBS Kids feed I have been able to make work at all. Kid friendly content is definitely on my to do list. just have to find some worthwhile stuff to include.

Would it be ok to send you a list of podcasts and you see if they will work? I've done some searching but most of the ones I've found that sound interesting no longer work. :?: I'll try to find something for you, if that's ok.

[nowhereman]

"trksh22" wrote:

"nowhereman" wrote:

I haven't looked at Disney yet, but I've been running into a lot of issues with PBS Kids and Nick. Nick has a handful of podcasts, but none of them have been updated in almost a year, so I didn't think they'd be worth publishing. PBS Kids just plain doesn't work. I don't know if it's something about the way the videos were encoded or what. Dragonfly TV is the only PBS Kids feed I have been able to make work at all. Kid friendly content is definitely on my to do list. just have to find some worthwhile stuff to include.

Would it be ok to send you a list of podcasts and you see if they will work? I've done some searching but most of the ones I've found that sound interesting no longer work. :?: I'll try to find something for you, if that's ok.

yes, by all means. chris@thenowhereman.com

[KennyJ]

"nowhereman" wrote:
Tonight's additions...

CNET
Archive.org
MLB.com
GameTrailers.com

Where did you get the feeds for Archive.org? I couldn't find xmls with mp4 enclosures.

[JoshuaMarc1234]

Are you certain of it not having NF "at launch"?

Last I heard, they would be supporting Netflix but not at launch, and Hulu support is very bad. Hulu supposedly drops you every so often while you are watching video.

EDIT: This is from the Boxee Facebook feed
Boxee Box by D-Link Selling should begin some time in late spring and for under $200 On the release Boxee Box will not support NetFlix or Hulu, they are working to change both issues.


http://www.facebook.com/posted.php?id=273283470815&share_id=288593399526&comments=1

Thanks for the info Phil.