Openelec library

[tmette]

Is there a good way to have Openelec installed on my RPi to stream videos from a certain directory on my Ubuntu desktop computer? I keep all my media on there since I have a bigger HDD and would like to use my RPi to stream to my TV. Everything is wired through ethernet (no wifi) and I can SSH into my RPi successfully.

I heard the best thing to do is set up a MySQL library? Sorry I'm such a n00b at this stuff, can someone help explain it to me? Not sure the best path to take. I also read about changing the port number from 22 to something else for security reasons?

I'll continue to throw in edits as I progress through this in case anyone else with the same issue stumbles upon this thread.

EDIT: Well I got a MySQL server set up fine thanks to this Youtube video, however half-way through he goes to a .xbmc folder in his home directory to edit an advancedsettings.xml file. I don't have the folder because I guess I don't have XBMC installed on my desktop, just my RPi. Not sure what to do from here.

EDIT: So last night I successfully got a video to stream. I set up the NFS by editing the /etc/exports file and adding the directory I wanted to share, with my computer's static IP and passed a read-only permission. Still haven't gotten the RPi to connect to the MySQL database, but I did find a hidden 'xbmc' folder on the SD card. There was no 'advancedsettings.xml' file so I'll probably have to create it later this evening. Does anyone know if there is a way to tell if it's set up properly with the MySQL database?

[chris217]

It would probably be best to install an NFS server on your Ubuntu machine. The RPi will pick this up and can stream from the directories you decide to share.

This is how my Openelec system accesses media on my NAS.

There are many tutorials available for setting up NFS. It is reasonably straightforward.

[BadBoyBubby]

Hi

I think you may have got a little confused with the database thing.

To get openelec working on your pi and streaming films from ubuntu.

1. download an openelec pi image from openelec homepage load this onto an sd card see instructions on openlec website

2. boot the pi from the sd card this loads xbmc on your pi.

3. under video's menu on xbmc front page select add source point it to your NFS share on your ubuntu machine where the films are.

4 select the movie scraper

5 call the media source 'movies'

now on xbmc main menu you should see a 'movies' option and it should start seaching the folder and adding all the films to its film database which xbmc creates.

Hope this is what you wanted.

Bubby

[tmette]

Thank you guys for the clarification. I have the NFS set up among two folders (Movies & TV) on my computer. It's all working smoothly except last night I experienced two more problems.

1. How do I get XBMC to scan for new content besides rebooting or something? I added a few more files in the Movie and they wouldn't show up.

2. On my computer I have folders of TV shows, and then subfolders with the different seasons. When I go to TV Shows from the XBMC menu and then Titles, it will list all my folders. However when I pick a specific show, it won't show any of the season folders, just displays nothing.

[mrasker]

Hi,

1. I have added an Add-on, which name escpapes me for the moment, that automatically scan and update my library in the middle of the night. Works like a charm form me. Go to the Movies Add-on and you'll find it. The name is something like "Auto Movies Update Database".

You can also pull up the menu for a folder and select "Update Library".

Third option is to configure XBMC to automatically update on Start-up, but if you like me always leave it on then this might not be an option for you.

2. Sounds like you have not added a scraper for the TV shows. I also strongly suggest you add a "tvshow.nfo" file to the root folder of every TV show and then select a TV shows scraper for the TV-show share. In the "tvshow.nfo" file you specify links depending on what Scraper you have selected. For TV shows I use the "The TV DataBase" scraper (http://thetvdb.com/).

For Movies I use the "The Movies Database" scraper since the IMDB scraper seems to be less reliable.

However, for both TV shows and for Movies I always also add the IMDB links as well so that if I one day change scraper I have all the links I need.

I hope this helps!