Why move from TheTVDb to IMDb?

[CorneliousJD]

I really loved the way TheTVDb was set up, IMDb doesn't seem to work as smoothly with Boxee as TVDb did.

Are season DVD covers and individual episode photos going to show as well still?

[iBeech]

I've asked this question, with no reply :( We do still use thetvdb.com for some resources. Mainly episode images.

[Heratiki]

Yeah atleast give us the choice. Honestly IMDB is sub par when it comes to many things. I understand the choice but it seems to be more headache than anything. Not to mention the fact that there are times IMDB simply goes down for maintenance and you can't get anything from the site. Oh well... We'll have to see...

Heratiki

[CorneliousJD]

I've asked this question, with no reply :( We do still use thetvdb.com for some resources. Mainly episode images.

That just seems like it's going to cause SO many issues...

IMDB may recognize a show as "Show A" and TheTVDB may recognize it as "Show B" so you'll have titles from A, and screenshots from B...

I primarily use Boxee for the TV shows, and I'm in love with TheTVDB, I'm hoping they decide to change it back...

[shawnx]

Why not make it an option to select which one we want to use in the settings? I too really like thetvdb over imdb

[agentlame]

See here:
http://forum.boxee.tv/showthread.php?t=13467

[Heratiki]

Makes perfect sense... LOL Too bad I hadn't thought of that...

Heratiki

[CorneliousJD]

alright, fair enough and totally understandable.

but since boxee is open source, could somebody make an addon/modification (not an entire new release)

that would allow fetching from other sources?
Hopefully this sort of addon/plugin could work between versions w/out much issue (unless boxee has some core changes)

or is this just totally out of the question?

[agentlame]

but since boxee is open source, could somebody make an addon/modification (not an entire new release)


I hope someone would. That is the point of OSS. I prefer the content from themovedb.org/thetvdb.org. The only thing I'm saying is that you should not expect such support in an official Boxee release.

[CorneliousJD]

I hope someone would. That is the point of OSS. I prefer the content from themovedb.org/thetvdb.org. The only thing I'm saying is that you should not expect such support in an official Boxee release.

No problem. It's best to avoid legality issues for sure, so I totally understand. I'm sure IMDB data will suffice for most anyhow.

Would somebody be able to mod this into Boxee itself as a sort of plugin that would carry over for minor releases (easy on end-users parts), or would somebody have to edit this into each and every release (a pain in the butt :P )

[ktuimala]

I have a huge anime collection that I spent hours ripping from dvd to xvid. The problem with imdb is that it has the worst episode lists I have ever seen from any source. For example, Dragon Ball Z (Uncut). IMDB cuts out a lot of episodes and has them incorrectly named according to the US uncut series. The beta has decided to finally index them with imdb data, but most of my episodes show up as "DELETE ME" because the seasons are off. The episodes that do "show" are mostly misplaced and named wrong. I am using the file feature to find them and watch them currently.

Legalities aside, this is a silly move for the niche crowd such as myself. However, we are likely to get much press.

In the next couple of months I will hopefully have some free time from clients and I will attempt to productively use that free time to create a plugin as previously suggested. At the very least I will try to figure out how to get it to switch to thetvdb.

Ohhhhh.... if there was only more time in the day................. Boxee wastes much of my sleep and night hours...... :D

[cmendill]

Oh no! Just as I was finally warming up to the idea of using an online DB & filenames to recognize TV shows, I find out that they've switched from thetvdb (which is awesome) to imdb (which is not awesome).

Case and point: There is a video serial called Stingray Sam (BNS Productions) which is a set of 6 episodes, but it is classified as a movie on imdb. I can't for the life of me figure out how to change it to a TV show.

[Fuzzgtp]

I have a huge anime collection that I spent hours ripping from dvd to xvid. The problem with imdb is that it has the worst episode lists I have ever seen from any source. For example, Dragon Ball Z (Uncut). IMDB cuts out a lot of episodes and has them incorrectly named according to the US uncut series. The beta has decided to finally index them with imdb data, but most of my episodes show up as "DELETE ME" because the seasons are off. The episodes that do "show" are mostly misplaced and named wrong. I am using the file feature to find them and watch them currently.

Legalities aside, this is a silly move for the niche crowd such as myself. However, we are likely to get much press.

In the next couple of months I will hopefully have some free time from clients and I will attempt to productively use that free time to create a plugin as previously suggested. At the very least I will try to figure out how to get it to switch to thetvdb.

Ohhhhh.... if there was only more time in the day................. Boxee wastes much of my sleep and night hours...... :D

Have talked to devs about adding anidb to the scrapers, would hope they have decided to look into it. Think anime is a big issue right now.

[CorneliousJD]

It's really not just Anime that's a big issue, IMDB is TERRIBLE for alot of TV shows.

TheTVDB was great.
Too bad there's not a way to recognize TV shows and get description from TheTVDB and use images from IMDB...

[shawnx]

Maybe someone will come up with a mod like mentioned earlier. I really need to learn to program so I can do this kind of stuff lol.

[minego]

It is pretty clear that boxee is going to stick to IMDB, and of course none of us want them to risk any legal trouble, so it is the right move. That being said, a plugin to add support for an alternative scrapper would make everyone happy, and keep boxee protected.

Now the problem with having a scrapper as a plugin or a patch to boxee is that it will break every time the boxee team makes any significant changes.

So I'd request that the boxee team provides a documented fixed plugin API that is expected to continue to work across releases. I don't think I'm asking for too much. Scrapping can be limited to a very small set of calls. If they are well thought out then it is unlikely to need to change them. If they do need to be changed at some point (or extended) then it wouldn't be hard to give some advanced warning so the plugins can be updated.

Is this a pipe dream? What does everyone else think? I'd love to help with plugins for various scrappers, but I don't want to write a lot of code just to have to fix it every few months.

[timesync]

Is this a pipe dream? What does everyone else think? I'd love to help with plugins for various scrappers, but I don't want to write a lot of code just to have to fix it every few months.

I'm with you. I'd be willing to help with the project. This is frustrating the hell out of me as I have every episode of DBZ (Uncut) (as well as a few other series) and IMDB is horrible. However, I DO think Boxee is making the right decision in terms of avoiding legal issues. So if it means the community has to chip in to make things right, then I'm willing to chip in.

[JSchloegel]

Ok, so I'm a little confused. I understood for the most part everything up to this point, but I just got me some Gummi Bears and Talespin (got nostaligic). The episodes in Gummi Bears are recognized from the thetvdb.com list, not at all from the IMDB list. On IMDB it's a bunch of double episodes, and thetvdb.com it's each 10 minute episode (half hour show was usually 2 short episodes). On Talespin, I don't even know where it's going for that. It's got a few similarities to both lists, but it lists Flying Dupes as both episode 59 and 65, and A Baloo Switcheroo as episodes 28 and 32, while not listing Vowel Play and On a Wing and a Bear. I realize these are minor, but I went through and got them named correct, went into Boxee and they were, episode wise, out of order. I went through and corrected them based on the list in Boxee so they'd make sense, but it's still a little wonkey. Just curious, and thanks. If you want, I can provide the lists, dunno if it'll help at all.

[TomyLo]

the move from TVDB to IMDB makes absolutely no sense, but I'm guessing because they are being licensed rights from IMDB and it's prolly part of the agreement not to use more than 1 source.

[NomadDNA]

The issue here is licensing. XBMC has a lot more leway, as there is not 'company' behind it.

Boxee, INC. is a for-profit company. Boxee has to make sure all their content--artwork included--is clean as a whistle, or risk being sued.

This is the same reason that XBMC scrapes IMDB.org, and Boxee licenses their database.

While the artwork on themoviedb.org is FAR superior to that if IMDB, it has not cleared the Movie Studios' copyrights.

Thank you tomylo

[bshifflett]

I used Mediabrowser in Mediacenter for a while and the way I resolved the shows was running a program called Mediacentermaster, this retrieved all the stuff from Thetvdb.com for tv shows and movie info from IMDB.com, it worked awesome, then it created an XML file in each directory, then Mediabrowser would use this XML file to display all the info for the show. I am seriously thinking of going back to Mediabrowswer and mediacenter for this reason only, all the fan art work got put in and I never have a mislabeled show and etc... But Mediacenter does not support Hulu and Pandora. I love Pandora and mediabrowser was SLOW!!!

How about Boxee use a similiar system, pull the info from an XML file in the directory and display all the info that way for the shows and movies?

Brad

[TomyLo]

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1409850/

"The American Experience" After the Crash (1991)

Season 3 - episode 9

Here's how I got it titled: American.Experience.S03E09

or what about this?

"Lost Kingdom of Africa" (2010)

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1587302/

[NomadDNA]

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1409850/

"The American Experience" After the Crash (1991)

Season 3 - episode 9

Here's how I got it titled: American.Experience.S03E09

Tomy: with respect, I understand your frustration about boxee not properly recognizing your files. It's a nuisance, and I think by march, boxee will have a build that allows users to change the metadata...

But you know this, and you know where to report misrecognized media. Please appropriately report this information to the support site.

[tennisbgc]

Has anyone gotten a workaround for the tvdb scraper?

[ziggie216]

definitely would love boxee to use TVDB again. Since this is about legal issue with artwork, couldnt we just use TVDB to recognize the files and pull the artwork from some where else? having 200 unidentified files and manually identifying them is not enjoyable at all.