Not to worry!  It's 9.50pm here and I'm just going to be - if it was 5.40am I don't think I would have been as polite!

Cheers,
Andy

Andy,

your MCE DVD Info app appears in my local language,of course only the web site part,as shown in the image I've Attached.

Which value have you set to the loacl parameter? I only know 804 for Simplied Chinese,404 for Traditional Chinese,411 for Japanese,412 for Korean,and your system language if null.It would also set the language to English if you input the illegal local value. I haven't figured it out what all the Navigate Params are about in that site,have you? It may be useful for the improvement of your app.

On the & thing,I have made a mistake.You dont't need to modify the & in both windowsmedia.com or MCE DVD Info app.The amp; will be auto added behind every &.Instead,you'd better remove every amp; when you click edit button to modify the DVD info.For example,when you choose your desired DVD and the info page shows up ,you find the info of Chaper 16 is Phantom Overture & Little Lotti [4:08].And then if you click finish button to generate the [DVDID].xml file,it will be no issue.Open that [DVDID].xml file using notepad to view the source code you'll find an xml expression amp; is add behind the &.It makes the chaptr info look like - Phantom Overture & Little Lotti [4:08] in notepad.
If you click the edit button in the DVD info page,you'll find an amp; is added behind every &.Do nothing and Click next to return to the DVD info page,you'll find the chapter info Phantom Overture & Little Lotti [4:08] become Phantom Overture & Little Lotti [4:08].That's why you have better remove amp; in the DVD info edit page.

It won't occur the amp; issue while generating [DVDID].xml file by metaservices.windowsmedia.com or MCE DVD Info app.What you have to do is removing the amp; while you are in the DVD info edit page,and if you donn't want "Tome & Jerry" shown as "Tom & Jerry" in MY DVD.
But this will be a real problem if you edit the [DVDID].xml file yourself in notepad: <chapterTitle>Tome &amp; Jerry</chapterTitle> will be ok but <chapterTitle>Tome & Jerry</chapterTitle> will cause the xml file crash and MCE will rebuild the [DVDID].xml file and All of your METADATA in that file will lost.

Most DVDs have got only one title.There are multi-title DVDs,too,such as The wedding DVDs usually contain a title for wedding vieo and another title for wedding album.The same DVD for differernt region or with differert edition may have diffenent titles or have got different title arrangement.That's the reason for chapter info not showing in MCE.As I have said in my ast post -- Oh,I reviewed that post and found I had typed the wrong words.It's not "I watched it in Media Player 10 and found the concert is in chapter 3,chapter 1 and chapter 2 are just FBI Warnning and Angel logo.",but "I watched it in Media Player 10 and found the concert is in title 3,title 1 and title 2 are just FBI Warnning and Angel logo.",sorry. -- the information I found in [DVDID].xml was:
...
<title>
      <titleNum>1</titleNum>
      ...
      <chapter>
        <chapterNum>1</chapterNum>
        <chapterTitle>Kama Sutra [4:35]</chapterTitle>
      </chapter>
...
The chapter info is inside title 1.There is no info for title 3.watching the DVD in MY DVD,I saw none info when the concert in title 3 is playing.And saw the title info - Kama Sutra [4:35] when watching the FBI warnning chapter which is the chapter 1 of title 1 in the dvd I owned.Even the FBI warnning title contain only one chapter and there are dozens of chapters and chapter info in title 1 in the xml file,the chapter info just showed.So,it's not the problem of chapter information in the xml file doesn't match the chapter information on the disk as you have said.It's the problem of chapter info assigned to the wrong title.I assigned the chapter info to title 3 and solved the problem.
You can't just change the title number from 1 to 3 in <chapterNum>1</chapterNum>,you have to add info of title 1 and title 2,or you'll still see none chapter info of title 3.The simplest way to add a title info is just adding the line <title><titleNum>1</titleNum></title>,which means the DVD contains title 1 and title 1 contains no information.
Here's my modify [DVDID].xml looks like:
...
<title><titleNum>1</titleNum></title>
<title><titleNum>2</titleNum></title>
<title>
      <titleNum>3</titleNum>
      ...
      <chapter>
        <chapterNum>1</chapterNum>
        <chapterTitle>Kama Sutra [4:35]</chapterTitle>
      </chapter>
...
The DVD contain more than 3 titles but I don't need their title and chapter info after title 3.It's not necessary to add line like <title><titleNum>4</titleNum></title>.But you'll have to add lines <title><titleNum>1</titleNum> and </title>
<title><titleNum>2</titleNum></title> if you want to show the info of title 3.

So,Andy,the function I wish you would add to your app is to make it possible to edit titles and reassign the chapters and chapter info to any title you want.

For peopel who don't kown how many titles are ther in your DVD and the what content of titles are,just play it in WMP10,you'll find what you desired.

Finally,it may be a little difficult to understand what I said for my poor English,I'm so sorry about that.

On the &amp; stuff, I can strip out the extraneous &amp;'s from the XML file I think - the data I get returned from the XML reader should be unescaped back to just "&", so if I replace instances I find of "&amp;" with "&" then that should work.  They will then be converted back to &amp; by the XML writer (instead of being converted into "&amp;amp;"

On the editing of titles, I'll have a look at this but can't promise anything.  If it looks reasonably straightforward to incorporate the editing of titles/chapters I'll put it in.  If anyone knows how to get the title/chapter count from the DVD please let me know!

My main thought for additional functionality has been to copy the DVD onto the hard disk (assuming AnyDVD or similar is loaded) and created the dvdid.xml file, so the whole loading process is automated.  

Cheers,
Andy

Here.s one of the quick ways to get the title and chapter count and to find out the main movie or concert title - chapter info is usually for the main movie

First,get ifoedit from http://www.free-codecs.com/download/IFOEdit.htm.

Run ifoedit,open the VIDEO_TS.IFO file of your DVD ,either on disk or on hadr driver.Then you will see the title and chapter info as bellow

Number of  Title Play Maps: 3 (VMG_PTT_SRPT)
Title    1:VTS_01_*,TTN_1 (Angles:1) (Chapters:3)...
Title    2:VTS_01_*,TTN_2 (Angles:1) (Chapters:2)...
Title    3:VTS_02_*,TTN_1 (Angles:1) (Chapters:24)...

there are three titles in the DVD,title 1 and title are in VTS (Video Title Set) 1,title 3 is in VTS 2,the chapter count of titlte 1,2,3 are 3,2 and 24.

And then go into the VIDEO_TS folder and couting the VTS_0*_*.VOB files.VTS_01_*.VOB files belong to title 1 and title 2 while VTS_02_*.VOB to title 3.There are two VTS_01_*.VOB,VTS_01_0.VOB and VTS_01_1.VOB.There are eight VTS_02_*.VOB files from VTS_02_0.VOB to VTS_02_7.VOB.So the main movie is in Title 3.

Hope this will help.

There is an DVD Structure article in Doom9.org may be useful - http://www.doom9.org/index.html?/dvd-structure.htm

I'm wondering, is there any way to make these programs work without the DVDID?  Is there a database to connect DVD names w/ DISC ID #s?

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Intel DG965WH, 2GB Corsair Value Select, Core2Duo E6300, Seasonic S12-430W, ASUS 8600GT, Seagate HDs, Vistaview Saber2020, Vbox Cat's Eye 164e, Winegard SS-1000 Antenna w/ CM3042 amplifier

What I was meaning was does anyone know how to access the chapter/title information using a progamming language such as C#...  that way I can add the functionality of ensuring the correct chapter/title spaces into the app, and all the user would have to do is fill in the details.

Cheers,
Andy

There are some people working on a web service to do this, but it's going to be a long haul to get the information in to the database.  Basically, each person who loads a DVD onto their machine can contribute to the database the DVDID of the DVD, plus the title.

Search for Kristian in the forums for more info.

Cheers,
Andy

Yepp, I have something here very soon.

My problem was that I got so eager querying every source I could think of for information, so there was a lot of parsing and coding...

But I've narrowed it down to AMG/Microsoft/IMDB (as sources for info), and will make support for custom edit of this info soon. you can of course edit all the xml you want locally, but when I say edit here, I mean edit the info that MCE auto downloads every time you click on a movie.

I'll have something ready for testing by tomorrow.

 

Question:

Is there many people here planning on using DVD changer outside the us? (it's possible with this application to map region2 id's to valid region1 id's, so that MCE auto downloads the correct information based on the actual dvdid it finds when a dvd is inserted).

 

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Using MyDVDs? http://www.e-Home.no/metaservices/

Kristian,

For the Microsoft XML source, you shouldn't have to do any parsing at all if you're getting it from the right place - let me know if you want some help on that front.

I was looking at a DVD changer (region 2/UK) but not sure yet.  Are you saying that you can automatically map the dvdid from region 2 to region 1, or are you doing a table lookup and building the content of that table over time?

Cheers,
Andy

Yes, It will be possible to "tell this system" that one spesific region 2 dvdid is "mapped" to one valid region 1 dvdid, so that MCE automatically will be able to download the correct meta info when it queries the metaservice for the region 2 id.

 

 

Some info about the app/service:

 

You use this application to manage xml id files.

It scans all video folders, and lists all folders containing a “VIDEO_TS” folder.

It checks to see if there is a .dvdid.xml file in there, if not, it searches the metaservice.

-         First it searches for dvdid’s uploaded by other people that are valid region 1 by title

-         Then it searches the metaservice for custom info (user provided) based on the id listed inside the dvdid.xml file (this is not implemented yet, but it’s coming)

That’s the automatic part (if you want to use it)

(I’m also thinking about making a windows service that can do the auto search stuff for those who want that)

 

The manual part:

You can click on a DVD folder, and select what movie info you will use. The “movie info selector” automatically lists/searches the local metaservice, the amg metaservice, and IMDB for titles matching. Here you can select witch one you want to use with a single click.

When MCE queries all video folders, it connects to our custom metaservice first and requests info for that current ID (listed inside the xml file). If we don’t have any info for this ID, AMG’s info will be returned (if any).

And the nice thing here is that all ID’s that are requested, is “recorded” (if they are valid region 1 id’s) so that other people will be able to use this by either manually or automatically search by title…

 

Valid ID’s that can be used in dvdid.xml files are CRC64 (00000000|00000000), AMG Title Id’s (E   123) or IMDB movie ID’s (tt0122151). By using these types of ID, MCE is able to auto download metadata through our metaservice.

(I will make support for custom id’s soon)

 

There are of course a lot of other features that I’m working on here, but this is what I’m starting with. If you are a .Net developer and want to help here, you are welcome

 

Here’s an image of the “movie info selector” in action.

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Using MyDVDs? http://www.e-Home.no/metaservices/

here's something i saw on the XPmce forum.  it's a website someone created where people can share their XML files.  once some more get posted on there, it could be pretty useful.

http://www.discids.com/index.php?cmd=all

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Intel DG965WH, 2GB Corsair Value Select, Core2Duo E6300, Seasonic S12-430W, ASUS 8600GT, Seagate HDs, Vistaview Saber2020, Vbox Cat's Eye 164e, Winegard SS-1000 Antenna w/ CM3042 amplifier

For those of you who are interested J

 

This is far from the fully functional application that I have planned, but it gives a good picture, and shows some nice functionality.

 

No installation required, just click and go.

 

At startup, it scans all video folders for DVD’s (looks for VIDEO_TS folders).

All .dvdid.xml files (if any) are checked online, and all movie folders missing an id file is checked online based on the movie folder name, and if found; a new .dvdid.xml file is downloaded…

 

I’ve added a zip file containing an empty structure of DVD’s that can be unzipped to “My Videos”, so you can see how this looks inside MCE and how the app works…

 

The app can also be used to search for movies online from our local metaservice, IMDB and AMG’s title search.

 

In order for MCE to download “non valid AMG id’s” the ‘Extended metaservice’ must be enabled (done by clicking a button inside the app).

 

And of course, the app is very stable from my pc’s, but it depends on a constant access to our metaservice, so if your internet access is slow, the app can be too sometimes

 

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Using MyDVDs? http://www.e-Home.no/metaservices/

After reading the entire thread I'm still uncertain as to how to properly get dvd's onto my hd in a format that mydvds can understand.

I have been using mymovies and it seems to work ok, but since i'm only trying to add dvd's I figure this program sounds best suited for it. What I would like to know is if I have to use a program to save the dvd's to my computer or if I can just drag n' drop the files from the dvd to my hd. I have anydvd running in the background if that makes any difference. I have no desire whatsoever to make 'hard' backups of my dvd's, I only want to add them to the server so I can stream them to the theater with my mce machine. Quality of dvd pic/sound is my #1 priority as we're using a 720 projector with an equally good soundsystem. Basically I'm trying to build a kaleidescape system on the cheap.

My dream would be to have an addon to mce where I just have to input the dvd into the tray, the program would look up and save all data about the dvd, and it would then transfer to my hd in a spot where I choose, and then be able to be played through mce.

Is this already possible or on the horizon?

That is almost possible. (but not fully automatically)

I use DVD decrypter to rip my dvds to my harddrive

http://www.google.com/search?num=20&hl=en&q=dvd+decrypter&spell=1

(Use file mode)

 

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Using MyDVDs? http://www.e-Home.no/metaservices/

thanks, that's pretty much what I've been doing to this point.

I'm curious what is different about the files that dvddecrypter puts out vs. just the drag n' drop method. As the files seem to be the same size, I'm wondering if that step is even necessary when running anydvd in the background.

A side note:

Is it possible to change the 'skins' of this addon? I currently own approx 1300 dvds which are all currently sitting in changers using dvdlobby as the front end. After getting to see kaleidescape in action I finally began to realize just what I've been missing for so long.

The issue I can see coming down the road as I continue to import dvd's to the array is that there are going to be hundreds of pages to scroll through to find the dvd. I noticed on the kaleidescape front end that they were able to display maybe a hundred thumbnails on one page all pinned up against each other. When you would highlight the movie you wanted the size would expand and give you details about that particular dvd, while the thumbnails remaind in the background. You could scroll through in this mode as well. This would be a killer skin to add if possible.

I'm also concerned about the load time as it's already horrible for my music collection which only has about 2500 albums or so. It's gotten so bad that I gave up on mce as the frontend for my cd's. I'm hopeing that there is a way to speed this up.

Finally, it would be really cool to be able to pick up where you leave off in a movie, kinda like normal dvd players have done for years now. At the very least be able to set 'favorite' positions in the movie for demo purposes.