Creating a plugin to watch a movie with others and chat

[DragoMag 4]

Good evening everyone,

I have set myself a goal: to create a plugin to watch a movie, series, etc. simultaneously with other users. The aim is very simple: everyone starts at the same time; if one person pauses, it pauses for everyone. Ideally, there would also be the possibility to open a chat to discuss (even though I don’t chat during a movie).

Here’s what I have in mind: as you can see below, we start by opening the contextual menu of the movie we want to watch, and we have a new button "Watch together".

Once that’s done, it would open an interface similar to the one where we manage user accounts. We would select the users and press an "invite" button. As for the next step, I don’t have many ideas on how it could work: a pop-up, a notification... If you have any suggestions, I’m open to them.

I started by looking at the documentation and the different templates available to us. I should mention that it’s been a long time since I last did any coding. First of all, I’d like to know how to test the templates: where should I place the generated files? And what type of project (in Visual Studio) would you recommend? I read that .NET Standard should be used. In the example, it’s in version 2.0, does version 2.1 also work?

Regarding the plugin, would you have any advice to guide me, please?

Thank you very much for your help and responses. Have a great evening!

 

 

[Luke 39640]

Quote

I read that .NET Standard should be used. In the example, it’s in version 2.0, does version 2.1 also work?

Hi, if you use 2.1 then the plugin will not run on servers that will use the mono runtime. In fact I think it will cause a crash on startup. The most prominent platform still running mono is android. Other than that it's mostly older nas devices.

[GrimReaper 3973]

IIRC @Protectedhas recently being trying to accomplish something similar, you might wanna shout out to him to potentially collaborate/compare notes. 

[DragoMag 4]

Good evening,

Thank you for your reply @Luke& @GrimReaper

Which version should I use then?

Edited October 23, 2024 by DragoMag

[Protected 56]

Hi. I'm basically done with mine, I'd have published yesterday if I hadn't opened a massive can of worms by diving into an attempt to let the various viewers' video players have delay tolerance when moving from one video to another (which means they stop and start in a not necessarily overlapping fashion), in order to prevent the last few seconds of a video from being cut from some users. It's a highly specific thing!

I just spent two hours putting down into writing solutions for everything this change broke, so hopefully I can still publish it this week. Since it's all meant to be open source you'll be free to use it or crib ideas from it!

 

[Protected 56]

And in response to Drago's earlier question, I used a "room list" UI rather than an invite-based UI. Here are screenshots (spoilers, I guess):

[DragoMag 4]

Good evening @Protected,

Thank you for your message, well, I guess I'm arriving at just the right time, haha! Thank you for making this open source. I would have liked to do it myself (even though I could), but I realize that I'm lacking... I don't know, logic? I'm not sure, it seems pretty complicated right from the start since it needs to be compatible across all devices...

Could you ping me when you've published your plugin, please? Thank you very much, and if it's not too much to ask, could I ask you some questions? I don't just want to copy... but to understand how you managed to progress in life.

Have a great evening !

[Protected 56]

If it's information about this project specifically it's best to wait another day so I don't have to repeat myself, but I can tell you right now that I'm only targetting the Emby web client. I don't think Emby currently has an easy way for plugins to create UI in other devices (outside settings), so right now I only support other devices through remote control. It would be pretty easy for Emby to have a system for loading javascript modules from the plugin though, which is a thing I'd certainly love to discuss with the devs.

[Protected 56]

@DragoMagIt's available now in this thread. I probably wouldn't call it done but it's a relief to get it out there.

[DragoMag 4]

Hello @Protected, sorry, my response didn't go through. Your plugin is truly amazing! I was imagining "less work" when I looked at the source code, but there are so many important things... I will try to contribute to the development of this plugin!

[Protected 56]

Thanks! Glad you like it!