A non-tech perspective on Emby ... from my wife

[eherberg 7]

For whoever may find this interesting or informative ... a summary of a non-technical user's impressions of Emby.  That user being ... my wife.

 

We had been trying Emby as a possible alternative to Plex.  After a couple of years using Plex, we exclusively used Emby for about 3 weeks.

 

After that time, in part because of an annoying bug I was facing regarding deletion, I went back to Plex.  Environment is a Win10 server with Fire Stick on main TV and Roku in the bedroom.

 

A note regarding my wife:  She will rarely move past the initial screen on either interface.  She is not going to click into menus nor is she going to move very often into library sections.  For her - an efficient interface is having what she wants to watch available right from the front page (which is hard to argue against for efficiency).

 

After a couple of weeks or so now of using Plex again ... the tale moves forward to yesterday, Easter Sunday.  My wife did it up big-time for Easter Dinner.  The ham, the sides, baked a pie ... the works.  After finishing up a meal where you are so full that you're convinced you are not going to eat again for days, my wife said:

 

"So ... I wanted to talk to you about the 'TV app'.  Could we go back to the other one?  The 'Emby' one?"

 

"By the way ... did you want any more pie?"

 

After realizing I got played through the use of food ... and then realizing it didn't matter because the ham was awful damn tasty ... I quickly folded when I realized that there was ice cream to go with the pie.

 

But then I also realized that it surprised me she even requested this.  To be honest, I didn't think she cared much one way or the other about the 'TV app'.  As long as her programs continued to be made available - I assumed that the server used was pretty much my deal and that I was the only one who really cared about it.  Turns out that isn't true.  In this case, the leanback interface was a big thing to her ... and she clearly had a preference.

 

After finishing some pie and ice cream, I asked her for more detail regarding the request.  It turns out that the above-mentioned launch screen was the clincher.

 

My wife's expectation is that no matter what she clicks on - the 'next up' should always be available for her to play.  In her examples, she doesn't typically get to her shows until the weekend.  In the case of Mon-Fri daily shows, that means there are at least 5 episodes of 'Rachael Ray' or half-a-dozen (or more) '30 Minute Meals'.  While using Plex, if not using 'On Deck', you get different behavior depending on where you click.  If I had just finished removing commercials out of her recordings of 'Rachael' and then put them on the server - the last episode I pulled in is what would be foremost on the 'Recently Added' section.  It may not be the next one that she hasn't seen, however.

 

My wife's expectation is that if she clicked on the episode on 'Recently Added', that she had the option to play 'next-up'.  The distinction between clicking on a series poster vs an episode poster on the Plex interface either wasn't understood ... or as she insisted during the conversation 'It shouldn't matter.  It should still give me my next episode."  

 

It turns out that the 3 weeks with Emby was what made her realize that she didn't like the other behavior.  And going back to it reinforced that dislike.  In Emby, if she goes to 'Latest TV Shows' from the startup screen -- it's always going to give her the 'Next Up' option.  If she uses 'Recently Added TV' in Plex, clicking on an episode on the front of that list plays the episode ... without an easy option to play the next unwatched (which is likely different than the newest entry on the 'Recently Added' list).

 

And ... as it turns out ... this interface difference is a big plus for her.  So much so, in fact, that she was willing to pull off one of the biggest Easter Dinner's I've ever had to make sure I was properly motivated to reconsider my choice.

 

So ... there ya go.  One case-study in interface from an average user who cares nothing about what goes on behind the server.  She just has interest in the leanback experience on the TV ... and as an average user has definitively expressed a preference for Emby (and is willing to load me up with however much ham, potatoes, and pie she has to in order to make that preference a reality).  :-) 

Edited April 23, 2019 by eherberg

[Sammy 735]

For whoever may find this interesting or informative ... a summary of a non-technical user's impressions of Emby. That user being ... my wife.

 

We had been trying Emby as a possible alternative to Plex. After a couple of years using Plex, we exclusively used Emby for about 3 weeks.

 

After that time, in part because of an annoying bug I was facing regarding deletion, I went back to Plex. Environment is a Win10 server with Fire Stick on main TV and Roku in the bedroom.

 

A note regarding my wife: She will rarely move past the initial screen on either interface. She is not going to click into menus nor is she going to move very often into library sections. For her - an efficient interface is having what she wants to watch available right from the front page (which is hard to argue against for efficiency).

 

After a couple of weeks or so now of using Plex again ... the tale moves forward to yesterday, Easter Sunday. My wife did it up big-time for Easter Dinner. The ham, the sides, baked a pie ... the works. After finishing up a meal where you are so full that you're convinced you are not going to eat again for days, my wife said:

 

"So ... I wanted to talk to you about the 'TV app'. Could we go back to the other one? The 'Emby' one?"

 

"By the way ... did you want any more pie?"

 

After realizing I got played through the use of food ... and then realizing it didn't matter because the ham was awful damn tasty ... I quickly folded when I realized that there was ice cream to go with the pie.

 

But then I also realized that it surprised me she even requested this. To be honest, I didn't think she cared much one way or the other about the 'TV app'. As long as her programs continued to be made available - I assumed that the server used was pretty much my deal and that I was the only one who really cared about it. Turns out that isn't true. In this case, the leanback interface was a big thing to her ... and she clearly had a preference.

 

After finishing some pie and ice cream, I asked her for more detail regarding the request. It turns out that the above-mentioned launch screen was the clincher.

 

My wife's expectation is that no matter what she clicks on - the 'next up' should always be available for her to play. In her examples, she doesn't typically get to her shows until the weekend. In the case of Mon-Fri daily shows, that means there are at least 5 episodes of 'Rachael Ray' or half-a-dozen (or more) '30 Minute Meals'. While using Plex, if not using 'On Deck', you get different behavior depending on where you click. If I had just finished removing commercials out of her recordings of 'Rachael' and then put them on the server - the last episode I pulled in is what would be foremost on the 'Recently Added' section. It may not be the next one that she hasn't seen, however.

 

My wife's expectation is that if she clicked on the episode on 'Recently Added', that she had the option to play 'next-up'. The distinction between clicking on a series poster vs an episode poster on the Plex interface either wasn't understood ... or as she insisted during the conversation 'It shouldn't matter. It should still give me my next episode."

 

It turns out that the 3 weeks with Emby was what made her realize that she didn't like the other behavior. And going back to it reinforced that dislike. In Emby, if she goes to 'Latest TV Shows' from the startup screen -- it's always going to give her the 'Next Up' option. If she uses 'Recently Added TV' in Plex, clicking on an episode on the front of that list plays the episode ... without an easy option to play the next unwatched (which is likely different than the newest entry on the 'Recently Added' list).

 

And ... as it turns out ... this interface difference is a big plus for her. So much so, in fact, that she was willing to pull off one of the biggest Easter Dinner's I've ever had to make sure I was properly motivated to reconsider my choice.

 

So ... there ya go. One case-study in interface from an average user who cares nothing about what goes on behind the server. She just has interest in the leanback experience on the TV ... and as an average user has definitively expressed a preference for Emby (and is willing to load me up with however much ham, potatoes, and pie she has to in order to make that preference a reality). :-)

Nice write up..

 

BTW, what are you using to skip commercials?

 

Sent from my SM-G960U1 using Tapatalk

[eherberg 7]

BTW, what are you using to skip commercials?

 

My right hand curled around a mouse.  :-)

 

I'm using good ol' Avidemux most of the time.  Since the programs are always her daily chat shows, I've found that it's actually faster most times just to do it by hand.  I've done it so often now that I know pretty much where on the timeline that the commercials are and can mark sections for deletion pretty quickly.  (I also had to learn the difference between a P-Frame and an I-Frame after the first couple of times).  It rarely takes me more than a minute to remove the commercials from a program of hers.

 

The way she typically watches them is through liberal use of the FF button.  I plan to show her chapters this week which may alter her method.  She tends to stockpile until the weekend, so by Saturday morning there may be 5 'Rachael Ray' programs, 5 'Live w/Kelly', and a handful of other programs stacked up.  She'll blow through until she sees a segment that interests her.  She can knock out the whole week in a couple of sessions during the weekend.  Fast-forwarding through a guest she doesn't care for ... watching a DIY or cooking segment she does. 

 

So my Saturday morning typically starts with going to the TVDB and entering the next week's metadata for 'Rachael Ray' while I'm pulling recordings off the drive.  Then - a quick snip of commercials from the episodes and dump them into the appropriate folder.

 

I experimented with Comskip - but for one of her programs (the mentioned 'Rachael'), during the 2nd half-hour there is a distinct change in the transition to commercial.  During the 1st half hour, there is a distinct sequence of black frames between show logo and commercial.  During the 2nd half hour, there is none.  Meaning - it goes right from show logo to commercial with no black-frame in between.  This tends to just throw off Comskip something fierce.  I've found that just pulling them myself with Avidemux is a more reliable method ... and given how many times I've now done it, I'm now really, really good at marking the sections in a pretty short period of time.

[Luke 37060]

Thanks for the feedback !

[BillOatman 500]

I experimented with Comskip - but for one of her programs (the mentioned 'Rachael'), during the 2nd half-hour there is a distinct change in the transition to commercial.  During the 1st half hour, there is a distinct sequence of black frames between show logo and commercial.  During the 2nd half hour, there is none.  Meaning - it goes right from show logo to commercial with no black-frame in between.  This tends to just throw off Comskip something fierce.  I've found that just pulling them myself with Avidemux is a more reliable method ... and given how many times I've now done it, I'm now really, really good at marking the sections in a pretty short period of time.

Looks like in the comskip.ini you can tell it not to depend on black frames.

detect_method=107         ; 1=black frame, 2=logo, 4=scene change, 8=fuzzy logic, 16=closed captions, 32=aspect ration, 64=silence, 128=cutscenes, 255=all

[eherberg 7]

Yeah, I knew that if I fiddled with it enough, I could have probably made it work.  But in the end, it just wasn't worth it.  In the time it would take to scan through one file (on the machine I'm using anyway), I could get all of them done by hand and still have time to make a pot of coffee after.  It just wasn't worth the fiddling time when I had already got the whole process down to about 10 minutes with my now super-speed skill and ability in identifying where the commercials are in her programs.  :-)

[mrfragger 39]

How would we survive without Next up.. Lovely story

[Riggs 300]

For whoever may find this interesting or informative ... a summary of a non-technical user's impressions of Emby.  That user being ... my wife.

 

We had been trying Emby as a possible alternative to Plex.  After a couple of years using Plex, we exclusively used Emby for about 3 weeks.

 

After that time, .............

 

Great story

 

That story reminds me my wife, she loves Emby, but everytime that she use it, she say: "I hate that cheap interface. That guys, have no taste to design a bean"

 

True story

Edited April 24, 2019 by HRSCR

[CBers 6771]

she say: "I hate that cheap interface. That guys, have no taste to design a bean"

 

Which Emby Client ?

[speechles 1917]

Cheap? Please can you define what is cheap? What constitutes a "cheap interface"? We need clarification there. Does this mean unpolished?

 

Design a bean? The design sort of matches AppleTV everywhere. Emby "borrowed" from Apple alot of the interface. But exactly which Emby client do you mean? Just as the question pondered above. 

 

You can't say "I hate it" and just walk way. People wonder what is "it"? Why no good with the bad? You have to keep balance in these things.

 

Tell us some good then lead into what you think is bad and why. She has to have given you reasons why she feels this way. She must sit there and go I hate the green. Right off why green? is green like "their" color? if so.. okay the green is fine. But I don't like the way.. etc etc.. She must be telling you where these issues are. You could let us know instead of hoard this knowledge.

 

You never find these things out unless people share what they mean. What do you mean? What does she mean? Is she being funny or serious? Are you being funny or serious? Are we in the matrix? Is any of this real? Yes.. it is real. This is real. We all exist. But what did you mean? lol

Edited April 24, 2019 by speechles

[Abobader 2942]

@@eherberg

 

Nice story, well done.

 

@

 

What exactly she did not like, the color or other's design?

 

@@speechles

 

LOL

[BAlGaInTl 279]

The "Spouse Factor" is a real concern in home media management.

 

[Riggs 300]

Which Emby Client ?

 

All

[Riggs 300]

The "Spouse Factor" is a real concern in home media management.

 

 

True

[denz 426]

My initial opinion of Android Tv is why is it so ugly until I was told about the options. Did she explore the options in Android TV defaults are not nice you get the line along the left of the screen, the pre play media options, the blue theme, vertical scroll and poster when you go to a movie that covers majority of the backdrop I took all those things away changed to dark theme used logo for movies etc and it looks great now It has few display issues to be fixed but overall I am very happy with it.

 

Roku is also looking great but it has few display issues that i reported like for tv recordings for some recordings it is using default icon but when you go to the web client or android tv it has a thumb for it.

[Riggs 300]

@

 

What exactly she did not like, the color or other's design?

 

Is nothing with the functions on the APP (all APPs because, you found the same in any app) is the fine detail, like buttons, the green color is used for almost everything, the tone of the green is not the same color branding in buttons, it is darker, you found a lot of shadows/overlays, wrong management of text, posters and backgrounds.

 

I write here several times about it. I never said before that was an strong opinion of my wife, but always was. She is a designer. She says that looks cheap, not modern at all.-- In short, there's not attention to the fine detail.

Edited April 25, 2019 by HRSCR

[Riggs 300]

Cheap? Please can you define what is cheap? What constitutes a "cheap interface"? We need clarification there. Does this mean unpolished?

 

Design a bean? The design sort of matches AppleTV everywhere. Emby "borrowed" from Apple alot of the interface. But exactly which Emby client do you mean? Just as the question pondered above. 

 

You can't say "I hate it" and just walk way. People wonder what is "it"? Why no good with the bad? You have to keep balance in these things.

 

Tell us some good then lead into what you think is bad and why. She has to have given you reasons why she feels this way. She must sit there and go I hate the green. Right off why green? is green like "their" color? if so.. okay the green is fine. But I don't like the way.. etc etc.. She must be telling you where these issues are. You could let us know instead of hoard this knowledge.

 

You never find these things out unless people share what they mean. What do you mean? What does she mean? Is she being funny or serious? Are you being funny or serious? Are we in the matrix? Is any of this real? Yes.. it is real. This is real. We all exist. But what did you mean? lol

 

When one comment is heavy everybody jump. Normal.

 

I explain here many times in detail what is cheap. My wife is serious in a positive way. The problem is that are many sensitive people here and that's ok, what is not is ok is that anybody reads, only when some post is "heavy".

 

Quote: "Design a bean? The design sort of matches AppleTV everywhere. Emby "borrowed" from Apple alot of the interface"

 

Really? You mean the Apple APP, or the Apple environment in general? Because the detail and design of Apple is in many ways excellent, and sorry but you can't compare the level of detail of any Apple APP with Emby.

 

Emby needs work, that's a fact, not an attack.

 

Take a look at Infuse 6 as an example of many.

Edited April 25, 2019 by HRSCR

[aspdend 174]

The "Spouse Factor" is a real concern in home media management.

 

The WAF (Wife Appreciation Factor) needs to be the top priority...at least in my house