Send Popup / Notification Message

[HawkXP71 112]

Couple message system feature requests.  They may already exist but the term "message" is so prevalent its hard to find, feel free to point me to other requests if they already exist

•  Add the ability to add messages to every user, that they see the next time the log in.  Ideally they would have an expiration date.  For instance, "Server will be shut down for maintenence on MM/DD/YYYY" that would expire the day after.  So if they didnt log in, they would never get it.

• Add ability for users to send a message to the admins.  
• Add ability to send a message as an email
  
  ~thanks

 

[chef 3810]

This plugin here will create and save messages that get sent when users login.

https://github.com/chefbennyj1/Emby.MessageUsers

 

There is a new feature getting released in emby that allows users to access plugin configuration pages. This plugin could be altered when that new functionality is released, to allow users to send messages to admins.

As for email, that could also be added fairly easily to this plugin as well.

So, yeah probabaly all of the above is possible.

[rbjtech 5284]

On 06/12/2022 at 05:38, chef said:

This plugin here will create and save messages that get sent when users login.

https://github.com/chefbennyj1/Emby.MessageUsers

 

There is a new feature getting released in emby that allows users to access plugin configuration pages. This plugin could be altered when that new functionality is released, to allow users to send messages to admins.

As for email, that could also be added fairly easily to this plugin as well.

So, yeah probabaly all of the above is possible.

Hi @chef - I had a quick look on Git and believe this is just using the same Emby messaging API we used for the IntroSkip Plugin yes ?

A couple of things that would make it really useful is a time on screen option (ie, no need to acknowledge) and a message 'date/time to live' function.  ie if outside it's TTL - then the message is not delivered, it's just deleted.  This would be useful for system maintenance etc - no point displaying it to users if it's already been completed.  It may also be an idea to append the date/time the message was created on the actual message ?

I may have a little play when I get some time.

btw - any reason this is not in the catalogue ?  As it seems a very useful thing to have .. 

Edited December 8, 2022 by rbjtech

[svdasein 8]

@chefAre there build instructions for Emby.MessageUsers or alternatively is there a pre-built binary somewhere?  I've been wanting some kind of messaging thing forever & just found your work.  I don't have a build env though so I'm just left drooling...

[chef 3810]

10 minutes ago, svdasein said:

@chefAre there build instructions for Emby.MessageUsers or alternatively is there a pre-built binary somewhere?  I've been wanting some kind of messaging thing forever & just found your work.  I don't have a build env though so I'm just left drooling...

I have a built DLL. When I return home from work I'll send it.

EDIT: hey look at that... It is already sitting in my emby community resource file list... So yeah! There it is:

 

MessageUsers.zip

Edited May 28, 2023 by chef

[svdasein 8]

That's awesome - thanks @chef!

[darkassassin07 652]

There's a built .dll on the Github repository as well once you click on the 1.0.0.1 release (not sure if @chef's is up to date if it's been sitting on the forums). I think I'll have a play with that as well once I'm off work.

 

 

/edit, just saw the name on the repository, didn't realize you were the creator Chef.... Probably got a recent build....

Edited May 29, 2023 by darkassassin07

[darkassassin07 652]

On 12/5/2022 at 9:38 PM, chef said:

This plugin here will create and save messages that get sent when users login.

https://github.com/chefbennyj1/Emby.MessageUsers

 

There is a new feature getting released in emby that allows users to access plugin configuration pages. This plugin could be altered when that new functionality is released, to allow users to send messages to admins.

As for email, that could also be added fairly easily to this plugin as well.

So, yeah probabaly all of the above is possible.

Well, I've installed this plugin and done a bit of testing using a test user and 3/4 clients: the web app via chrome Android and Chrome Win10, the XboxOne app, and Emby for Android.

In all 4 cases: a client that is already logged in when a message is sent will receive that message upon loading any new page, but if not already logged in; upon login the message disappears from the 'saved messages' queue, while displaying nothing to the client.

Tested mostly through an nginx RP with websockets enabled, but I got the same results testing via the web app/browser + localhost.

 

 

I did also find if a user is signed into multiple devices (android + a browser for example) it's pretty hit or miss which client receives the message. Android app is logged in and running in the background, while I'm actively browsing the web app and loading new pages on a desktop browser, but the message regularly goes to the inactive android client instead. (it's siting waiting for confirmation when I bring it back to the foreground)

 

Beyond that, if you are using the dark settings theme, the saved messages  section shows up as white text on a white background making it entirely invisible until you highlight it (desktop web app only, nothing else I tested lets you select/highlight the text to be able to see it).

 

 

It's a great concept that I'd love to see developed further. I've often found myself wanting to leave messages that clients would receive next time they login. I don't necessarily want to bother people immediately for stuff that's only relevant to emby and can be left till they next want to use the server. Especially things like upcoming maintenance messages.

If you're expanding features at all: a history/delivery report would be awesome. Info on what was delivered, when, and to what client/device. Perhaps even an option to select which client/device to deliver a message to.

Edited May 30, 2023 by darkassassin07

[chef 3810]

15 minutes ago, darkassassin07 said:

Well, I've installed this plugin and done a bit of testing using a test user and 3/4 clients: the web app via chrome Android and Chrome Win10, the XboxOne app, and Emby for Android.

In all 4 cases: a client that is already logged in when a message is sent will receive that message upon loading any new page, but if not already logged in; upon login the message disappears from the 'saved messages' queue, while displaying nothing to the client.

Tested mostly through an nginx RP with websockets enabled, but I got the same results testing via the web app/browser + localhost.

 

 

I did also find if a user is signed into multiple devices (android + a browser for example) it's pretty hit or miss which client receives the message. Android app is logged in and running in the background, while I'm actively browsing the web app and loading new pages on a desktop browser, but the message regularly goes to the inactive android client instead. (it's siting waiting for confirmation when I bring it back to the foreground)

 

Beyond that, if you are using the dark settings theme, the saved messages  section shows up as white text on a white background making it entirely invisible until you highlight it (desktop web app only, nothing else I tested lets you select/highlight the text to be able to see it).

 

 

It's a great concept that I'd love to see developed further. I've often found myself wanting to leave messages that clients would receive next time they login. I don't necessarily want to bother people immediately for stuff that's only relevant to emby and can be left till they next want to use the server. Especially things like upcoming maintenance messages.

If you're expanding features at all: a history/delivery report would be awesome. Info on what was delivered, when, and to what client/device. Perhaps even an option to select which client/device to deliver a message to.

Nice work.

I'll have to load this project and take a look.

Some clients don't have the ability to accept messages.

But, it sound like the clients you tested should accept them, so the code probabaly needs to be updated.

 

 

[rbjtech 5284]

@chefBefore making any modifications - you may wanna catch up with the Luke et el - as they may have something like this on the radar given the recent security news.  

[chef 3810]

@darkassassin07 I went through the code.

There a couple things I have noted.

One in particular: There really isn't away to get any feedback from the client that the message was shown.

We'll get an 'OK' response from the command over http, but this only seems to tell us that the device accepted the message command, not that it was actually shown on screen.

 

@rbjtech I'm going to update the plugin  libraries, and also make sure that any API header attributes are in inline with the new security.

This plugin is a good opportunity to test out how  the core has implemented the attributes for the custom API's.

Should give us an chance to learn and understand what they've done there.

 

I'm diving back into the code again. 

This was written so long ago, there are many... many code refactors to be made in there... LOL! I was really 'green' at the time I wrote this. LOL!

[darkassassin07 652]

57 minutes ago, chef said:

@darkassassin07 I went through the code.

There a couple things I have noted.

One in particular: There really isn't away to get any feedback from the client that the message was shown.

We'll get an 'OK' response from the command over http, but this only seems to tell us that the device accepted the message command, not that it was actually shown on screen.

Hmm. Well, messages do seem to reliably show when the user has already logged in; it's just the on-login messages I can't get to display. Perhaps a delay could work? Wait 10s or so after the login event to push the message?

[Justus 8]

Any news on this one? Im pretty Interested in this feature too 

[nightknight 35]

I'm pretty sure this was abandoned. The devs must have lost interest.  The idea using web sockets isnt that great considering many clients don't support it.

It could be done with little effort if clients we just using http web interface but clients using the apps would need updated too.   The most simple solution is to have the messages saved in the user's data folder.  The message information could be transfered when the client connects or on a schedule. 

 

Using embys websocket api I think is a dead end for compatibility standpoint. Unless all the devices supported it..

 

At the rate features get added there's probably no hope anyway

Edited April 1, 2025 by nightknight

[Luke 42077]

42 minutes ago, nightknight said:

I'm pretty sure this was abandoned. The devs must have lost interest.  The idea using web sockets isnt that great considering many clients don't support it.

It could be done with little effort if clients we just using http web interface but clients using the apps would need updated too.   The most simple solution is to have the messages saved in the user's data folder.  The message information could be transfered when the client connects or on a schedule. 

 

Using embys websocket api I think is a dead end for compatibility standpoint. Unless all the devices supported it..

 

At the rate features get added there's probably no hope anyway

Abandoned is not the correct term. It's more like it's hasn't yet become important enough compared to other things that people want.

[bakes82 167]

It’s a fairly simple plugin. You just hook into the on playback start and keep a secondary table of occurrences shown.  Now if there were hooks for on login then you could use that but on playback start is available and usually works for most.  If on start and # occurrences < max amount send message, log occurrence to database.

 

 

[nightknight 35]

11 hours ago, bakes82 said:

It’s a fairly simple plugin. You just hook into the on playback start and keep a secondary table of occurrences shown.  Now if there were hooks for on login then you could use that but on playback start is available and usually works for most.  If on start and # occurrences < max amount send message, log occurrence to database.

 

 

Are you talking about this plugin?

 

https://github.com/chefbennyj1/Emby.MessageUsers

[bakes82 167]

2 hours ago, nightknight said:

Are you talking about this plugin?

 

https://github.com/chefbennyj1/Emby.MessageUsers

Im talking about the concept in general, I created my own in under 8hrs, most of the issues I had were the sqlite drivers emby uses that is needed to log the occurrences.  No idea what chef did, but I wrote the OG 4k transcoding killing which sent messages to users so the send message/on play hook stuff was already easy and tested.

[yoyo77yo 28]

Can you give me your plugin ? Please

[fricelander 10]

 

On 12/6/2022 at 5:13 AM, HawkXP71 said:

Couple message system feature requests.  They may already exist but the term "message" is so prevalent its hard to find, feel free to point me to other requests if they already exist

•  Add the ability to add messages to every user, that they see the next time the log in.  Ideally they would have an expiration date.  For instance, "Server will be shut down for maintenence on MM/DD/YYYY" that would expire the day after.  So if they didnt log in, they would never get it.

• Add ability for users to send a message to the admins.  
• Add ability to send a message as an email
  
  ~thanks

 

I think we have to separate things here,

- login message / popup it's more what this thread is about (maybe should be renamed)

- sending messages

 

im not sure people would have use for the second features but what I think could be useful for the first feature

-  popup / welcome message for first connection on Emby (new users) 

-  temporary popup / welcome message base on maybe on dates or period of time 

- popup / welcome message at each connection 

- popup / welcome message that shows only once per user

Maybe be able to plan those message ahead of time with publication time would be great as well as be able to have some layout options on it (add pictures, be able to format text ...)

@Lukemaybe changing the title of this suggestion to make it more clear like : popup / notification message ?

Edited October 25, 2025 by fricelander

[Luke 42077]

Done.