I hate to ask this but here it goes...

[King Pin 34]

Does anyone use a different Android app on their tv other than EMBY? 

My only gripe is it's been geared towards mobile users and I really hate having to horizontally scroll to do a lot of things. 

For instance I go to a movie and click on one of the actors in the description to see what other movies they are in and you have to scroll horizontally instead of seeing them show up like a panel. 

No big deal except if you click a movie and then click back it takes you back to the beginning of the list and you have to scroll horizontally all the way to where you were again.  

 

The same thing if I click favourites up top. 

The list of actors show up horizontally and you need to scroll forever. 

Might not be a big deal for some people but with over 6000 movies and tons of favourite actors I think I may be looking for something different. 

 

I like Emby server on my desktop and will keep it there because it works perfectly and there is none of the horizontal scroll that I truly despise. 

 

Flame suit on.   

Edited March 26, 2025 by King Pin

[Gilgamesh_48 1240]

17 minutes ago, King Pin said:

Does anyone use a different Android app on their tv other than EMBY? 

My only gripe is it's been geared towards mobile users and I really hate having to horizontally scroll to do a lot of things. 

For instance I go to a movie and click on one of the actors in the description to see what other movies they are in and you have to scroll horizontally instead of seeing them show up like a panel. 

No big deal except if you click a movie and then click back it takes you back to the beginning of the list and you have to scroll horizontally all the way to where you were again.  

 

The same thing if I click favourites up top. 

The list of actors show up horizontally and you need to scroll forever. 

Might not be a big deal for some people but with over 6000 movies and tons of favourite actors I think I may be looking for something different. 

 

I like Emby server on my desktop and will keep it there because it works perfectly and there is none of the horizontal scroll that I truly despise. 

 

Flame suit on.   

It seems that there are two Emby Android apps. One labeled "Emby" and the other "Emby Android TV." They are both in the Google Android app library and I can get either on my Shield by simply entering the Play store and searching for "Emby" The results show the "Emby" app firs and "Emby Android TV" app a few selections further in. 

I have reasons to believe that "Emby Android TV" is the best and newest. It does have some minor problems and horizontal scrolling is used in some places but, for the way I use Emby, I almost never run into them.

There is also Kodi: I believe that there is still a working plugin for Emby on Kodi. I tried using Kodi a good time ago and it did work as an Emby client but, for me, It is the worst Emby client i have ever used. 

I am sure there are quite a few other Emby clients in the Play Store. But I have never even heard of them.

I suggest you try "Emby Android TV" as all the others I cannot recommend. 

BTW: If you find one I have not mentioned please share it here as I really like trying "new" things even if I also tend to stay with the old.

[King Pin 34]

Thank you. 

I think I am using Emby Android TV.  

[Gilgamesh_48 1240]

Then I believe you are using the best Emby Android app. 

[Luke 42077]

Quote

My only gripe is it's been geared towards mobile users

Hi, what makes you think it's been geared towards mobile users?

[King Pin 34]

40 minutes ago, Luke said:

Hi, what makes you think it's been geared towards mobile users?

My examples in the first post.

Why would a developer (not sure if that's the job title) make a user scroll through so much when it can be displayed as a page the same way the web version does? 

I have 80 movies with Bruce Willis.  I can only view 7 movies before I have to start scrolling horizontally. So I get 3/4 the way through click on a movie but I decide to choose another.

I click back and I'm taken to the beginning and I have to scroll all the way back again.  If it's not geared towards mobile then I would suggest it's a poor way of doing things.

 

 

[seanbuff 1313]

17 minutes ago, King Pin said:

I have 80 movies with Bruce Willis.  I can only view 7 movies before I have to start scrolling horizontally. So I get 3/4 the way through click on a movie but I decide to choose another.

Have you actually tried using the other Android app in the Play Store to see how it compares? It's called 'Emby for Android' (without TV in the name)

If the actor doesn't also appear in a Series or Episodes and only lists Movies, then the movie list will be vertical as it appears in the web app.

[King Pin 34]

1 hour ago, seanbuff said:

Have you actually tried using the other Android app in the Play Store to see how it compares? It's called 'Emby for Android' (without TV in the name)

If the actor doesn't also appear in a Series or Episodes and only lists Movies, then the movie list will be vertical as it appears in the web app.

No I haven't.  Until today I didn't know there was another app.  

Is there a reason there are 2 apps? 

I mean is there a big difference in the two? 

[seanbuff 1313]

20 minutes ago, King Pin said:

Is there a reason there are 2 apps? 

The Emby team have plans to unify the apps, however there has been no date set for sunsetting the existing "TV" app. I imagine both will remain active for a while. 

 

23 minutes ago, King Pin said:

I mean is there a big difference in the two?

Try them both out and see which one you prefer, they can happily co-exist on the same device.

[King Pin 34]

8 minutes ago, seanbuff said:

The Emby team have plans to unify the apps, however there has been no date set for sunsetting the existing "TV" app. I imagine both will remain active for a while. 

 

Try them both out and see which one you prefer, they can happily co-exist on the same device.

I have added it and for my use case I find it much more to my liking.  

Only thing that's weird is if I go to adjust picture settings in the Emby for Android app that I just added the background changes to my home screen with the movie playing in small box below. Makes it very difficult to adjust pic settings if you can't see anything. 
There's also no beep sound when moving around but that's no big deal. 
I wonder how would a person install their Custom CSS in the box they are using on their desktop and would it actually work?

 

Pictures below.   Emby for Android TV on top & Emby for Android on the bottom. 

 

 

Edited March 26, 2025 by King Pin

[justinrh 259]

@King Pinreport back if you find any difference in picture quality of movies.

[Smitty018210 143]

On 3/26/2025 at 2:16 AM, King Pin said:

My examples in the first post.

Why would a developer (not sure if that's the job title) make a user scroll through so much when it can be displayed as a page the same way the web version does? 

I have 80 movies with Bruce Willis.  I can only view 7 movies before I have to start scrolling horizontally. So I get 3/4 the way through click on a movie but I decide to choose another.

I click back and I'm taken to the beginning and I have to scroll all the way back again.  If it's not geared towards mobile then I would suggest it's a poor way of doing things.

 

 

They (Devs) don't seem to understand that people don't want to horizontally scroll through 100s of movies, episodes, actors, ECT.

This issue has come up time and time again. They continue to removed vertical view options from their apps time and time again.

They just can't or wont give users the option and let us choose. How hard can it be to have a vertical scroll for these things? Makes no sense.

Edited March 29, 2025 by Smitty018210

[Luke 42077]

22 minutes ago, Smitty018210 said:

They (Devs) don't seem to understand that people don't want to horizontally scroll through 100s of movie, episodes, actors, ECT.

This issue has come up time and time again. They continue to removed vertical view options from their apps time and time again.

They just can't or wont give users the option and let us choose. How hard can it be to have a vertical scroll for these things? Makes no sense.

When you have two sections stacked one above the other, you can't really make them vertical scroll. At that point you need a whole new design.  That is why it's not so simple to just throw in an option to toggle one way or the other.

[Smitty018210 143]

42 minutes ago, Luke said:

When you have two sections stacked one above the other, you can't really make them vertical scroll. At that point you need a whole new design.  That is why it's not so simple to just throw in an option to toggle one way or the other.

You had clickable headers in TV mode for years, and then you removed them. The option was already there. You took them away.

Having that clickable header for actors would solve this issue for OP.

OP could  have clicked on the header and have vertical list of all the movies for Bruce Willis for example. (You can still do this in desktop mode)

That option was there in TV Mode and now it's gone.

This is just one example, There are many more.

 

Edited March 29, 2025 by Smitty018210

[darkassassin07 652]

@Lukehere's some example screenshots:

 

 

When viewing a cast member with Android mobile, you can select the movies/shows header(s) and vertically scroll through all their content:

 

 

When you change to the TV display mode however, these headers are no longer selectable. You can't get to the dedicated Movies/tv Shows page for that actor and are instead forced to horizontally scroll through the list in their details page.

 

[Smitty018210 143]

10 minutes ago, darkassassin07 said:

@Lukehere's some example screenshots:

 

 

When viewing a cast member with Android mobile, you can select the movies/shows header(s) and vertically scroll through all their content:

 

 

When you change to the TV display mode however, these headers are no longer selectable. You can't get to the dedicated Movies/tv Shows page for that actor and are instead forced to horizontally scroll through the list in their details page.

 

That option used to be available in TV mode too. Devs removed it.

[ebr 16169]

48 minutes ago, darkassassin07 said:

TV display mode however, these headers are no longer selectable

That's because doing so would double the number of clicks on a remote control necessary to navigate vertically.

[Smitty018210 143]

12 minutes ago, ebr said:

That's because doing so would double the number of clicks on a remote control necessary to navigate vertically.

And add HUNDREDS of clicks horizontally lol

Up - Down clicks = bad

left - right clicks = good

That logic has never made sense to me. Never will.

Crazy thought give users the option to turn on/off Clickable headers?

You don't want the extra clicks turn them off

You don't care about extra clicks and want the clickable headers turn them on

Why don't you let us decided?

Edited March 29, 2025 by Smitty018210

[darkassassin07 652]

So it's better to not be able to see the other pages EVER?

40+ clicks sideways in lists that refuses to remember your position to save 3 clicks down? Seriously? 

Who tf cares if you have to scroll past the headers, THEY'RE USEFUL and the only thing below them are external links. Move those up if reaching them immediately such a big deal. (it's not)

[GrimReaper 4739]

I have to side with @Smitty018210and @darkassassin07on this one, IIRC focus could've been brought on header only when clicking UP, meaning DOWN vertical navigation was not affected - but even if it were, doubling the number of vertical clicks (which is very limited number to begin with) is more than fair trade compared to infinite horizontal clicks. 

Edited March 29, 2025 by GrimReaper

[GrimReaper 4739]

Alternate solution (not the happiest one but it'd at least give some option) would be to implement "Group by" feature as in Collection view - as the underlying principle is the same. 

[Smitty018210 143]

12 minutes ago, GrimReaper said:

I have to side with @Smitty018210and @darkassassin07on this one, IIRC focus could've been brought on header only when clicking UP, meaning DOWN vertical navigation was not affected - but even if it were, doubling the number of vertical clicks (which is very limited number to begin with) is more than fair trade compared to infinite horizontal clicks. 

I know there no real sense to arguing with them (Devs) about this topic anymore. 

They seem to have made their decision about this topic. (Vertical Viewing options -Adding new ones or bring back old options that were removed) 

I for one will never understand all the forced horizontally scrolling in this product/apps. 

The dev teams seem to prefer it and will all just have to deal with it.

 

 

 

[GrimReaper 4739]

I know it might feel like pulling a teeth sometimes - but I also know Devs can be reasoned with, number of features (quite a few more than it might be apparent in the forums) do actually find their way into the product eventually, though some do take somewhat lo(ooooo)nger time. Don't give up just yet.

[Chyron 256]

Honestly, this shows the primary difference between an engineer and a designer.

They should be consulting with someone who has a background in design, to give the client app(s) a proper balance of functionality and aesthetic.