Major network plug-ins

[samkrit 0]

I have been using Plex strictly for the major network plug-ins, which allow me to watch "on demand" TV shows with no commercials. Can I do that with Emby?

[Luke 42085]

We have a few channel plugins in our plugin catalog, but not too many major networks.

[Carlo 4561]

I have been using Plex strictly for the major network plug-ins, which allow me to watch "on demand" TV shows with no commercials. Can I do that with Emby?

Everything below is just my personal opinion as I'm not speaking for anyone else.

 

You've probably noticed Plex has pulled their plugin catalog and are removing plugin support from all clients as they go forward.  One of the reasons for this is that Plex was being used to circumvent the "store" policy.  Roku for example could ban the use of XYZ from it's store, but then you could load and use xyz via Plex as a work around (when their plugins actually work). Same for Apple, Google and Windows stores. Obviously it's not good to jeopardize your own product's distribution by allowing it to be used for things the store itself has banned or is protecting from unauthorized use.  This caused/causes a lot of problems for Plex as they never had permission to use the content in the first place and was violating the terms of service of said content providers.

 

Plex supported plugins via Python which wasn't integrated well into their C++ code. It became outdated over time as it got no love from Plex.  It slowly was falling apart and new server releases would break existing functionality.  This too as well as the previous issues caused them to drop support for plugins as it was no longer worth the time and effort to keep up the code.

 

 

Emby on the other hand uses C# for compiled plugins that have great integration with the server.  Same language as server, much stronger and well supported APIs, no flakiness as the plugins just work and actually integrate the functionality of the plugins into the server itself vs riding on top via "hacky" methods.

 

If you look at the Emby catalog of plugins you will notice a drastic difference compared to Plex.  Emby uses plugins mostly to enhance server and admin functionality with additional features or content enhancers. Things like Box Sets (collections in Plex speak), fancy cover art done dynamically, additional meta-providers, automated subtitle, themed music & videos downloads for your content to adding content and integrated functionality from other legal servers/services you run such as PlayOn or standalone DVR programs (DVBLink, DVBViewer, MediaPortal, NextPVR, ServerWMC, TVHeadEnd, TVMosaic, Vu+).

 

Emby has a bunch of different plugins for notifications so you can setup and receive notifications of things happening on your server via many different methods.  Plugins also can be used to add functionality such as reporting & statistics.  Emby has plugins to help you organize your media, convert it to different formats as well as upload (sync) to different cloud providers (removed functionality from Plex).

 

Emby does have a few plugins that can add content to the server that you have legal access to such as Trailers, Podcasts, IPTV sources, Tunein radio, Twit, BlurN, ICI Tou.tv & Playon which was already mentioned.

 

Emby certainly could provide access to network content like you're asking for from a technical standpoint, but can it do it legally and with permission of the content network and owners of the content?  All of the major networks like ABC, CBS, NBC, Fox, CW, etc have their own apps they are pushing on different platforms and forbid unauthorized access to content (read their terms of service).  They don't provide public APIs or methods to access their content (they don't want this). So the real question becomes, why would Emby want to blatantly jeopardize itself by providing access to content you clearly don't have permission to use in this fashion?

 

Sure from a user standpoint it would be nice to access all content from one app, but we don't view Netflix, Amazon Prime, Hulu or other major content providers this way inside Emby either.  Emby is all about YOUR MEDIA and adding value to it.

 

With today's devices it's so easy to load up the network or content app it really doesn't make sense trying to duplicate this functionality and spending man hours maintaining it.

Edited January 26, 2019 by cayars