Hello everybody,
I can’t wait for Plex 9 to be released! It looks really awesome from the few videos that you’ve posted and looks very much like what the guys who started the MacMediaCenter (with which I very minimally helped) were going for. I really think it’s a very elegant solution to separate the media server from the actual player, and it looks like you guys have done a great job of this.
In any case, I’ve been hearing lots of rumors about a new AppleTV (or iTV) device that Apple may release in the near future that would allow you to develop apps for your TV. I can’t think of a more useful app than a Plex client, and being a developer, I’d like to try my hand at it. I realize that the Plex alpha is closed at the moment, and as much as I WANT to work on Plex 9, I seriously don’t have the time right now (I’m working for a small startup as the only developer and I also have 1-2 paid side projects and 3 or 4 open source projects on my plate). However, it would be great if we, as a community, could start thinking about how it would need to be implemented and gathering any ideas about how to proceed. Personally, I’d love to make it all myself and have it be totally awesome and sell it for like $4…but I doubt that’s going to happen.
So, below are my ideas/thoughts and I would love some feedback from the community/developers of Plex 9. I realize that its not finished, ever-changing, and that documentation probably isn’t on the top of your list, but it would be great if we could get some ideas of how clients connect and talk to the Plex 9 Media Server (PMS). Perhaps this could be an unofficial documentation thread, or at least a place to get started.
So, here goes:
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[]I’ve read this post regarding an iPad remote mock-up, and it sounds like this would be a great path to travel. I think there are some definite improvements to be made, but I’ll post those in that thread so we can keep them separate.
[]I’m imagining this as an iPhone/iPad/iTV universal app that could do two things
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[]Allow you to browse/play your media by streaming it to the iDevice, or
[]Allow you to browse on the iDevice and play it on another iDevice or computer
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I’m not sure if Plex 9 can support this, but it sounds like it might be possible since the PMS is split from the player. This could be a global setting, so you could say, “I want to use my iPad as a remote to browse the PMS on my Mac Pro, but play it on my AppleTV when I select the media.” Now, since this may not be possible, the precursor to this awesomeness would be, “I want to use my AppleTV to browse the PMS on my Mac Pro and play it on either my Mac Pro or my AppleTV” (no idea why you would ever want to play it on the Mac Pro if you have a TV, but I think this would/should be possible/supported).
[] Just like Plex for the desktop, I think we should be able to configure the remote to display the media differently (i.e. wall of thumbnails, list, coverflow, etc).
[] I would highly suggest that we get some of the basic functionality working, release it, then add support for more cool stuff as we go. I think this will enable us to get something useful out the door and get a lot of interest/feedback about it. Along these lines, it may be best to release an iPad version, then an iPhone and then the iTV if we can get it out of the door quickly enough; otherwise, we may want to start with an iPad app so we have a base, but then finish the iTV version first so we get it in the TV app store very early on. Then, we could release the iPad/iPhone version.
[] I would love for it to be a paid app if I’m the core/only developer, but a free app if it’s more of a community effort.
[] I would love for it to be branded as an official Plex app that is officially maintained and released alongside Plex (which may mean it has to be a free community effort, not sure on this; perhaps it could be paid and all proceeds go to supporting the Plex developers as a non-profit org?).
[] It should be able to play media on your PMS or on your iDevice; for instance: if you’re using an iPad, you should be able to play any videos you have on your iPad even if there is no PMS running, or if you’re not connected to the WiFi network that your PMS is on.
[] It would be awesome if it could stream your content over 3G (which is now allowed by AT&T/Apple as long as you follow certain guidelines), but obviously, this would need to come in a later iteration.
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So, those are my thoughts/ideas! Please tell me what you guys think and add your own ideas. If this really gets going, perhaps we can move this to an official page on the wiki 
Cheers! (as a side-note, what do we as Americans say instead of “Cheers”? It sounds very British, and I’m not British…)
We don’t know if iTV will support third party apps, if it will use iOS or even if iTV will exist ever ! Rumors are just rumors…
Concerning the two ideas of control and stream on iPhone and iPad, it is already possible to do this with separate apps :
- Controllr to remotely control Plex (doesn’t work great for me with 550 movies)
- Streamtome to watch all your movies locally or over 3G. It uses ffmpeg to convert any movie on the fly and send a compatible stream to iPhone or iPad. It also works with music and pictures.
So basically yes, it would be great to have an app that do all of this through any plex database but I guess that it will take some months/years before we can play with something like this because the developer will need a lot of skills and time to achieve this result.
Sooner or later an iOS client for Plex is inevitable. If there isn’t any work in progress on an iOS version I’d say we better get started!
An app which can present movie sources by name in a TableView and play them streaming from the PMS without reencoding on the fly would be the first step, right? Is it possible to use the file container “parsers” which Plex uses on OS X? Are they objective-c libraries?
I haven't tried Streamtome but I have tried AirVideo...
You really want to avoid on the fly reencode since it seriously impact image quality. Of course not all movies will be playable on the iOS devices as of today, because of CPU etc., but that is something time will take care of.
I also tried AirVideo to watch a bluray m2ts file of more than 40go on my iPad at a stream of 2048 kbit/s.
Quality was just awesome for the resolution of the device !
Concerning the supposed “iTV”, I will never buy one if the device can’t handle a high bitrate 1080p file.
If the iTV is released, and accepts 3rd party apps, I sincerely hope a Plex app will be developed. What an amazing $99 box that would be
If they release an iTV device, and it’s actually called iTV, it will almost certainly run iOS. Honestly, I can’t imagine them NOT doing this. Think of all of the cool games people will make that you will be able to play on your TV using your iPhone or iPad as the controller. This is the obvious next-step for Apple, so I think we’ll all be pleasantly surprised.
Now, back to the rumors: I have a feeling that Plex is NOT being acquired by Apple, and that the release date was just setup to coincide with the media event to draw some hype. The Plex release teaser looks Appleish, but not made by Apple. If Plex were being acquired, I think Apple would take the time to do a truly proper teaser poster.
Whatever happens, I think I am more excited about what Plex has to offer, not what Apple is going to release, on September 1st. Anyway, it’ll be a great day!
Come Weds you will see the new Apple TV which will run iOS and have 3rd party apps ...Its been confirmed by so many sources that while its not 'apple official' it is well beyond rumor.
The Plex devs don’t live in total isolation. I’m sure they’ll surprise us with something when .9 arrives 
http://elan.plexapp.com/2010/08/30/one-more-thing/
I guess that was the “wait until we release it and you’ll se why it was worth the wait”…
Okay…considering the awesomeness of the new iOS version of Plex, I’m gonna assume you’ve already got some plans for an iTV version if it comes out.
Well played guys, well played
God I hope so...Plex on iTV would be heavenly :)
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