No reason to destroy original atv functionality - enhance it by adding a Trailer link amongst your choices inside PlexConnect or by being greeted by a “Trailers or Plex” inside the primary page.
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There already exists a Plex Apple trailers plugin. Just load that in your PMS and it will be available under channels. Last time I tried it, it was already working with Plexconnect.
Uh... have you tried to run the Plex plugin for apple trailers? My guess is, it wouldn't work. And as roidy pointed out, you might risk a tear in the space-time-continuum...
I tried once and it did work. That was a few iterations of Plexconnect ago. I haven’t tried recently but will when I have a chance.
It did work? That is quite strange...
I do ask myself: How was aTV be able to connect to "real" trailers.apple if we intercept and re-route all those requests to PlexConnect/PMS?
Currently you are able to browse the listings... everything that is contained in/served via PMS. Once PMS decides to link to the real address for media (also metadata like thumbnails and stuff) it should desperately fail. Or cause this crack in the space-time-... you never know.
When you first enter PlexConnect you set a flag to tell DNSServer to not hook trailers.apple.
The problem I see is clearing same flag. What event can be used for that ? I'm guessing there is no web request (or anything) when you leave an app for the homescreen...
Hmmm... on second thought... is the top shelf rebuilt on each return to the homescreen ?
It did work? That is quite strange...
I do ask myself: How was aTV be able to connect to "real" trailers.apple if we intercept and re-route all those requests to PlexConnect/PMS?
Currently you are able to browse the listings... everything that is contained in/served via PMS. Once PMS decides to link to the real address for media (also metadata like thumbnails and stuff) it should desperately fail. Or cause this crack in the space-time-... you never know.
Is the dns server hooking just trailers.apple.com/index.xml or all subsets ? I think you only only need to hook the one called by starting the Trailer app.
Is the dns server hooking just trailers.apple.com/index.xml or all subsets ? I think you only only need to hook the one called by starting the Trailer app.
DNS is bout the connection hostname (like "trailers.apple.com" to IP Adr (192.168.xx.xx)). This means, it ALWAYS affects every file you would pull from the original site.
Otherwise you would need to update the IP referenced by trailers.apple.com inside the aTV from "hijacked" to "original". Other possibility: Set up the own WebServer to just pass through requests and content.
Okay put it this way...
I don't know which ip addresses are being referenced by the various homescreen apps or even within the Trailer app itself but ONLY the original trailers.apple.com/index.xml needs to be hooked (so as not to complicate things) so perhaps it would be better to have the dnsserver hook the search for that particular file (trailers.apple.com/index.xml) than for all lookups based on trailers.apple.com
Again... DNS is the "address book" of the internet. It only looks for hostnames. No directories or single files.
If I send you to go to "17 Miller Street, Some City, ZIP", you might go there. Not knowing who actually lives there... Is this a good example? I don't know...
Ok but the dns server is written by us so we have every ability to be more specific in our handling of what is passed to it, even to do a text-based parsing of the requested url before deciding whether to pass it to the isp's dns server or handling it our self.
Does the atv not request the url "www.trailers.apple.com/index.xml" when accessing the Trailer app or am I missing something ?
Ok but the dns server is written by us so we have every ability to be more specific in our handling of what is passed to it, even to do a text-based parsing of the requested url before deciding whether to pass it to the isp's dns server or handling it our self.
Does the atv not request the url "www.trailers.apple.com/index.xml" when accessing the Trailer app or am I missing something ?
you're missing something, the DNS server never knows the full url of what is going on, it only ever gets asked to resolve the hostname. it does not know there is a http:// at the front, or anything at the end, DNS only deals with hostnames.
Trudge... thanks. I thought I made that clear before :-D
sickboy2: Looking from the WebServer point of view (and this is different to the DNSServer, two really different things), we COULD decide if we request the apple data and pass this back or ask PMS for input. However, aTV at first requests an *.js script file for setup. Once this is loaded, I guess there is no real way going back. We might try at one point, currently there are more important things... there is a trailers app available for Plex. Or... just switch your aTV DNS address back and forth between "automatic" and the PlexConnect one.
Ok thanks for that guys - I thought I had a handle on dns protocol I guess I don’t and can’t even find hard examples when I looked it up.
And I absolutely get there’s more important things to address but I thought this more simple than it turned out to be.
Thanks though for addressing it.
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Well it appears I must have been imagining that the Plex trailers plugin worked because it doesn't anymore (and probably never did since Baa's reasoning is, of course, sound).
On the other issue, I feel that the trailers app was the correct choice at least until a more flexible solution emerges.
I have just had the chance to play with Plex and the PlexConnect goodies for my aTV. I have to say I am Impressed. I agree with this thread it would be nice to have something easier to get back to the trailers section than resetting the DNS every time.
Easy to toggle, yes.
Convenient and "Apple-ish", no.
I understand this is early release and I appreciate that very much. Just think that sickboy's initial idea is a good thing to consider.
The fact that people want it has been noted but it is not known if it is at all possible with the current implementation and is not high on the priorities at the moment.
Just a thought, but if the Apple Trailers channel were reworked to lookup the hostname IP and return the URL with an IP address instead of domain name, this would get around the DNS issue.
Since the channel itself runs on the server, there would be no issue hitting the apple servers.
>> lookup the hostname IP and return the URL with an IP address instead of domain name
Yes, this might work... however, the IP addrs gained by a DNS request usually have some kind of expiration date. So if one just let's his box sit there - and the global IP changes (for whatever reason) - it might fail next time. Most probably not a really big deal, but not really nice as well.
My idea is a little different: when there is need to access the apple server, use a changed hostname. Eg. sreliart.elppa.moc - let the DNSServer detect it and correct the name before forwarding.
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