Problem with themes

WD Legacy Products WD TV Themes
1

Hi,

My only problem with themes is that it seems, unless I’m happy sticking with the vanilla stock theme, I’ve either got to have a real bodge of a theme made by someone who’s either colour blond or no sense of style or, if I want one that looks really cool and that a lot of effort went into it, I’ll have to go to university for 3 years just to learn how to make it work and install it.

Surely being that the people who make these themes are intelligent and that the WD box is the same for all, can’t a theme be made into one file that you just install and go, like themes on Android.

Why has it got to be soooo hard for a nice theme that’s pleasing to the eye???

Moan over :slight_smile:

Thanks.

2

Ahh installing a theme should not be that difficult for you. At most it is moving a few files around. The time consuming part is creating movie sheets or linksheets. If you are willing to live without those, I think almost any theme you can get on this board is pretty easy to install.

-P

3

I’m with pearl on this

a theme is easy to still give me 2 minutes I can probably install and try 2 different themes

it really is just moving some files, or for the SMP uploading a zip file

it’s xml’s and moviesheets, linksheets that take time

and those will always to specific to your set up

4

If this is a device you intend to keep till it dies AND you really like a particular theme it’s in your best intrest to learn the little bit you need to learn to fully utilize it. It really isnt that much. Sure it takes some time at first but once you have it done keeping it up is simple and not nearly as time consuming as it is getting it all going. I actually find it’s fun and have modded the particular theme I like to my personal tastes. It involved tinkering around in the xml files and I managed to tweak it to what I like. So if a 62 year old dude can handle it, well need I say more? 

 

Get busy, quit slacking off and git er dun!  :) 

 

5

flhthemi wrote:

 

Get busy, quit slacking off and git er dun!  :) 

 

That’s the ticket. I like the way you put it flhthemi. You need to try a bunch and find the one that really suits your needs. Then, it is worth spending the time to learn it and go through the process of making your sheets. At first, I didn’t have a good grasp on this part and spent an enormous amount of time making xmls and backdrops, and then later linksheets for each theme I tried. It’s not worth the hassle. If you have a lot of movies and TV Series, spend the time deciding which theme is the one you want to stick with, and then go through the process of making all your sheets. Even when you automate the process, it’s a drag to redo 1000+ movies in Thumbgen because you want to change your theme.

Now, as my friend above noted, pick your favorite and get crakin’

-P 

6

the most important advice I can give so that you don’t have to manually re-do thousands of sheets

in thumbgen create metadata files .tgmd

when I change a theme.

I leave thumbgen to re-run everything based off .tgmd files

takes about an hour, but I can leave

and then it’s all just done

it’s pretty easy actually

but without .tgmd files, your basically out of luck

1 Like
7

That’s a great cal KAD79. I was advised of this after i had already done about a quarter of my movies so I don’t have a complete set, but close. I have never actually used them but your post make me think I should find some time to get that last quarter done so I can check out some other themes easily. I love what I have setup and modded, but it would be nice to change it up every once in a while

-P

8

.tgmd file are very useful

I’ve used them to redo movie sheets

I’ve even used them to recreate xml files when I previously had none

just set to batch re-create from meta

9

KAD79 wrote:

.tgmd file are very useful

I’ve used them to redo movie sheets

 

I’ve even used them to recreate xml files when I previously had none

just set to batch re-create from meta

 And if you change the tmgd file extension to .zip, guess what you can do? ;) 

 

10

flhthemi wrote:

 And if you change the tmgd file extension to .zip, guess what you can do? ;) 

 

never even thought to try that

but I’d image you end up with all the data easily accessable

that would be a neat trick to keep in mind

11

If you extract files they have no extensions so you just have to rename Fanart1 to Fanart1.jpg. No biggie. 

 

12

I think you are all missing my point.

I shouldn’t have to do any of this. It should just work. Like any other theme for any other consumer device.

We’re not talking about turning a Raspberry Pi into a media centre here.

This is a consumer device, created by a multi billion pound company with research groups and (I’m fairly sure) an ability to creat a product that works without needing a degree in computer science.

I shouldn’t have to rework anything to make it work, it just should work.

13

Although I agree with you on the main point that it should just work, in theory it does. You are trying to install user made themes instead of using what WD has provided. WDs standard theme is on and working right out of the box. If you want to mod up your device, you then have to put in the time to understand how it works and what to do. Although not extremely difficult, using 3rd party software does require extra knowledge of the device.

When you go to WDs site and look at the specs / description of the HUB, it doesn’t (at least anymore) say anything about having multiple themes that you can switch to.

http://www.wdc.com/en/products/products.aspx?id=570

If only technolgy were easy, then everyone would have killer setup, not just those of us who put in the time. :smileyvery-happy:

14

What about something like android. They provide you with a theme, users can create their own themes that they can sell or give away. Consumer downloads and installs theme and all is well.

How is this not possible for a simple box???

pearl wrote:

Although I agree with you on the main point that it should just work, in theory it does. You are trying to install user made themes instead of using what WD has provided. WDs standard theme is on and working right out of the box. If you want to mod up your device, you then have to put in the time to understand how it works and what to do. Although not extremely difficult, using 3rd party software does require extra knowledge of the device.

 

When you go to WDs site and look at the specs / description of the HUB, it doesn’t (at least anymore) say anything about having multiple themes that you can switch to.

 

http://www.wdc.com/en/products/products.aspx?id=570

 

If only technolgy were easy, then everyone would have killer setup, not just those of us who put in the time. :smileyvery-happy:

15

Well I love my Android Pad, I wouldn’t want to compare it too linksheets on my media steaming device. I guess for me there is no question about what WD provides. They make a device that does “x” amount of things, and I was aware of the things it does not do when I bought it. I choose the HUB based on my needs at the time and I bought a Roku because of what that does. My expectations were based on what those products did, not what I wished they did.

I am not saying that WD couldn’t make a device that provides you with multiple easy to use themes, I am saying that they don’t. We are very fortunate to have some extremely genrous people on this board who are willing to dedicate their time to desigining themes that they give to the community for free. Those are the options that we have, and I for one am thankful for their hard work. I am now running XBMC on a PC to play with it and it is pretty cool and has a ton of great themes. that is always an option if themes are what is important to you. I personaly stil find the HUB easier to use.

You certainly have the right to be unhappy with the products capabilities and think that they should offer you more. I just wonder why you would expect to be able to do things with the device that WD didn’t include in the package. I could say the same thing about the Roku box (that I love). It comes with a basic theme and thats what you get. I knew that when I bought it so it does not frustrate me.

In the end, you can choose the basic theme, or with a small amount of modding do some cool stuff. I am sure you are smart enough to get through it pretty quickly, it’s just. a decision if you want to dedicate the time to it. Lots of people don’t, and for those who do, there are some great resources on this board as far as themes, posts and helpful people. The choice is yours.

You dont blame your coffee make for not making esspresso. They didn’t tell you it could, and you still can buy coffee makers that do both if you want to spend the money to buy one. I only get frustrated when a device or a piece of software is supposed to do something that it doesn’t. A whole different issue.

Please dont take my opinion for flippant or nasty. Its just my opinion. I am sure there are many people who feel the way  you do. I bought the Live Plus and then later the HUB based on the formats it could play. That was the most important thing to me. Theming was just a bonus that I could have lived without. That said, now that I put in a small amount of time to learn how to use them and found one I love, it enhances my user experience tenfold, and was well worth the resource investment

Good luck, and I do hope you try out a few themes. You may find that it’s not very difficult and some have very clear step by step instructions that would have you up and running in under and hour.

-P

16

richardhanney wrote:

What about something like android. They provide you with a theme, users can create their own themes that they can sell or give away. Consumer downloads and installs theme and all is well.

 

How is this not possible for a simple box???

 

 

Humm…I have tried several different apps (Mizuu, MovieBrowser UPnP/DLNA, Another Movie Database,MediaHouse UPnP,My Movies, MoviesBook) for my Asus tablet that are media players/databases. Most are DLNA compatable. NONE of them offered up any themes other than the built in option of DARK or LIGHT. BUT, I’m pretty sure the apps could all be modified by someone slick enough to get into it and change a lot of the graphic files. Certainly this is not as easy as installing a theme on your Hub/SMP. Sure a lot of apps offer up themes but it doesn’t seem that any of the movie database type of apps do.