After reading countless posts, please verify my understanding is correct re Linksheets on the SMP device.
Linksheets are intended to be stored on the device’s internal storage. In the case of SMP, it is limited to only 30MB.
Therefore in order to use Linksheets to display movie/tv info, you need to use a custom firmware for the SMP. This firmware allows linksheets to instead be stored on devices (NAS, shares, USB) that would have enough capacity to store all the movie linksheets.
When your firmware is modified you can then use the available themes out there (Coco, Goodby, simplicity) on your SMP.
Linksheets are generated using the Thumbgen profiles generally provided by the SMP themes themselves.
A linksheet is an image (.jpg) that is generated by Thumbgen for each movie (or TV show).
The primary benefit of Linksheets (instead of the old moviesheet, with iso_sheet & xml) is faster loading.
Displaying by Linksheets no longer requires the .xml files. It’s only 1 image file to 1 movie file requirement.
But, they are stored in the “Theme” (On Internal SMP Flash Memory (30MB Limit) or USB using Firmware Hackclick… Linksheets cannot be stored anywhere else)
Additionally, Linksheets can be used with “Folders” as well
Also, Linksheets can be *.png format as well (Allowing for transparencies)
Do linksheets have to be on a USB, or can it be a NAS drive? But that begs the question, if the linksheets are stored locally for that particular device, how would it work if I had 4 SMP units in the house? Would each device have it’s own duplicate copy of the themed linksheet files?
The way my setup is right now is everything (.mkv, moviesheets, xml, iso_sheets, folder sheets, etc) is on a shared NAS folder, so each of the SMP devices are pulling from a single source.
And I guess once I use the Firmware hack, I shouldn’ update the SMP firmware using WD any longer?
I’ll play around with it and see what I can get working. Just wanted to test my understanding before I use a firmware hack and can’t go back.
Linksheets have to be in the root of your Theme’s directory. By default that would be physically on your SMP (with a 30mb limit). If you are running alternate FW, it is probablyon the attached USB drive. It would not be on a network drive/NAS.
If you have multiple devices, each one would need the same linksheet in it’s own theme directory. Unlike the XMLs and moviesheets, Linksheets cannot be pulled from a common location. I do this with several WD devices now and it works well. You could do that manually, or your could synchronize the the sheets automatically with a script or program. Any way you decide to do it, each time you make a new sheet, you just need to get it into the theme root of all of your WD devices
To get proper info on alterate (Non-WD) firmware, you would have to go the forum/website you are getting it from. You will find all the info you need there.
this link, has relevant info, but is pretty dated, of what it discusses is either done by the themer or is taken care of by using the current custom firmware v 0.0.7
as for sheets stored on NAS, might be possible, I haven’t implemented something like that
for now, you’ll need separate copies for each device
