Bruji

Hi guys,

Since I also use Dvdpedia to track, comment and rate the movies I see, my goal is to start sharing what I've been watching with friends.
I've been exploring the export options and have some questions.

1) I export to MobileMe, each time I update, it says, "checking if file needs updating" for every file uploaded. Would there be a way to bypass this?
Like by default make dvdpedia update only the new entries. If I want to make sure everything is up to date I could still do it manually.
--> Because the upload process is much longer than it could since it's checking every single file at a time.

2) Any way to "push" the new entries automatically, without having to export the Library manually every time I add a title?

3) If I understand correctly, I'll be able to choose what fields are uploaded or not on the webpage, exactly how they are displayed but also create "links" for more info, links to imdb, etc? If I get my head around making my own template or editing one existing. New to this.

4) Can I add some sort of links to each films (posts?) in the library uploaded on the web so I'll be able to share/tweet a film's info & comments to FB or others.
Or this is up to my server to support such options?
To make that possible, each movie entry would have to be considered a "separate post", right?
• Or perhaps do that directly from dvdpedia?? Be able to share a movie with predetermined fields to share. (title, image, rating and imdb link) Via scripts perhaps?


Thank you again and again for this app I use almost every day.
Gabriel

All my previous posts have been deleted??
There was some stuff and threads I wanted to keep...

Which of your posts were deleted? We only delete spam usually, not valid posts. Especially if their only a few months old (if a post is more than a couple of years old and doesn't have any pertinent information then it might also get cut).

I don't remember what topic exactly but always posts associated with DVDpedia. Some old, some newer. At least two topics with relevant information.
And never spam of course...

Sad.

Any input on this topic in question?

Hi Gabe,

I can assure you that nothing has ever been deleted that been posted by you "Gabe". I searched the entire forum logs to verify. Could it you have another forum login? There is another user named Gabriel that goes under the forum name "Amaramt", but he writes about CDpedia.

1. There is no other way to make sure that everything is current than to check the modification date on all the files. If you would like more control over the way the upload is done it's better to use a dedicated program such as Transmit that has a sync command to update an online folder based on a local folder and more flexibility on the rules of when to perform an update.

2. There is no current way to just push changes with MobileMe. We are looking at offering that feature down the road but it would require a more extensive infrastructure, that we are currently working on.

3. The fields and links are all based on the template used. You can include as many or as few fields as you would like. For example fields are exported based on the presence of keys in the template; "[key:director]" would export the director field, if you did not want the director information you would remove this field and maybe add one of the personally fields that are normally not included like [key:location] or [key:custom2].

4. Indeed it would be beneficial to use one of the entries that have details template that are specific to a single movie. For example the "White" template list all the movies in a single page but then every movie has their own specific page that you can then link to. You can also add the meta tag below to a template to have the pages named after the UID of the movie, this would mean that even if you where to change all the settings on an export the URL would remain the same for the movie details. You could even embed links into the movie details page that go to Twitter and and Facebook. Making it a one "click to share" this movie online. 4b. Scripting from DVDpedia is also a possibility, and there are millions of ways to go there but most of them would involve some kind of programming and knowledge of the Facebook and Twitter APIs. DVDpedia even includes a plug-in architecture so you could add the script as a menu command via Cocoa.

Hi Conor!

Thanks for your answer. It took a while for me to get back to you since I was trying to digest, understand and apply the template creation process + what you shared in the last post.
I must say though that I'm just stumped. All of this is Chinese to me. I found a bunch of help files or threads or resources here but it just doesn't compute...

I read a lot. Stuff like "Writing info view templates" in dvdpedia help or this: http://bruji.com/howto/creating_templates/

I simply want an export template with the image, the title, the director and writer, custom rating, my comments, link to imdb.
Also as discussed, each title entry has its own clickable "share to FB" link or other.

Perhaps you can reassure me and tell me it's perfectly doable even for a newbie like me? Or offer some other resources or guidance.


re:#2 You are currently working on that or it's in the "maybe" bucket?
re:#4 When you said an embed link in the movie details, do you mean the links tab in edit view?


Very grateful for your help!

P.S. I sent you a PM concerning the lost posts. I found some of them. It was indeed through this login.

Writing a web page, template, does require some HTML knowledge. The easiest solution is taking the included template that you like best and pressing the edit button in the export window. Then doing only a few changes to add your extra features. For example select the "White" template and press the edit button, then open MyWhiteDetails.html in a ext editor that shows you the actual HTML code and replace everything between (including) <!--BeginRepeat--> and <!--EndRepeat--> with the snippet bellow: Save the file and then exporting "MyWhite" template, will have one long list with all the movies and detail pages with only the fields you mentioned (I had to guess on custom rating, and added custom1 and custom2, but you should be able to change those lines to export the actual field you desire).

2. It's in the "sure" bucket, but it's not with MobileMe that we will be doing it. Hence a number of other features need to happen before we can even begin work on this feature. That said pretend the feature will never exist, with all our planned features we like to not talk about them. The Apple way of road development, saying nothing at all, is better than the competition that announces Playbooks that don't or might not ever exist. Speaking of which there are MobileMe rumors saying it will change and have new ffeatures, should that happened we would of course work those new features into our program.

4. I meant in the template itself, since the templates are no different than a regular web page, you can create a "like" link as you would on a regular webpage. For example adding the following to a template would create a "Facebook Like" link (this is included in the snippet above after the movie title):

Thanks Conor for your great help!

I've been playing around with it (editing templates) and I think I can end up creating what I want.
Will update with results or questions.

Cheers!