[Variable!]

Not sure if I'm missing a setting somewhere but here's what's going on:  While I have my movie collection in Library mode, I *do not* use Library mode for my TV shows.  Instead I created a Favorite and added it to the home screen, and use that to be able to file-browse around my top-level TV folder.  This master TV folder contains sub folders for each individual show, and those contain sub folders for each season, and then the individual episode video files are inside each of those season folders.

When I browse inside my master TV folder, highlighting the folder of a particular TV show (each of which contain a fanart.jpg), that fanart will display in the background of the master TV folder, depending on whichever show currently have highlighted.  Once I decide on a show, and enter that folder (now I'm looking at all the season folders and highlighting which season I want), the correct fanart image no longer displays, because the highlighted season folders to not contain a fanart.jpg file.

Is there a setting that I've neglected to select somewhere that tells Amber to basically apply the parent folder's fanart.jpg to all of it's "children" or sub-folders?

[bsoriano]

Not sure if I'm missing a setting somewhere but here's what's going on:  While I have my movie collection in Library mode, I *do not* use Library mode for my TV shows.  Instead I created a Favorite and added it to the home screen, and use that to be able to file-browse around my top-level TV folder.  This master TV folder contains sub folders for each individual show, and those contain sub folders for each season, and then the individual episode video files are inside each of those season folders.

When I browse inside my master TV folder, highlighting the folder of a particular TV show (each of which contain a fanart.jpg), that fanart will display in the background of the master TV folder, depending on whichever show currently have highlighted.  Once I decide on a show, and enter that folder (now I'm looking at all the season folders and highlighting which season I want), the correct fanart image no longer displays, because the highlighted season folders to not contain a fanart.jpg file.

Is there a setting that I've neglected to select somewhere that tells Amber to basically apply the parent folder's fanart.jpg to all of it's "children" or sub-folders?

@Variable! , there is no setting like that in Amber.  The skin is not looking for fanart.jpg or other file in order to show the art.  it relies on artwork loaded into the database, default backgrounds (the skin's or those set by you).  I can add a setting like that, and you can try it out to see if it suits your needs.  Please let me know if you know how to update the skin from GitHub; I would like for you to try the changes without committing them to the Amber repo.  Thanks.

Regards,

Bart

[Variable!]

"The skin is not looking for fanart.jpg or other file in order to show the art.  it relies on artwork loaded into the database, default backgrounds (the skin's or those set by you)."
The skin actually does appear to be looking for fanart.jpg when "Settings > Skin Settings > Backgrounds > Show Fanart Background On Sub Windows" is enabled.

Keep in mind, I am *not* using any Library database information for my TV shows, I have simply added my folder full of TV shows as a "Favorite" and am browsing around the files that way.  The "Set Content - This Directory Contains" is set to "None" for this video source, thus the Library database feature is not even being used in my case.

When adding a source as a favorite, choosing "None" as the content type, and ensuring that the aforementioned "Show Fanart Background On Sub Windows" setting is enabled, the image for fanart.jpg *will* be displayed for the folder you've highlighted, but not for any sub folders, unless you create duplicate fanart.jpg files and place the copies in eaech individual sub folder.  This can be a benefit if for some reason you want different fanart images to display for each different sub folder, but if you just want the one parent folder's fanart.jpg image to apply to all sub folders automatically, this behavior does not occur.  (I performed a fresh install of kodi/amber as a test, and it appears my previously described behavior of a "random fanart" is due to another setting somewhere, but what I am describing in this post is a "clean" test and demonstration of the skin's behavior).

I would recommend that the "Show Fanart Background On Sub Windows" behavior be changed to apply a fanart.jpg image recursively down from a parent folder to all sub folders located within it, and that if the option is not enabled, then the skin should apply fanart.jpg to only the single folder which contains that jpg file (in order to still allow someone to customize different fanart images for each of their sub folders, without being overridden by the image in the parent folder).

[bsoriano]

"The skin is not looking for fanart.jpg or other file in order to show the art.  it relies on artwork loaded into the database, default backgrounds (the skin's or those set by you)."
The skin actually does appear to be looking for fanart.jpg when "Settings > Skin Settings > Backgrounds > Show Fanart Background On Sub Windows" is enabled.

Keep in mind, I am *not* using any Library database information for my TV shows, I have simply added my folder full of TV shows as a "Favorite" and am browsing around the files that way.  The "Set Content - This Directory Contains" is set to "None" for this video source, thus the Library database feature is not even being used in my case.

When adding a source as a favorite, choosing "None" as the content type, and ensuring that the aforementioned "Show Fanart Background On Sub Windows" setting is enabled, the image for fanart.jpg *will* be displayed for the folder you've highlighted, but not for any sub folders, unless you create duplicate fanart.jpg files and place the copies in eaech individual sub folder.  This can be a benefit if for some reason you want different fanart images to display for each different sub folder, but if you just want the one parent folder's fanart.jpg image to apply to all sub folders automatically, this behavior does not occur.  (I performed a fresh install of kodi/amber as a test, and it appears my previously described behavior of a "random fanart" is due to another setting somewhere, but what I am describing in this post is a "clean" test and demonstration of the skin's behavior).

I would recommend that the "Show Fanart Background On Sub Windows" behavior be changed to apply a fanart.jpg image recursively down from a parent folder to all sub folders located within it, and that if the option is not enabled, then the skin should apply fanart.jpg to only the single folder which contains that jpg file (in order to still allow someone to customize different fanart images for each of their sub folders, without being overridden by the image in the parent folder).

@Variable! , thank you for the additional information. You still did not tell me if you are able to update from Github. As I mentioned, I can add a setting to look for fanart.jpg in the folder or the parent folder. Let me know if you are able to update from GitHub. If you are able, I will let you know as soon as I add the setting so that you can test it. I await your response.

Regards,

Bart

[Variable!]

Apologies, I don't believe I've ever updated that way before, are there instructions somewhere?

[bsoriano]

Apologies, I don't believe I've ever updated that way before, are there instructions somewhere?

@Variable! You can download the updated version from here: https://github.com/bartolomesoriano/skin.../tree/Leia. You should see a green button that you can click to download a zip file of the skin. The folder inside the zip file will be named "skin.amber-Leia". Please change that to"skin.amber", and then you can just use the Kodi function to install an addon from a zip file with the zip file you downloaded. This should update Amber with the changes that are only in Github and not yet in the Amber repo.

Please let me know if you require further details on how to do this. Thanks. By the way, what Kodi version are you using, under what OS?

Regards,

Bart

[Variable!]

Looks like progress!  The only issue is that it apparently stops working and reverts to the default background when you get all the way into the season folder and highlight individual video files.

Also, it appears that the old "Show Fanart Background On Sub Windows" option no longer seems to make a difference while the new "Use fanart.jpg if present in folder or parent folder" option is enabled. (speaking for "Favorite"/file browsing mode only, I haven't tested any of this in Library mode).

I'm running Kodi 18.9 in Windows 10.

[bsoriano]

Looks like progress!  The only issue is that it apparently stops working and reverts to the default background when you get all the way into the season folder and highlight individual video files.

Also, it appears that the old "Show Fanart Background On Sub Windows" option no longer seems to make a difference while the new "Use fanart.jpg if present in folder or parent folder" option is enabled. (speaking for "Favorite"/file browsing mode only, I haven't tested any of this in Library mode).

I'm running Kodi 18.9 in Windows 10.

@Variable! Thanks for testing. I will work on the fanart for the second level (individual video files). And yes, the other setting has no effect if the new setting is active. This is because from the skin side, I don't know if you are browsing in file mode or library mode. I will provide updated skin code for you to test later today.

Regards,

Bart

EDIT: @Variable! please update and test again.  You should now see the fanart for the individual video files too.  Please confirm if this is what you were looking for.  Thanks.

[Variable!]

Ok this is the behavior I'm seeing now: Level 1 determined by the "Show Fanart Background On Sub Windows" setting, while levels 2 and 3 are determined by the "Use fanart.jpg If Present In Folder Or Parent Folder" setting, and the test scenario only contains one copy of fanart.jpg, located in the Series folder (such as the "Knight Rider" or "Portlandia" folder, which contains all the season-folders within.



As a test, I created an example with a 4th level, and it did not apply the fanart.jpg to that 4th level.  Not sure why you'd need a 4th level, but I'm sure there are plenty of use-cases out there so if there's an easy way to make "Use fanart.jpg If Present In Folder Or Parent Folder" behave in an infinitely recursive manner, regardless of how many levels of sub-folders down you go, that might make more people happy than just me, lol.

Also, not as important but rather just an observation I made, the settings for "Show Fanart Background On Sub Windows" and "Use fanart.jpg If Present In Folder Or Parent Folder" are independent of each other, meaning it is possible to toggle your settings in such a way where the series level 1 does not show a fanart background, but the seasons Level 2 and episodes Level 3, do show the fanart backgrounds.  Just an observed behavior I figured is worth writing down.

That said, this current iteration works for *my* use case, but as previously stated, if the "Use fanart.jpg If Present In Folder Or Parent Folder" feature can be made to act upon all subfolders, regardless of how many levels there are, that'd probably be more intuitive behavior for other users besides just myself.  In any case, thank you for STILL putting so much work into Amber (I belieive you and I had a similar message-exchange about feature development sometime a year or two ago in another thread), your work is GREATLY appreciated.  Please let me know if you have any questions or would like me to test anything else with this.  Thanks!

[bsoriano]

Ok this is the behavior I'm seeing now: Level 1 determined by the "Show Fanart Background On Sub Windows" setting, while levels 2 and 3 are determined by the "Use fanart.jpg If Present In Folder Or Parent Folder" setting, and the test scenario only contains one copy of fanart.jpg, located in the Series folder (such as the "Knight Rider" or "Portlandia" folder, which contains all the season-folders within.



As a test, I created an example with a 4th level, and it did not apply the fanart.jpg to that 4th level.  Not sure why you'd need a 4th level, but I'm sure there are plenty of use-cases out there so if there's an easy way to make "Use fanart.jpg If Present In Folder Or Parent Folder" behave in an infinitely recursive manner, regardless of how many levels of sub-folders down you go, that might make more people happy than just me, lol.

Also, not as important but rather just an observation I made, the settings for "Show Fanart Background On Sub Windows" and "Use fanart.jpg If Present In Folder Or Parent Folder" are independent of each other, meaning it is possible to toggle your settings in such a way where the series level 1 does not show a fanart background, but the seasons Level 2 and episodes Level 3, do show the fanart backgrounds.  Just an observed behavior I figured is worth writing down.

That said, this current iteration works for *my* use case, but as previously stated, if the "Use fanart.jpg If Present In Folder Or Parent Folder" feature can be made to act upon all subfolders, regardless of how many levels there are, that'd probably be more intuitive behavior for other users besides just myself.  In any case, thank you for STILL putting so much work into Amber (I belieive you and I had a similar message-exchange about feature development sometime a year or two ago in another thread), your work is GREATLY appreciated.  Please let me know if you have any questions or would like me to test anything else with this.  Thanks!

@Variable! , thanks for testing and for all of your observations.  Unfortunately, I do not know (with my level of skinning knowledge) of a way to make it so that the fanart.jpg is shown independently of how many levels there are in the folder structure.  And yes, the settings are independent of each other; I thought about making it an either or situation and decided against it.

Finally, thank you for your kind words in regards to the work in Amber.  I enjoy doing this and thanks to users like you I am always learning and improving.

I will add this feature now to the next version of Amber.  Thanks again for requesting it and for testing.

Regards,

Bart