[mythtv] Android companion application for Mythweb / API for Mythweb

[Robert McNamara]

On Sun, Nov 6, 2011 at 3:18 AM, thomas strandenaes <thostr at yahoo.no> wrote:
> Hi,
> I'm a long term, happy and active user of Mythtv. Congratulations on a great open source project and product! I am also a developer, and I've thought of ways to contribute to the project. I've recently picked up Android application development, and I am thinking of developing an Android application for administrating Mythtv recordings on my android devices. More specifically, I am planning on extending the Mythweb project with an API (RESTful) for the obvious functions (channel, listings, recordings etc) and then consume these services on the Android application. I've just barely started to study the Mythweb PHP code, but before I get my hands too dirty I would like to know whether such an extension to the Mythweb project will be considered relevant and is something I can expect to have commited into the Mythweb project. Alternatively I could use the MythBackend protocol and implement a separate web project, but given that most of the required code is in
>  place within Mythweb and is already maintained there, I consider extending Mythweb with a thin API layer to be the most attractive option. Having Mythweb expose an API will also facilitate other similar applications on other platforms. A second and perhaps more obvious alternative would be to develop a Mythweb template suited for Android usage. I however don't find this to be a very attractive option, as I would like a more fluid and responsive user experience than a pure web application can provide.
>
> Would be very happy to receive feedback on my plans and thoughts. If there are other similar APIs or ongoing projects, I would also like to know about these.

It's likely that an API to Mythweb wouldn't be acceptable, simply
because we've been hard at work on the Services API, which is the
replacement for MythXML.  It was referred to elsewhere as being a
rewrite of MythXML, but in fact it is a new entity entirely.  As the
documentation has been posted for you I won't add that.  Both the
documentation and the code itself is still a work in progress but many
interesting things are possible by using it.  Some examples:

http://vimeo.com/31353793
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U78szwgwkZM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CGAM93n4BX0

The first video may be of particular interest to you, as much of what
you propose is already possible.  Setting up new recordings is not yet
possible, but is definitely very high on the list of things to get
done and the Services API is very much an active project.  The app in
the first video has also come a long way since then, for those with
any interest, adding a fully functional native UIKit Guide, and some
other goodies.  This API is definitely the way of the future, possibly
even for MythFrontend itself, and definitely for the web based backend
setup.

Robert