Author Topic: Exporting Episode Variations  (Read 8017 times)

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Offline creajar

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Exporting Episode Variations
« on: November 02, 2008, 02:08:13 am »
I very much love this Db. ;D I use it quite often for the different variations that can be created with it especially the export files...  And the fact that I can use it for my "series" collections showing individual episodes which I use not just for TV series but with a box set with multiple discs (20 - 50 movie collections within a few discs with different years and actors)
I was wondering if there may be a possibility for episodes to include the year and actors also..  It would be great if it could.  I am just an amateur  ??? at the script and have not been able to code this...

Offline rick.ca

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Re: Exporting Episode Variations
« Reply #1 on: November 02, 2008, 02:38:05 am »
Sorry, it's not possible. See Exporting Episodes.

Offline creajar

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Re: Exporting Episode Variations
« Reply #2 on: November 02, 2008, 04:26:15 am »
Are you saying that it cannot be done in the existing version for modification or just not possible for an upcoming version?  Or maybe a possibility of an upcoming version that would have New Box Set instead of using New Episode?

Offline rick.ca

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Re: Exporting Episode Variations
« Reply #3 on: November 02, 2008, 05:35:00 am »
It's not possible with the current version. Otherwise, "not possible" is not the best choice of words, since anything is possible. But I'm not the one who decides these things anyway. I had noted...

Yes, indeed, but it is pretty difficult to make an export function that is able to export all episode information without making the whole setup very complex, so I thought it would be enough to export fields you mentioned above.

...which, being the words of one who sees the future, suggests to me a very low likelihood of this being possible in the next version. ;)

I think you have to accept the fact the episode management feature was designed for episodes, not for groupings of movies. It doesn't have to be used for series, but the main idea behind it—that episodes have a "child" relationship with their "parent, where common information is recorded—has to be respected. If you want exactly the same information from episodes as movies because the parent-child relationship doesn't exist or is not very relevant, then those episodes would have been better treated as movies in the first place. They could have been associated using a custom "collection" field used for the purpose of displaying them together as groups.

I see the function in question does allow you to export enough information about your "episodes" that they could be re-imported as movies. You could also include the current "series" titles of such collections, and import those to a new "collection" field for each movie.

Offline creajar

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Re: Exporting Episode Variations
« Reply #4 on: November 02, 2008, 06:20:27 am »
Thanx for the quick inputs on this and guess it answered my curiosities on this.  Just wanted to clarify that I haven't looked over anything in this.  Thinking that it wasn't too hard for me to tweak the plain listing the way I wanted it to look - thought maybe I could do the same for the html file also which I was looking to put a year and main character to title.  Probably could do manually in description field for now....

Offline nostra

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Re: Exporting Episode Variations
« Reply #5 on: November 03, 2008, 03:48:10 pm »
A Box Set feature is in my TODO list, but it does not seem to qualify for 0.9.9, so in 1.0 maybe...

Extending the export plugin is not sooo difficult for me, but the syntax for templates will become much more complex and it will be too difficult for normal people to create own templates. I am changing things all the time and maybe I'll come to some good idea of an easy syntax with all the features you want, but I can't guarantee this.
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