We expected a good amount of interest from the last post, but the response was overwhelming.

As a result, we have been hard at work fixing bugs and adding missing features from the first release. So here it is, v2 of XBMC for your AppleTV2/iDevices.

Update: A last-minute build-bug caused the SMB+Live Essentials fix to be left out. This is fixed now, users still experiencing this bug should update to get the fix.

Changelog:

• GUI speedup
• Webserver enabled
• RTMP support
• AC3/DTS Audio Dialogs
• Rotating for the iPhone and iPad
• Black and Dim screensavers working
• Bluetooth Support
• SMB shares with Windows Live Essentials should work.
• Sleep timer works
• Add-on updates now working
• Decrypted ISO playback works
• Thumbnail creation fixed

This question of 1080p display has come up very often, so here’s the answer: XBMC can decode 1080p video but for now the ATV2 is limited to display 720p output. Its still unknown whether this is a hardware or software restriction.

For more FAQ see this page.

Update Instructions:

AppleTV2: Connect via SSH in and run “apt-get update && apt-get install org.xbmc.xbmc-atv2′”

iOS: Upgrade through Cydia.

The XBMC developers are hard at work on non-apple related features as well, expect a post in the next day or two outline what else we’ve been doing.

The XBMC team is proud to present our first ARM-based release, and it’s a big one. Scott Davilla, with the help of Edgar (gimli) Hucek and Zeljko (amet) Ametovic and several other developers and testers, is finally ready to pull the curtain off of his fun little secret.

You know that $99 tiny form-factor powerhouse that would be just perfect if it could only run XBMC? Now it can.
Or how about that iPad that is just begging to be used as a real portable media center? Now it can.
And while we’re at it, put your iPhone4 to work using XBMC as well. Why? Because we can.

These are not initial ports, and they are not early development snapshots. Here they are: full XBMC installs and source code, ready for consumption.

AppleTV2

This thing may fit in your pocket, but don’t underestimate its power. Unfortunately, it is seriously lacking in capability due to its limited feature-set revolving around rentals and iTunes. Where’s the fun in that?

Full XBMC install, this is not a remote or thin client streamer. No longer is your AppleTV2 chained to iTunes. Who wants transcoded video anyway? Share files on your network your way. Full hardware decode for 720p/1080p movies. Everything else you know and love about XBMC.

iPad/iPhone4

What good is a tablet that makes you play by its rules? We at XBMC want our media our way.

You guessed it, this is full-blown XBMC. Not a remote. Launch XBMC like any other app. Drag and drop media from your computer, or share it on your home-network Also fully hardware accelerated for most formats. Works on iPhone4, though it’s currently frustrating to use. Challenge: Who will be the first to create a gesture-driven skin?

Availability

As you might have guessed, you won’t be seeing XBMC in the app-store any time soon, since it directly competes with apple products. XBMC will only be installable for those of you with jailbroken devices. If that’s you, head to the wiki for instructions for the atv2 or ipad/iphone.

Update: There was a typo in Sigma’s press release and our resulting post. Their XBMC port was done on the SMP 8656 which supports Open GL ES.  GLES will also be supported on Sigma’s recently announced SMP 8910, so this may be a potential target for XBMC as well.

For those asking “Will a potential XBMC port be possible for my xyz Sigma-based device?”, it is only a possibility if GLES 2.0 is supported.

–

For those who may have missed the previous post, Sigma Designs announced last week that they have begun work on porting XBMC to run on their next-generation SOCs, and showed off their nascent project at the 2011 CES. After meeting with a few Sigma employees, I wanted to give more detail into what is going on.

Sigma hired a 3rd party company to do their initial port, which is shown in the picture below. A proof-of-concept is up and running on their SMP8656, and while the GUI is choppy and playback is still not working, it is an impressive effort so far. There was a significant amount of interest in the port from CES attendees, who quickly appreciated XBMC’s rich experience compared to the user interfaces usually found on Sigma-based hardware.

Sigma has also expressed an interest in working directly with XBMC developers rather than using an outside company. This leads to the possibility of full-time XBMC devs, which would be a win for everyone involved. We are looking into our options. If the collaboration succeeds, it is quite possible that some turn-key XBMC solutions could be in the works in the not-so-distant future.

This is getting interesting!

To answer a few questions:

• The collaboration has just begun, the above is subject to change.
• Don’t expect to see a Sigma-based XBMC solution on shelves in the next few months. These things take time.
• The capabilities will depend on the SOC used, nothing is set in stone yet.
• Sigma takes the GPL seriously, as do we. We do not foresee any problems.
• XBMC may be launched as an application, or run as the main front-end, depending on what the vendor wants.

Today Sigma Designs announced(pdf) that they are working to bring XBMC to their popular line of system-on-a-chip models (their new SMP8656 in particular). For those not familiar with Sigma, they are a major player in the set-top box market and their SOCs are the heart of many products from Popcorn Hour and WDTV, as well as countless other consumer media devices

We believe this could lead to many interesting things for XBMC. Not only do we benefit from the source code from their port, but any company interested in developing hardware for XBMC now has another fine choice. Judging by the amount of times we’ve heard the question “does XBMC work on Sigma hardware?”, there is a great amount of interest.

A few of the XBMC developers, myself included, will be checking out their initial port first-hand at CES this week, as well as meeting with some of their developers and project managers. We will keep you updated as details emerge.

As we discussed in a recent post, XBMC is finally moving to a current SCM. Many of us have been using git-svn for quite a while anyway, but the burden of doing a real migration has kept us from making the switch. Today the migration begins.

We have picked GitHub as our host due to their great features like pull requests and the commenting system, as well as their lightning-fast speed compared to some of the others. We will push clones to gitorious, sourceforge, repo.or.cz, and anywhere else that makes sense (ah, the beauty of a distributed scm!). We’re very excited about git as it should allow for much more efficient development. For those who would like to read up on git, some great propaganda is available here.

The transition may be a bit bumpy, and some of our services may be down for a day or two during the transition (trac being the biggest concern). Many projects experience a few headaches in such a transition, so we are prepared to think on our toes.

Now for the unfortunate part. We have had a clone of svn on github and gitorious for quite a while. Those of you who have used it know that it’s huge.. almost 1gb. We have decided to do a one-time filter on the repo to get the size down to nearly 250mb. This means that when the final repo is ready (link coming soon) everyone with an existing clone will need to grab a new one. We think this is a necessary one-time pain that will make life much easier in the long-run.

The final svn commit was r35744. Everyone who builds from source will need to use git from this point on. We’ll do our best to answer any questions in the comments, but let’s avoid a SCM flamewar, ok?

Update: Done! The move to our new repo is done and we have resumed committing. Some services like Trac still need to be updated, and we will need to get clones migrated to the other sites, but we’re well on our way.

It’s been a LONG time coming. Too long. But here it is. XBMC 10.0 “Dharma” is ready for consumption. Those who have been following development know that add-ons are the main focus of this release. In the past, in order to find a new skin, you would have to dig through the forums, find a link, and hope it worked. Ditto for plugins, scrapers, etc. Those days are over. All of these things are now available within XBMC, no need to put down the remote to find new content or change the look of your HTPC. Just head to the “add-ons” section in the system menu. At the time of this writing, there are 11 different skins available, all with distinct looks and personalities. But we didn’t stop there. Want to watch your favorite youtube videos? Listen to some web radio or podcasts? Install a web interface to control your living-room experience, or even one to manage your media? It’s all available in the new add-ons system. Even before the final release, we have seen an average of 50,000 add-on downloads per day. It’s time for you to see what many others have discovered! And remember, the best part is that the add-ons are very much alive. New ones are being added every day, and current ones are continuously updated.

But that’s just the beginning of Dharma. We have improved the entire experience. As always, we strive to play all of the current media formats available, including the new WebM/VP8 codec that is the latest buzz. Hardware acceleration has been added in windows (Vista or 7) via DXVA2, CrystalHD has been added for all platforms (best supported in OSX and Linux), VDPAU support has been improved in Linux, and VAAPI support has been added for the hardware that supports it in Linux. There are far too many improvements to list here, so check out the changelog for a full list. For those of you who would like to see what XBMC is all about without disturbing your current system, give XBMC Live a shot. It’s a bootable LiveCD that boots directly into XBMC, and even provides a nice graphical installer (check in “Programs”). If your htpc doesn’t have a cdrom, check out UNetbootin to create a bootable flash drive. And don’t forget to check out the iPhone and Android XBMC remotes, they’re the perfect companion to your mediacenter. We have spent almost a year on Dharma and we hope that you enjoy using it as much as we enjoyed creating it. XBMC continues to be a great example of open-source software and community-based development. Maybe we’ll find some time to kick back in our media rooms for a few days and enjoy the experience… or maybe we’ll just get to work on Eden. Note that the skins in the Skins Gallery page has not yet been updated to match the newly available skins. Look for a website revamp that includes a live add-ons browser in the near future. Update: Shoutcast support via the addon was broken at the last minute (yesterday!) by a change made by AOL. See here, here, and here. We have mailed them asking for an exception, but if they wouldn’t do it for VLC, they aren’t likely to do it for us either. We are looking into other options.

Dharma RC2 is ready, and this one is a Release Candidate in the truest sense. There are a few reasons we decided to do one last pre-release:

• Shoutcast support has been redone. Listening to your favorite online radio stations with the shoutcast plugin is now a much nicer experience.
• The add-ons moved out of the testing repository and into their permanent home. This means that everyone will need to upgrade in order to see future add-on updates. If you continue to use RC1 or previous, please don’t report a lack of updates.
• Automatic updates for add-ons are now enabled by default. Of course, you can still disable them via the add-on manager if you prefer.

It has been far too long already, so the final release of Dharma should be close behind this one. If you have any outstanding issues speak now or forever hold your peace!

Head this way for the good stuff.