New Playlist Portal - explaination and discussion

[crazed 9.6]

I have been playing with the new Playlist Portal on both MOL and the DOL2 applications. I have come across a few problems and have relayed them to Formuler team.

First I will post how it was explained to me on how to function this Playlist Portal correctly...

MOL M3u Function explained:
Supports normal m3u and m3u_plus formats.
Categories will be automatically created when using m3u_plus format (assuming the Playlist itself has the categories added).
If you only use 1 m3u, [MOL > Portals > M3U > "M3U Playlist" Line 1]
If your list contains both Live+VOD links, MOL will separate the Live and VOD into the Live and VOD menus for you. The separation algorithm looks at the file extension to differentiate live and VOD.

If you use 2 m3u, [MOL > Portals > M3U > "M3U Playlist" Line 1 & "M3U VOD List" Line 2 as well]
Only the live streams from the 1st m3u will be added to the Live TV section,
and all links from the dedicated m3u VOD List will be added to the VOD section.


Okay that is the official explanation on it's use.

Below are the issues that I have come across and are quotes from conversation with Formuler team member.
The same results happen with the Formuler NanoZ MOL and the Dreamlink T1Plus DOL2

DOL2 results...... I loaded an edited m3u_plus Playlist from my server, thru USB (not URL)...This Playlist has only VODs included. I have also added categories to it. Added the category heading into each separate channel line, depending what genru the VOD movie is.... This works thru Perfect Player and all new categories I added show up and the VODs chosen in any given category play correctly.,,, So I load this Playlist thru the Playlist Portal and then in the First Line #1... I find the path to my USB m3u file . and then a loading bar appears and that is loading the Playlist portal, which I named as '66'
Once the portal loads then 3 VOD selections appear. There is also three categories there which are Movies, Favorites and a category which I added in that Playlist which is called Holiday Specials. No other categories show, and there should be approx 50 categories with VOD selections in each.... So I then hit menu and get the LiveTv Vod, and Portals options and open the VODs and once opened then I see the VOD menu like seen thru the server and this time with all my VODs and all my new categories I made, they all are there ... but soon as I click on one of the categories and then a VOD selection, it then takes me directly back to loading that 66 portal again and the same 3 channels appear again with one of them automatically starts playing.... So then I figure it might be my edited playlist giving me issues (but it does work correctly thru Perfect player), so I grab a fresh m3u_plus generic Playlist from server and I still get same results concerning the VOD movies. ... The Live tv work thou.
This fresh Playlist has both VOD and LiveTv and when it opens the 66 portal and then I choice LIVETV option, all the LiveTv channels are there and they are coming from the USB load because I edited one channel and added a digit to the channel title and I do see that digit when open thru 66 portal and the LiveTV... So that part is working, but not the VOD. Choosing a VOD selection, thru 66 portal and then thru VOD option, i always get booted back to the 66 portal loading page and then the original channel starts working from them3 channels. .....
I will next test all this thru that second m3u line in the EDIT menu.... This was all thru DOL2 so far and will test MOL as well ... this is also only with the m3u-plus Playlist loaded thru USB and have not tested thru Playlist URL (yet).

Loading either my edited m3u_plus Playlist or the original m3u_plus Playlist thru the second line in the Playlist Portal's EDIT menu still gives me same results.

Okay, I ran the nanoZ and the MOL thru the same procedures and come up with exact same results.

Another thing I noticed is that the second line in the EDIT menu will sometimes give an error saying wrong type, when attempting to add the path to the .m3u file, Seems to happen randomly... but I can not be sure. Might be only when the top line is empty.

Playlist script is okay....I been doing these Playlists for years... That same Playlist works correctly thru Perfect Player .... Problem is not isolated to me.... I have reports from others with same results... When I edit a playlist I also take it to VLC Player and check script lines thru that and fix any mistakes, which do happen... but if any mistakes they are just a mistake in separate channel line scripts and should not effect the rest of the Playlist.... I have not given up with this thou and have been trying different things,but results are same always... And I also tried a fresh, unedited m3u_plus playlist with same results.



Okay, there are my results.
But if anyone has this working correctly, please let us know :)
thnx

update... this is working correctly now. All reported issues seem to be non-excistant now and the edited m3u Playlist with VOD categories is functioning correctly.

[von101]

Hi, do you use m3u8 playlist in Dol2 in the same way as described above via uSb or url?. How do you to change a m3u to m3u8 playist. I have read that m3u8/HLS streams give better quality and reliability- less buffer. Not sure when you supply your mac address to an iptv provider if you are given HLS or TS streams. Must it be from an HLS iptv provider?

[crazed 9.6]

--do you use m3u8 playlist in Dol2 in the same way as described above via uSb or url?
DOL2 and MOL would work the same with these Playlists, yes (USB or URL methods).

--How do you to change a m3u to m3u8 playlist?
No need to change m3u over to m3u8. All m3u 'formats' can be considered m3u8, players or streaming protocols do not recognize any difference between the two. Both work with any Player application.
M3U is a windows based encoded text file, while with an m3u8 text file it has been encoded with UTF-8.
The Unicode version of M3U is M3U8.
In fact the m3u channel files found with our supported services, are in fact m3u8, but either way it does not matter.


--I have read that m3u8/HLS streams give better quality and reliability- less buffer.
HLS = HTTP Live Streaming protocal, introduced by Apple Inc.
Apple HLS streaming is proprietary.
It works by breaking the stream into a sequence of small HTTP-based file downloads, each download loading one short chunk of a potentially unbounded transport stream.
The streaming source would need to support HLS, of which our supported IPTV services do not. Apple HLS streaming is proprietary.


--Not sure when you supply your mac address to an iptv provider if you are given HLS or TS streams.
Apple HLS streaming is proprietary.
The services supported here do not use HLS

-- Must it be from an HLS iptv provider?
Yes

[von101]

Thanks for the info and explanation crazed 2.0. ​You have certainly cleared things up for me

[von101]

Crazed 2.0 I also meant to ask when i loaded a m3u plus format in the first line of the playlist portal. My VOd and live tv categories appear but no epg. is there a way to get the epg loaded. i know the epg data format is an xmltv file/url or is that Formuler needs a fix for that

[Mano9423]

Crazed 2.0 I also meant to ask when i loaded a m3u plus format in the first line of the playlist portal. My VOd and live tv categories appear but no epg. is there a way to get the epg loaded. i know the epg data format is an xmltv file/url or is that Formuler needs a fix for that

The original XML puller that formuler had installed in the Beta software caused crashing, so they removed it. Its supposedly going to be re-added to the software with a new Beta being release towards the end of this month. So, unfortunately, no EPG for m3u at the moment, but you can always use the API portals as they have EPG support. Unfortunately you can't use an edited playlist with an API portal, but its a decent option for any service you have that isn't MAC based that you want to add to the Formuler box.