Part 2: Media library set-up,  adding media sources and setting up network file shares

Once you have finished installing XBMC the first thing you will want to do is add some media sources or network shares. You may also wish to join a windows home Work-group.

I will start by explaining how to join the XBMC to your home Work-group as it makes life easier when browsing for shares or accessing the XBMC from other PC’s on the same network.

Navigate to: System -> OpenELEC -> Services and enable the option to “Start Samba at boot”

Alternatively there is a guide here for setting up SMB shares with XBMCbuntu using SSH/Putty.

The next step is to modify your ‘ samba.conf’ configuration file.

If you have experience with Linux, you can use ssh/putty to open a terminal to your OpenELEC machine (there are guides on how to do this elsewhere on this site); the configuration files are held in /storage/.config and you can use vi or nano to edit them.

From a Windows PC, open explorer and browse to the IP address or the network name of the OpenELEC machine.

Navigate to the Configfiles folder and open the samba.conf.sample file with Wordpad (do not use notepad).

# samba.conf

# This configuration file allows you to customize the samba shares
# available from your machine
[global]
server string = Media Centre(%i)
workgroup = WORKGROUP
netbios name = openelec
security = share
guest account = root
socket options = TCP_NODELAY SO_RCVBUF=8192 SO_SNDBUF=8192
wins support = yes
syslog only = yes
name resolve order = lmhosts wins bcast host
# Using the following configurations as a template allows you to add
# writable shares of disks and paths under /storage

You can now specify the name of the Workgroup and set the desired XBMC machine name.

Once done save the file and re-name it ‘samba.conf’, then re-boot the machine.

Now XBMC is part of your home work group you should be able to discover it on the network from your other home PC’s and browse the file-structure.  Later on this will be useful if you want to copy media content to XBMC from other sources.

The next step is to start adding media sources to XBMC so it can scrape your media library and download the metadata (DVD and CD Album Covers, Artist and Film Information, Trailers etc…)

Navigate to Videos > Files > Add Videos…

Click Browse, scroll down and Select ‘Add Network Location’.

Note: If you have already copied content to XBMC from another device you can simply select the folder from the list.

We are going to add a windows share for the purpose of this tutorial, but as you can see there are many different source protocols available, including FTP, WebDav (HTTP), NFS, SAMBA (CIFS), RSS and many more.

Enter the details for a new network location as shown below:

Protocol: Windows Network (SMB)

Server name: Enter the server name or IP address here (\192.168.1.9).

Shared folder: Enter the name of the share on the server (“Films” or “Video” or “Music”)

Tip: If you have already joined a home Work-group you can browse for the server and select the share by clicking the ‘Browse’ button. This makes it a little quicker adding new shares.

Username: Enter the username you use to access the server

Password: Enter the user password

Click OK

Now you should see the new share in the list, scroll down, select it and click OK.

You can add as many shares (media locations) as you like. Once you have added them all enter a name for the media source and click OK. I recommend grouping the media sources by type, so all ‘Film’ or ‘Movie’ sources are grouped together, all ‘TV’ sources are grouped separately and all ‘Music’ sources are grouped separately again. This makes it easier when scraping your content.

The next step is to identify the appropriate scraper for the source content. Under the list labelled ‘This directory contains’ select the most appropriate content type and then chose a scraper from the menu on the right. You can add more scrapers if you have one you prefer that doesn’t appear in the list. I find the default scrapers work well enough.

Important: If your movie content is organised in separate folders (a folder for each individual movie), ensure you select the check-box ‘Movies are in separate folders that match the movie title’

Click Next, when promoted select ‘Yes’ to ‘Do you want to refresh info for all items within this path’

XBMC will now start scanning the contents of the shares and scrape the appropriate metadata building a rich media library for all your content. You should be able to see the progress in the top right of the screen. You can see the result by navigating back to the main menu and selecting the appropriate media category (Movies/Music/TV).

Pretty awesome huh?