I'm trying to use Beyond TV from SnapStream Media as my TV viewer.  I had this registered as an extension of VMC and it was working great until a Windows Update toasted my machine (at least I think that's what it was - the nVidia SATA driver).  Anyway, after reinstalling Vista and everything else on top of it (except for the nVidia SATA driver update) and getting both VMC and Beyond TV to work in their respective areas separately, I've re-registered Beyond TV in MCE but it no longer works like it did before - selecting the Beyond TV entry in the TV + Movies menu strip or the More Programs section plays the sound but nothing gets launched.  Not only that, the image I registered for it to display doesn't display either (it used to before).  I've verified that everything listed here is actually there (by looking it up from the console).

Note that I have disabled UAC - I just ran into too many problems with the various components I've got installed (e.g. Beyond TV, M.Play ZiNi software from Zalman, etc.).

Here is what I have registered:

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Media Center\Extensibility\Applications]
"Title"="Beyond TV"

; This entry causes Beyond TV to show up in the More Programs section.
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Media Center\Extensibility\Categories\More Programs\{975A008C-BFD2-40bb-984A-4B88BA7613EB}]
"AppId"="{975A008C-BFD2-40bb-984A-4B88BA7613EB}"
"Title"="Beyond TV"
"Description"="Watch live TV and recorded video"
"ImageUrl"="%ProgramFiles%\\SnapStream Media\\Beyond TV\\FSMedia\\Images\\config_net.png"
"Run"="%ProgramFiles%\\SnapStream Media\\Beyond TV\\BeyondTVMCE.bat"
"NowPlayingDirective"="pause"
"CapabilitiesRequired"="console"
"TimeStamp"=dword:0E15B680

; This entry causes Beyond TV to show up in the TV + Movies menu strip.
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Media Center\Extensibility\Categories\Services\TV\{975A008C-BFD2-40bb-984A-4B88BA7613EB}]
"AppId"="{975A008C-BFD2-40bb-984A-4B88BA7613EB}"
"Title"="Beyond TV"
"Description"="Watch live TV and recorded video"
"ImageUrl"="%ProgramFiles%\\SnapStream Media\\Beyond TV\\FSMedia\\Images\\config_net.png"
"Run"="%ProgramFiles%\\SnapStream Media\\Beyond TV\\BeyondTVMCE.bat"
"NowPlayingDirective"="pause"
"CapabilitiesRequired"="console"
"TimeStamp"=dword:0E15B680

; I added this entry thinking it might be required since all the other entries in More Programs are listed here.  Not sure if it is required.
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Media Center\Extensibility\Categories\Services\TV\{975A008C-BFD2-40bb-984A-4B88BA7613EB}]
"AppId"="{975A008C-BFD2-40bb-984A-4B88BA7613EB}"
"Title"="Beyond TV"
"Description"="Watch live TV and recorded video"
"ImageUrl"="%ProgramFiles%\\SnapStream Media\\Beyond TV\\FSMedia\\Images\\config_net.png"
"Run"="%ProgramFiles%\\SnapStream Media\\Beyond TV\\BeyondTVMCE.bat"
"NowPlayingDirective"="pause"
"CapabilitiesRequired"="console"
"TimeStamp"=dword:0E15B680

Does anyone have any ideas on what could be wrong?  How do you troubleshoot problems like this?  Is there a log file somewhere I can view that might have details?

Thanks for any help you can give me.

David

You haven't included your 'Applications' entry - that is also needed.

If you are making these files by hand, you really should be using the XML file and RegisterMCEApp.exe

This is MUCH easier to use and is much easier for us to help you with.

Try my blog on how to make one -

http://thedigitallifestyle.com/cs/blogs/developer/archive/2007/06/23/wix-way-do-i-go.aspx

http://thedigitallifestyle.com/cs/blogs/developer/archive/2007/06/17/stage-10-installing-it.aspx

Thanks so much.  I've got it working now.  Here is the resulting registration XML file (which I've called Register-BeyondTV-in-MCE.xml):

<application
  title="Beyond TV"
  id="{1E9EFD13-8440-4af9-A20B-039B07790C32}"
  companyName="SnapStream Media"
  description="Watch live TV and recorded video"
  >
  <capabilitiesRequired
    audio="true"
    video="true"
    intensiveRendering="true"
    cdBurning="true"
    console="true"
    />
  <entrypoint
    id="{975A008C-BFD2-40bb-984A-4B88BA7613EB}"
    run="%ProgramFiles%\SnapStream Media\Beyond TV\BeyondTVMCE.bat"
    title="Beyond TV"
    nowPlayingDirective="pause"
    description="Watch live TV and recorded video"
    imageUrl="C:\Program Files\SnapStream Media\Beyond TV\FSMedia\Images\config_net.png"
    >
    <category category="Services\TV"/>
    <category category="More Programs"/>
  </entrypoint>
</application>

Here is how to register Beyond TV with VMC (and probably MCE):

C:\Windows\eHome\RegisterMceApp /allusers Register-BeyondTV-in-MCE.xml

For completeness, here is the contents of my BeyondTVMCE.bat file which I copied to the Beyond TV program directory:

"%ProgramFiles%\SnapStream Media\Beyond TV\BTVD3DShell.exe" /displaymode exclusivefs

Unfortunately you can't specify environment variables in the path to the image URL so I had to hard code the drive letter.  If your Windows installation is on a different drive, you'll need to modify that line.

Thanks,
David

I believe it handles relative paths - they are treated as 'relative to the working directory when RegisterMCEApp is called'.

So if you call it from 'C:\Program Files\Something' and have an image with a path of '.\MyLogo.png', it will resolve to 'c:\program files\something\mylogo.png'.

IgnoranceIsBliss:

I believe it handles relative paths - they are treated as 'relative to the working directory when RegisterMCEApp is called'.

So if you call it from 'C:\Program Files\Something' and have an image with a path of '.\MyLogo.png', it will resolve to 'c:\program files\something\mylogo.png'.

What happens is that if it doesn't see a drive letter at the beginning it prepends the current directory.  Here is what happened in my case:

"C:\Dowloads\BeyondTVMCE\%ProgramFiles\SnapStream Media\Beyond TV\FSMedia\Images\config_net.png"

Pretty lame!  Oh well, I'm working on a different method that solves this problem and also the problem of installing on either 32-bit or 64-bit Windows.  I'll post the results of that when I'm done.

Thanks,
David

PS Is there a way to post files, e.g. a zip file?  I keep getting a message saying I don't have permission to do that.

I posted the updated package to the SnapStream forum.

Entire thread:
http://forums.snapstream.com/vb/showthread.php?t=36192

Message with the attachment (included in the above thread):
http://forums.snapstream.com/vb/showpost.php?p=260568&postcount=23