MediaCenter & the new Photos App from Apple

The new Photos app from Apple is now integrated in a pre-release version of the media center. This allows access to the media of the Photos app, as it has been already available for the iPhoto media.

5 days ago, a pre-release version of Mac OS X 10.10.3 (Yosemite) has been released for developers which now gives you the long-awaited Photos app. How Apple had announced some time ago, iPhoto and Aperture will probably not be developed further, but replaced by the Photos app. Therefore, we have set ourselves immediately to the media center integration of the Photos app.

After the installation of the pre-release version of Mac OS X 10.10.3 and the first Photos app launch, the iPhoto media were easily transferred. As far as we can tell, the new Photos app is stable and makes a good impression. Who knows iPhoto will quickly find one's way.

In a pre-release version of nessMediaCenter and nessViewer, "Photos" is displayed in the media center main menu if the photos library in the pictures folder exists. In the media center preferences either only "Photos" or "iPhoto" and "Photos" can be activated.

On YouTube a demo video can be watched which demonstrates and explains - among some other newer features - the access to the media of the Photos App.

We will continue to test the pre-release and see how far Apple extends the new photos app. So far it would only be desirable from our point of view the ability to sort the media also by title - this is possible in iPhoto, but is absent in the Photos app.

nessMediaCenter 1.6.2 available in AppStore

nessMediaCenter 1.6.2 is now available in the AppStore - with the following changes:
1.) Preferences: Choice of the media center selection color
2.) modernized display of the selection
3.) optional presentation start from the current entry

In addition, "Open MediaCenter at startup" was renamed to "Open MediaCenter at application start", because "startup" has been interpreted by the review team as computer startup and this renaming is better understandable for the user as well.

Actually, this version corresponds to version 1.6.1 from 20.1., which was unfortunately rejected because of the ambiguous wording. By a faulty XCode upload, we had unfortunately to upload a corrected version as 1.6.2 on 28.1. - and therefore the release by Apple lasted this time 2 weeks.

The improved DLNA availability is not available in this AppStore version but will follow in the next AppStore version.

MediaCenter: DLNA availability

Erik informed us about a problem in the media center: if multiple DLNA devices are present, then only the first DLNA device appears in the media center - and this device must not be a DLNA media server, so that although DLNA appears in the media center, there is no media accessible.

Through several trials and protocols, that were issued for test purposes and Erik sent us back, we were able to solve the problem finally.

Especially helpful were there 2 existing DLNA media server (Fritz!Box NAS and DS214play), whereat the Fritz!Box NAS has been disabled for test purposes. In this case, the Fritz!Box NAS still reported itself as a DLNA media server even though it is no media available - and thus DS214play was then not available.
Another problem was DS214play that reports itself twice as device - and only the second device is a DLNA media server.

We have now solved the problems by showing only the first DLNA media server that really provides media. A modified version can be downloaded from the download page.

Many thanks go to Erik, who had the patience to test several attempts and different combinations!

And then there is also bad news for the AppStore customers: nessMediaCenter 1.6.1 was rejected on 27.1. by Apple. Due to a bug in XCode we had to upload unfortunately a corrected version as 1.6.2 on 28.1. - and apparently it takes again a week until Apple will review the new version. And the improved DLNA availability will not be included in this AppStore version.