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This documentation is valid for MediaTomb version 0.11.0.
Copyright © 2005 Gena Batsyan, Sergey Bostandzhyan
Copyright © 2006-2008 Gena Batsyan, Sergey Bostandzhyan, Leonhard Wimmer
Table of Contents
MediaTomb comes with an AJAX driven web user interface that allows to add or remove media from the database and modify properties of media items. It also provides the means of selecting various Autoscan options. The UI is constantly improving, our goal is to offer a wide range of features to allow the user to easily control the server.
Here is a list of icons used in the MediaTomb UI.
The database view presents the content that was added to the servers database - this is the hierarchy that will be served to UPnP devices.
Manually creates a new object in the database.
An object type can be selected from the drop down list and is one of the following:
Container
A container, that can hold other containers or items.
Allowed settings:
Title
Title of the container as it will appear in the UI or as it will be presented to UPnP devices.
Class
UPnP class of the container, leave the default setting if you are unsure.
Item
A media item, typically an audio, photo or video file that resides on the servers local file system.
Allowed settings:
Title
Title of the item as it will appear in the UI or as it will be presented to UPnP devices, this can be anything and does not have to be the actual file name.
Location
The location of the file on disk, must be given by an absolute path.
Class
UPnP class of the container, leave the default setting if you are unsure.
Description
Free text describing the item, it may be shown on the UPnP device depending on its implementation and capabilities.
Mimetype
This identifies the mime type of the media and is probably one of the most important fields - this will tell your device what kind of file it is dealing with. If you are unsure, use the file utility to retrieve the mime type information, type the following in a console (this example uses a jpg image):
file -i /opt/media/photos/key70113.jpg
The output from the file utility will be something like:
/opt/media/photos/key70113.jpg: image/jpeg
For the example above you would have to enter image/jpeg in the Mimetype field.
Active Item
Active Item is an experimental feature, it allows you to execute a script or a program on the server when this item is being downloaded - or “triggered”. Refer to the Active Item documentation for more information.
Title
Title of the item as it will appear in the UI or as it will be presented to UPnP devices, this can be anything and does not have to be the actual file name.
Location
The location of the file on disk, must be given by an absolute path.
Class
UPnP class of the container, leave the default setting if you are unsure.
Description
Free text describing the item, it may be shown on the UPnP device depending on its implementation and capabilities.
Mimetype
This identifies the mime type of the media and is probably one of the most important fields - this will tell your device what kind of file it is dealing with.
Action Script
Location of the Action Script, take a look at an example script demo_toggle.py in the mediatomb/scripts directory.
State
Arbitrary string, identifying the current state of the Active Item. It is made available to the script and allows the script to decide which action to take (for example when implementing “ON” - “OFF” switches).
External Link (URL)
An online stream or file, located somewhere on the web.
Allowed settings:
Title
Title of the item as it will appear in the UI or as it will be presented to UPnP devices, this can be anything and does not have to be the actual file name.
URL
The URL to the stream, for example http://www.deadlock.dhs.org/192/Deadlock_Veteran.04.Uznik.mp3
Protocol
Usually http-get will be fine, but you can specify settings for rtsp and other streaming protocols depending on the presentation of the online content.
Class
UPnP class of the container, leave the default setting if you are unsure.
Description
Free text describing the item, it may be shown on the UPnP device depending on its implementation and capabilities.
Mimetype
This identifies the mime type of the media and is probably one of the most important fields - this will tell your device what kind of file it is dealing with.
Internal Link (Local URL)
A media item, typically an audio, photo or video file that resides in the servedir as defined in the servers configuration file, see main documentation for an example.
Allowed settings:
Title
Title of the item as it will appear in the UI or as it will be presented to UPnP devices, this can be anything and does not have to be the actual file name.
URL
The location of the file on disk, relative to the servedir entry.
Class
UPnP class of the container, leave the default setting if you are unsure.
Description
Free text describing the item, it may be shown on the UPnP device depending on its implementation and capabilities.
Mimetype
This identifies the mime type of the media and is probably one of the most important fields - this will tell your device what kind of file it is dealing with.
Allows to edit various object properties. The available fields vary, depending on the type of the object but will be generally the same as described above.
- Note:
you can not modify the title and the location of objects in the PC-Directory because it is a special container that must guarantee a 1:1 mapping to the file system.
- Note:
by editing object properties you do not change the original file on your drive (i.e. you do not modify any id3 or other information), the properties are edited in the MediaTomb database.
Removes the object from the database. This icon is available for virtual items (items that were created by the import script) and also for icons in PC Directory. When used on a virtual item it will only remove the current reference, but it will keep the original object in PC-Directory. When used on an item in PC-Directory it will remove the item and all it's references.
- Note:
the remove feature does not touch the files on your drive, the remove operation is only performed in the MediaTomb database.
Removes the object and all its references from the database. This icon is only available for virtual items, not only will it erase the current reference, but it will also remove the original item in the PC-Directory container and all associated items.
- Note:
the remove feature does not touch the files on your drive, the remove operation is only performed in the MediaTomb database.
You can use the autoscan feature to monitor data in a certain directory, changes will be periodically synced with the database.
In the database view this icon is only available for containers in the PC-Directory. Here are the possible settings:
Scan Mode
Defines the autoscan mode, can be one of the following:
None
The directory is not being autoscanned.
Timed
Enable timed rescans. The directory will be rescanned in intervals specified below.
Inotify
Enable filesystem event based rescans - this is only available when MediaTomb was compiled with the inotify feature.
Scan Level
Defines the autoscan type, can be one of the following:
Basic
The “Basic” autoscan type will only keep track if files have been added to or have been removed from the monitored directory. It will not detect changes inside the files, i.e. if you modify an id3 tag of your MP3, the metadata in the database will not be updated.
Full
The “Full” autoscan type will not only keep track of deleted or newly added files, but it will also watch the modification times and re add the media if it detects any changes. This might be useful if you updated the id3 information of an mp3 file or exif information of an image file.
Recursive
Operate recursively, also monitoring files in subdirectories.
Include hidden files/directories
Process or ignore hidden files and directories, i.e. those starting with a dot.
Scan Interval
Interval in seconds, the directory will be rescanned in given intervals.
- Note:
the countdown for the next rescan starts only after the current scan is complete.
Identifies an autoscan container of the Inotify scan type that was setup via the server configuratoin file. It is treated as persistent and can not be removed in the UI.
The Filesystem View allows you to browse the contents of your harddrive and add media to the severs database.
Adds a file or directory to the servers database, use this to make your media available to UPnP devices.
Red eyes indicate that the UI is currently loading data/building up the tree structure.
Orange eyes indicate that the database has changed and that the UI needs to be updated in order to reflect those changes. The update will usually take place after a certain timeout, which depends on your actions. If you are constantly navigating, the update will be delayed further to prevent the case that the tree gets updated during navigation - this would be very annoying. You can skip the timeout and cause an immediate update by clicking on the skull icon.