Vero OSMC UI and user experience questions

[kuuper]

Hi guys!

I’m considering to buy a Vero (2 or 4K) with OSMC for my mom, but I have some concerns, and I don’t have any device to test OSMC before buying.

I tried Kodi 17.1 on a computer (both with remote and keyboard) and I really tried to like it, but it is frustrating and unintuitive to use to say the least, so I ditched it even despite of the great content it offers. And I tried a lot of different customised builds, skins and so on as well. So the following can be considered as suggestions too.

OSMC looks quite pretty, clean and unified and has more simplified menu structure. In this sense wins over almost any Kodi build I have tried or seen. Also the purpose-built remote control is promising. But how does OSMC Vero feel to use? In particular, compared to Kodi I’m interested in:

• If “left” is pressed on the remote, do the view options menu pop up in each separate section instead of navigating? (IMO direction buttons should be used solely for navigation in any UI)

• In a submenu or in an addon, if we want to go back to the previous menu of that addon, do we need to go to the top of the file tree and if we press the back button, does it exit from that addon instead of going back to the previous submenu of the addon? (that is such a pain in Kodi)

• Can entire addon sources added to the library or only after fiddling with locations and then still only one movie or show at a time, and only when that particular addon has the “add to library” context menu option? (I gave up on Kodi when I failed to add entire sources, I’m just an end-user, don’t want to mess with tweaking too much.)
  In other words is content unified or separately accessible in each addon under the video plugins menu?

Thanks a lot in advance!

[ActionA]

Kodi is Kodi… OSMC is simply the underlying operating system for the Vero and RPi devices. Besides applying the OSMC skin and some tweaks to improve performance on low power devices such as RasPi and Vero#, Kodi still behaves as Kodi…

@kuuper

If “left” is pressed on the remote, do the view options menu pop up in each separate section instead of navigating?

In some situations, yes.

@kuuper

does it exit from that addon instead of going back to the previous submenu of the addon?

No. But if there were situations where back button took you to the top of tree in the previous menu, nothing will be changed here.

@kuuper

Can entire addon sources added to the library or only after fiddling with locations and then still only one movie or show at a time, and only when that particular addon has the “add to library” context menu option?

This is addon dependent… OSMC has no bearing on this.

[sam_nazarko]

You could try YouTubing OSMC to see how the interface is; but keep in mind that:

• It’s changed a bit over time (and hopefully for the better)
• You can completely customise it by using Kodi ‘skins’

@kuuper

If “left” is pressed on the remote, do the view options menu pop up in each separate section instead of navigating? (IMO direction buttons should be used solely for navigation in any UI)

If you press left, then depending on the menu, you will activate some options like List View.

@kuuper

In a submenu or in an addon, if we want to go back to the previous menu of that addon, do we need to go to the top of the file tree

No – you can just press Back on the remote. It will go up one menu. If you want to go right to the Home screen, you’d press the Home icon.

@kuuper

Can entire addon sources added to the library or only after fiddling with locations and then still only one movie or show at a time, and only when that particular addon has the “add to library” context menu option?

If the add-on supports library mode, you can add it as a source.

As @actiona says, if you are familiar with Kodi, you shouldn’t have problems operating OSMC and Vero 4K.

Sam

[sam_nazarko]

We regularly listen to feedback and try to improve things and make it more user friendly. We are aiming to do more regarding that this year.

[BobCratchett]

The following is true for the default OSMC skin. It may or may not apply to other skins

@kuuper

If “left” is pressed on the remote, do the view options menu pop up in each separate section instead of navigating? (IMO direction buttons should be used solely for navigation in any UI)

You can disable the left-hand view-options menu in many sections (though not all - PVR, for example, where it’s used for navigation) by enabling ‘Kiosk mode’ from the skin settings.

@kuuper

In a submenu or in an addon, if we want to go back to the previous menu of that addon, do we need to go to the top of the file tree and if we press the back button, does it exit from that addon instead of going back to the previous submenu of the addon? (that is such a pain in Kodi)

The normal navigation in Kodi is pressing ‘Back’ will take you up the hierarchy until you get to the level that you entered the add-on. Another ‘Back’ will then take you to the homescreen. If you have menu items on the home screen that go to an add-on and you always want ‘Back’ to take you up the hierarchy no matter what level you entered at, you can remove the ‘,return’ element (the last bit) of the action for the shortcut. (In the menu customiser, choose ‘Change action’ and then ‘Custom action…’ - the last item in the list).

So, you’d change something that looks like:

ActivateWindow(Videos,"plugin://plugin.some.name/?addition=parameters",return)

to

ActivateWindow(Videos,"plugin://plugin.some.name?additional=parameters")