For the Android TV version of leanfront see https://github.com/bennettpeter/leanfront .
Leanfront, mobile version, is a frontend for MythTV that runs on Android phones and tablets. Some features of the Android TV version are not yet provided in the mobile version. Leanfront, mobile version, supports playback of recordings and videos from MythTV.
Leanfront can be installed from the Google play store.
Table of Contents
- The main screen shows a scrolling list for the selected recording group or All. One icon is shown per series.
- Select a group name or All from the menu obtained by tapping the three dots ⋮ icon at the top right hand of the screen to see the Series Screen.
More details
- The Live TV group shows recordings already made or busy recording from Live TV. You can watch them but you cannot initiate Live TV from the app.
- If you have Videos in the Video storage group on the MythTV backend, select "Videos" from the menu of recording groups to see the Videos Screen
- At the bottom you can select the Settings page or the Upcoming page.
- In landscape mode, tap the menu icon at top left to get to the Settings or Upcoming page.
- Indicators next to recordings show 🗑 for deleted, 👁 for Watched.
- This screen shows one entry for each episode.
- Tapping an episode icon starts playback.
- Tapping the description of an episode gets a menu of actions to immediately take on the episode.
Videos from the Videos part of MythTV are shown here, organized by directory. You can drill down to sub-directories or play videos from this screen.
- Tapping a video icon starts playback.
- Tapping the description of a video gets a menu of actions to immediately take on the video.
- During playback tap the screen to see the playback controls. Tap again to hide them.
- Commercial skip is supported if the recording or video has been flagged in MythTV. Skipping with back and next keys is supported. Set the option to use those keys for commercial skip in settings.
- For more information see Playback.
In Settings, any value can be restored to its default by tapping it, deleting the contents and selecting OK.
If an amount too high or too low is entered, it is automatically set to the maximum or minimum. If invalid data is entered (e.g. non-numeric value) it is set to the default.
Notes
If your backend has been set up to require user authentication for the service API, you will see user Name and Password prompts. Leanfront needs these to communicate with the backend. These do not show if you do not have a user authentication requirement, so most people will never see these prompts.
By default leanfront will use mediacodec hardware decoding for audio and video. If there is no hardware decoder it will switch to software decoding with ffmpeg. You can force it to only use mediacodec or to prefer software decoding.
Software decoding of Video can show bad performance on most low-cost android TV devices. It works well on NVidia Shield.
- Maximum Recordings/Videos to load. Leanfront can handle an unlimited number of recordings and videos. However loading huge numbers of recordings and videos results in excessively long times to load the listing. WIth 60,000 recordings it takes about 3 minutes to load he list from the backend and another 3 to 4 minutes to format the display. To avoid this, the system defaults to loading the only the most recent 10,000. If you are happy with waiting minutes for the screen to refresh, you can increase the value. If you want a quicker refresh you can reduce the value.
The advanced section of settings includes a value that may need to be changed to suit unusual circumstances. Be careful when changing it as you may cause bad things to happen if you use inappropriate values.
- TS Search Packets. Increase this if when playing a recording or other TS file, the recording length does not show in the OSD, and you cannot use skips or bookmarks. The default value supplied with exoplayer is 600. I have set a default value of 2600 in leanfront. The value is limited to a range of 600 - 100,000. Increasing the value will cause the start of playback to take longer and use more memory. Also skips forwards and back will take longer. Thus it is best to make this the smallest value that works for you.
This is the program guide from the MythTV listings service.
- Select the channel group from the menu by clicking the three dots at the top right hand of the screen.
- Select the date and time by scrolling right or tap the calendar/clock icon at the top right of the grid.
- Schedule a recording or change an existing recording by tapping on an entry in the grid.
- Search the guide using the magnifying glass icon.
Entries which are in the record schedule display the recording status and a paperclip. Tap on the paperclip to create a recording override. Tap anywhere else in the entry to update the recording schedule.
From the results of the guide search you can tap any entry to schedule a recording.
Entries which are in the record schedule display the recording status and a paperclip. Tap on the paperclip to create a recording override. Tap anywhere else in the entry to update the recording schedule.
This is shown as a result of tapping and entry in the guide, guide search or upcoming screens.
The schedule screen includes all of the normal options for scheduling a recording. Scroll down for further options and to see the Save button at the end.
From the paperclip icon you can get to this screen where you can select override options for an individual episode.
This displays upcoming recordings on the MythTV backend. You can use the menu icon at the top right hand side to select "Show All" to show the full list including shows excluded and the reason for excluding them.
Tap an entry to edit the record rule. See Schedule Screen.
Entries which are in the record schedule display the recording status and a paperclip. Tap on the paperclip to create a recording override. Tap anywhere else in the entry to update the recording schedule.
You need an Android phone or tablet. For TV devices see leanfront.
Leanfront is available in the Google Play Store. Either go to play.google.com or use the play store from the android device and search for MythTV or leanfront. If you have previously installed an apk from the download site, you do not need to uninstall, the play store will upgrade it.
Preferably use the play store or app store for installation.
Packages are also available here, in case you cannot install from the play store: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1LMf7dTK_fD_e1S3S2HgB1NEPsWI0MdyB . Make sure to download the mobile version and not the TV version.
To install a side load version you can download the apk file from the above link. Put it on your android device using direct download, a USB cable or another method. Open a file manager, select the apk file and tap on it to install. Alternatively you can use adb to install from a computer if you have developer mode enabled on the android device.
The first time you run the app it will prompt you for the MythTV Backend settings. Supply the IP address or DNS name of the master backend. If you have MythTV V32 or V33, change the status port from 6544 to 6744. (Note that 6544 still works but does not support the latest features). In V34 and later, use port 6544. In future port 6744 may be removed.
- The application uses exoplayer, which is the player code used by youtube, Amazon Prime and others.
- It plays recordings, videos and Live TV from a MythTV backend.
- This application uses the MythTV Service API to communicate with the backend. It needs no access to the database password, and will work on all versions of mythbackend from v29 onward. It may work on older versions if the APIs are available on the MythTV backend.
- With backend on master or recent MythTV v30 or later this frontend will prevent idle shutdown on the backend. On older backends you need to take steps to ensure the backend does not shut down while playback is occurring.
- Bookmarks are supported. Bookmarks are stored on MythTV. In order to store bookmarks for videos on MythTV you need backend version v32-Pre-658-g48557d32c2 or later or v31.0-73-g7bf1284867 or later. If you have an earlier version that does not support the Video/GetSavedBookmark and Video/SetSavedBookmark methods, the bookmarks for videos will not be set.
- Last Play Position is supported on versions of MythTV that support it. The last play position is always stored on the backend.
- The "Watched" flag is set if you get to the end of the recording or video during playback. To ensure it is set, press forward to get to the end before exiting playback.
- There is a delete/undelete option so that you can delete shows after watching. Also there set watched or unwatched and remove bookmark options.
- Videos do not currently support deletion.
- Wakeup of master backend is supported via setup.
- Subtitles (Closed captions) are supported.
- Video and Audio playback is supported using mediacodec (hardware) or ffmpeg (software). By default it will use mediacodec if it can, and will switch to ffmpeg if there is a media format not supported by mediacodec. There is a setting where you can change this default and force either mediacodec or ffmpeg.
- Selection of alternate audio tracks during playback.
- Playback from slave backends is supported.
- Live TV is not supported. You can watch Live TV recordings but you cannot initiate Live TV from the app.
- The Master Backend Override MythTV setting is supported. Playback will be from the master backend even for recordings made on a slave. However the Preview image still uses the slave backend, so it will not show if the slave is down.
- Note that some phones do not support MPEG-2 playback. In this case MPEG-2 recordings are decoded via software.
- Supports MythTV commercial breaks and cut list.
- Shows the program guide with searcjhj capabilities and supports scheduling recordings and changing schedules
You can see a list of changes in each version by looking at the commit list in github. See https://github.com/bennettpeter/leanfront-mobile/commits/main .
Recordings in progress are supported and the duration increases as the program is recorded.
Bookmarks in a recording or video are stored in the MythTV backend. On versions of mythbackend before v32-Pre-658-g48557d32c2 or v31.0-73-g7bf1284867, recording bookmarks are supported but video bookmarks are not supported.
Last Play Position is always set upon stopping playback and the default on starting playback is to start at Last Play Position. It can be cleared from the episode or video menu.
If you run mythcommflag or comskip to detect commercials in a recording, or you use Edit mode in mythfrontend to add a cut list, leanfront supports skipping over cuts or commercial breaks.
There is a Setting on the Settings page, "Commercial or Cut Skip". You can select "Off", "Notify", or "Automatically Skip". These apply to both flagged commercials and cut lists. If a cut list exists the commercial breaks are ignored.
If "Off" is selected, cut lists and commercial breaks flagged are ignored, and everything plays. You can manually skip commercials if you have set previous and next keys to commercial skip.
If "Notify" is selected, when a Cut or Commercial Break is encountered, a menu is displayed at the bottom left of the screen, with options "Skip" or "Do Not Skip". If you select "Skip", playback immediately skips to the end of the cut or commercial. If you select "Do Not Skip" or leave the menu without selecting anything, it will continue playing. At any stage of playing in the cut or commercial, you can select "Skip" to go to the end.
If "Automatically Skip" is selected, playback will automatically skip each cut or commercial flagged.
In the settings there are adjustments to start and end position that can be set. Setting a negative value means that it will skip that number of seconds early, setting a positive value will skip that number of seconds late. To make sure that absolutely no commercial is shown, you can make the skip larger by setting a negative value for start adjustment and a positive value for end adjustment. However you could miss a second or two of actual show. In the opposite situation, if you are unsure whether commercial skip works correctly, you can make the skip shorter by setting a positive value in the start adjustment and a negative value in the end adjustment. Then you will see a few seconds of commercial at the start and end of the break, so that you can be sure it is only skipping commercial and not skipping part of the show.
There is currently no way to edit a recording or video in leanfront. That can only be done in mythfrontend.
Leanfront also supports skip and cut lists in Videos in the "Videos" storage group. For this you need mythbackend version v33-Pre-925-gf702d54093 or later.
Live TV is not supported. However you can play Live TV recordings initiated from somewhere else.
The following controls are available when tapping during playback.
Tapping the screen brings up the OSD playback controls. Tapping outside the controls dismisses the OSD controls.
In the middle of the screen are icons previous, skip back, pause or play, skip forward, next. The number of seconds to skip can be selected in Settings. Previous (⏮) and Next (⏭) can be set to either jump back and forward or to skip commercials.
The progress bar near the bottom can be dragged or tapped to navigate playback to a new position.
The CC icon can be used to select a caption to display.
The cogwheel presents a menu where you can change playback speed or audio track.
To the left of the CC button is the aspect ratio button. This is for use if the picture is shown stretched due to the video having wrong aspect ratio information. It supports the resolution set by the video (default), 4x3, 16x9, and 9x16.
To the left of the aspect ratio button is the zoom button. By default the picture is shrunk until it all fits in the screen. Tapping zoom changes it so that it expands until the entire screen is filled, keeping the aspect correct, and possibly cutting off parts of the picture along the edges.
To the left the next button (clock face) is used for adjusting audio sync.
Double tap on the play screen while playing or paused is used as follows:
- Left hand side of screen: Skip backwards. The number of seconds skipped is as set in the Settings.
- Center of screen: Toggle play and pause.
- Right hand side of screen: Skip forwards. The number of seconds skipped is as set in the Settings.
Dragging horizontally across the screen is used to move forwards or backwards in the show. It is exponential, the beginning of a drag gives a small increment, dragging further adds increasingly larger times.
The amount moved and the exponential increase can be changed in Settings.
In mythbackend V32 and V33, the web server has been rewritten and there is a new status port. The old status port still works but does not support the latest features, like "Last Play Position". To use the latest features, change your port number in settings to 6744. If you have any problems with this please open a ticket.
This is a temporary change, in V34 the port changes back to 6544, with the new features. Port 6744 is still supported in V34 and is an alternative port for the same code as port 6544. At some point, 6744 may be disabled. You will then have to change your settings back to port 6544.
In MythTV V35, an authentication option has been added to MythTV services. See https://www.mythtv.org/wiki/Web_Application#API_and_Web_App_Authentication . If you setup Authentication Required, you will have to supply a user id and password to leanfront. Leanfront will automatically add User Name and Password to the Settings list and prompt you to enter them if you have enabled it on the backend. If you have not enabled it, those prompts will not be visible.
If you expose port 6544 to the internet, you can run leanfront remotely. In this case it is recommended to set a user id and password as described in the wiki article.
If you have a mythbackend earlier than v30 you need to disable the mythbackend idle shutdown, as leanfront cannot prevent shutdown, even while playing. On v30 and later, leanfront prevents backend shutdown while leanfront is in the foreground on the phone or tablet.
To refresh the list from the backend either tap the refresh icon at the top of the screen or drag the list downwards when at the top.
- Clone from github.com bennettpeter/leanfront-mobile.git.
- Run ./update_dependencies.sh. This will download 3 repositories and check out the appropriate branches / tags.
- Download and install Android Studio.
- Look in the file app/build.gradle for the line like ndkVersion '28.2.13676358'. Install the specified ndk version from the menu Tools/SDKManager in App Studio. ALso install CMake from the SDK Tools.
- Starting in November 2025 you need to use ndk 28 or higher to satisfy a Google Play Store requirement for 16K pages.
- In the $HOME/Android directory create a link to the ndk, for example android-ndk -> Sdk/ndk/28.2.13676358
- Run build_ffmpeg.sh.
- Open the project in Android Studio.
- Compile and deploy to your phone or tablet.
- If you do not want to build this yourself, see Installing Leanfront.
- Set up the backend in Settings on the first run.
The source code supports multiple languages. There is a python script that translates strings into several languages using Google Translate. The results are likely not optimal, but may be better than nothing. The system does allow for manual fixing of translation errors. If anybody wants to volunteer to correct translations for a language please email me or create an issue in https://github.com/bennettpeter/mobfront/issues . The list of strings is at https://github.com/bennettpeter/mobfront/blob/master/app/src/main/res/values/strings.xml . The translations are in various directories under https://github.com/bennettpeter/mobfront/tree/master/app/src/main/res , named vales-xx where xx is the language code.
Licensed under the GNU GPL version 3 or later. See the LICENSE file for details.