Efika 8610 Project New Freevo based Media Center on Efika 8610 in category Multimedia proposed by Rob Shortt on 31st March 2008

	Project Proposal Project Proposal for new Freevo based Media Center on Efika 8610 I am designing a media center project based on Freevo (a Home Theatre PC Framework) and the Kaa Media Framework that uses other existing Freevo components as well. This frontend is being built to take advantage of the DirectFB API so the final product will rely on a DirectFB graphics driver. In my search for a suitable development board for this project I found the Efika 8610 which meets or exceeds my expectations. I am a developer of Freevo and have been with the project since 2002. There are a number of existing features of these frameworks that make the project suitable for an embedded system on a consumer electronics device: - The use of an embedded database (sqlite). - A built-in lightweight web interface. - No requirement for XFree86 or X.Org. - Distributed architecture. This project consists of multiple stages (in general order): - Port core framework and dependencies to the Efika 8610. - Get the UI as it is up and running on unaccellerated framebuffer. At this time have the other processes (Electronic Program Guide server, recording backend, media file server, etc) running on other servers on the network. - Evaluate the best media player backend (xine-lib, mplayer, gstreamer) for the Efika 8610 and this framework (using DirectFB). - DirectFB optimizations to take advantage of possible multiple display layers (primary graphics, video, picture in picture, on screen display, subtitles...). - Port remaining processes to the Efika 8610. - Deal with features and functions regarding different host configurations, ie: diskless, flash only, flash and disk. - Support potential hardware encoders and decoders (MPEG-2, H.264, etc). Once the system is stable and functions well on the Efika 8610 work will be done to improve existing features and add new features. Features include: - Removable media support: optical disks, CF and other flash disks, USB drives - Network media support, via: SBM, UPnP - Share the device's media over the network. - “Television” depending on systems hardware: using analog tuner, svideo or composite inputs, DVB-C/T/S, ATSC / HDTV card. - Pause live TV features. - Media transcoder for DVD backup, recordings or downloads. - Web interface to access features, schedule, etc. - Setup and configuration with remote control or web interface. - Beautiful UI, with effects and animations. - RSS / news feed client. - Weather reports. - Security: user support, passwords, parental controls - Themable user interface. - Bittorrent client. - Share media with friends and family. - Access popular internet services: YouTube, Flickr, Amazon, IMDB, Google - Depending on the configuration, obtain EPG data from 3rd party (like Schedules Direct) or from DVB stream's EIT. - Autoconfiguration of available TV channels through scanning (VBI stream or DVB's PAT/PMT/SDT). - Interface with Asterisk PBX for telephony features. - And more... The final product will not likely be running from a common Linux distribution, but on a custom built embedded distribution that includes only what is needed. However, software packages for the product will be provided for popular distributions. Screenshots:

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