[Android Software Development] mgschwan:
Hi,

This software is still in beta status. You have to expect problems.

If you experience any bugs or glitches please look in the Known Issues section of this post. If the problem is not there send me a message.

This app is developed by me and Sony did not contribute to the development of this software

A personal note from me: I will not use the trademark LocationFree or the brand name Sony in the App (especially in the title)

I do however want to thank the people at Sony (and sonyericsson). They were very active to find a solution so i can distribute this app. Their recent opensource engagement seems to pay out, for people like me.

News:

Today the 1.0.4 Version was released. It includes support for Japanese Basestation, different color systems (NTSC/...), experimental recording functionality...

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The official site of this app is theretv.zero997.com. I have also added a commenting system to the site. You can now put your feature requests and bug reports directly in the comments.

The current status of the software is (as of 02/12/2012):

Compatible to all known BaseStations (LF-B1, LF-B10, LF-PK1, LF-B20, LF-V30)

Support for EU, US and JP models

Switch between MPEG4 and H.264(on supported BaseStations)

Recording of streams to MKV files (EXPERIMENTAL)

Remote control support

Registration works from within the app

Fullscreen playback

Works over Wifi/3G/4G

Selectable stream quality

Advanced performance settings (adjustable scaling filter/adjustable frame dropping)

Change the encoder settings of the BaseStation (framerate/videosize)

Change the video source

Support for the integrated tuner

Here is a video showing the App in action http://youtu.be/R1uaKrfdAoc

Upcoming features

Recording of shows directly on the device (like a DVR)

Timed recordings

Thanks to my testers: insanenyc, Tommyboy_65_98, Mister_Mxyzptlk, Jim_IT

Just on a side note, for all those people asking in other threads why no one made a LocationFree player even though Sony put the source code online:

The code released from sony is just an excerpt of an opensource library they used to stream the data everything else is closed source.

List of tested devices:

HTC Thunderbolt

HTC G2

HTC HD2

Nexus S

Glaxy Tab 10.1

HTC Inspire (overclocked to 1,5Ghz) : works

Motorola XOOM : works

Toshiba Thrive : works

Droid X : works

HP Touchpad : works

HTC Desire (not overclocked) : works although it is a bit too slow

HTC Wildfire: works but very very slow

First message 02/03/2012

Over the last month i've reverse engineered the Sony LocationFree Protocol and started the development of an Android client.

Update 02/05/2012:

The current release improves the frame dropping mechanism. This should result in better picture quality on slower devices. If the user sets a frame dropping factor the frames are only dropped at the end of a GOP. Thus the dropped frames are immediatly followed by an IFrame. This means that the frames following a dropped frame can be decoded without any errors.

The synchronization between audio/video has been improved. The audio decoder can tell the video decoder to drop frames if the delay becomes too big, this means that video frames are dropped before the audio decoder has to drop anything, which should result in better audio quality.

The remote control can now be shown/hidden.

Update 02/07/2012:

The encoded video size can now be set. The framerate of the encoder can be set.

Update 02/07/2012:

The support for LF-B10 BaseStations is now included

Update 02/08/2012:

Preliminary support for LF-V30 BaseStations. Video still has problems.

Added support for the second video source

Update 02/10/2012:

The display problems of the remote control that some testers experienced are fixed now.

The support for the LF-V30 BaseStations has been improved. But it's still H264 only

Documentation:

Once the app is installed. It's called ALF Player (Android LocationFree Player)

When started it presents you with a play icon. Don't just hit it yet, you need to first hit the Menu key and got to preferences (enter Server address/port). You can also enter a hostname. If it does not work try it by directly conecting to the wireless network of the basestation first.

Choose your remote (The remotes of all testers should be integrated already). If your remote is not listed i haven't extracted it yet.

Go back to the play button and hit the menu key again.

Got to registration.

Set the Registration on the Base Station via the web interface to enabled. You should get a registration which is 8 characters long.

Enter the password exactly as it is displayed (i guess it is always lowercase)

Press "register". It should display Registration sucessful within a second. If registration does not work look at your base station anyway, it may

have registered but did not detect it correctly.

If that is the case, press back to get to the Play button and press it.

It should take a few seconds for the stream to start (hopefully).

To activate the remote just touch the screen

To deactivate the remote touch anything except a button

If you have performance problems you have the following options:

Reduce the Picture size

Set the scaling filter to fast

Lower the stream quality

Activate frame dropping (i.e 50 percent)

Lower the encoder framerate

Set the encoded video size to low

Known issues

FIXED in 1.0.1 On some devices the player crashes before showing any video at all.

FIXED On some devices the remote control is not displayed correctly

FIXED The stream from LF-V30 BaseStations may cause trouble and not resync after dropped frames

PARTIALLY FIXED If the program can't connect it will hang until it crashes :)

Donations:

The following people have donated to this project (If you don't want to be listed here send me a message).

If you consider donating more than the 4 Euros of the donation version, please use paypal, otherwise most of your money will end up with google (30% fees)

Greetings

How to get the program:

You can download it from the android market

https://market.android.com/details?id=com.mgschwan.lfxreg Donation Version (4 Euros)

https://market.android.com/details?id=com.mgschwan.fxreg Free version

or you can scan one of the following codes:

Donation version (4 Euros)

Free version

Michael