phpVideoPro

Intro

If you've got too many DVDs, VideoCDs and video tapes to handle, then you need a better system! That's exactly why phpVideoPro was created. This program is all you need to get your huge collection under control. It puts your information at your fingertips.

History

phpVideoPro was inspired by Bernd Rickers' VideoPro, which is available in a DOS-based clipper application (latest release in 1994) as well as in a Windows version (starting from about 1993 - this is now known as Video-5). phpVideoPro was designed using PHP because of the cross-platform abilities and the added plus of having your information available anywhere at anytime.

Features

phpVideoPro Media list The program allows you to add and change entries as needed - on your request, it utilizes the  IMDB (Internet Movie DataBase) to retrieve information for this task, using the IMDBPHP class also available separately. phpVideoPro can be configured to display your catalogue at will. You can view your items in a list containing all of your entries or you can request the program to display a list of available free space on your homemade video tapes. You can view details of a specified entry, or display a list of all movies with a certain actor. Moreover, you can have phpVideoPro printing labels for your media - just to mention a few examples.

So you are able to keep track of what is what and what you're looking to add to your closet of treasures! The filter functions help to sort through your catalogue by creating subsets and finding special entries within your ever-growing collection, while the statistics page tells you how much it has already grown…

Data import from IMDB phpVideoPro is widely configurable. Making use of templates in almost all places, it allows you to adjust its look and feel without any PHP knowledge (some HTML knowledge is needed for this, however), or to create your own label design. You can even have phpVideoPro talking to you in your own language (if it not already does) by creating a special language file using the built-in translation editor (don't forget to place it here afterwards to have it included with future versions of phpVideoPro - and to be mentioned in the "Hall of Fame").

The program does distinguish between DVDs, VideoCDs and Videotapes - new media types can be added easily via the administration interface. While you may have enough tapes and DVDs to open up your own version of Blockbuster, phpVideoPro wasn't designed to cater to video shops. The current release wasn't made to log multiple copies of the same item. However, multiple simultan users are served together with their own preferences and permissions with the help of cookies and a built-in session management. More to come.

If you want to know more, you may explore the (incomplete) Feature-List or try out the Demo installed on this server.

Requirements

• Database: either MySQL (v3.28.32 or higher, recommended is v5) or PostgreSQL (7.1 or higher)
• a Webserver with support for PHP (tested only with Apache)
• PHP5 (better 5.2+) with support for the selected database

Future

New features are planned, and development still goes on. The frequency of new releases is not very steady and probably won't ever be - since "it's only a hobby", and there are so many others that require my presence But as long as I have not added all the features I need (see doc/2do), you can be sure that there will always be a fresh release available within the next few weeks! And even if not, don't give up - sometimes it takes a bit longer. So I close with my standard disclaimer: "This is only a hobby, I can't promise anything - I just ask you to stay tuned…"