A very common feature of most DVR and cable guides is having the channel playing in the corner or in the background while browsing guide data. Would love to see that addition! I've seen this requested - just wanted to give it my vote too. Otherwise keep up the great work.
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If you are talking about the channel you are currently watching while browsing the guide, this is already a feature if you turn on auto Picture in Picture mode.
The downside is that once you select the new channel, it switches the PIP window to the new channel but doesn’t automatically go full screen, and you have to manually switch out of PIP mode.
If you are talking about changing the pip window to each channel as you scroll through them, that might be annoying as it takes a few seconds for devices to start streaming.
Should be a basic feature, that's why I use Spectrum for live and Channels for the DVR.
I've been advocating for a guide overlay of the current playing channel. If you notice when you bring up the quick guide while a channel is playing, the banner with the quick guide takes up the top half of the screen (at least on ATV). Why not have the option to bring up a full guide overlay that takes up the entire screen while the current channel continues to play.
In reality, I realize this is almost impossible to accomplish with the limited functionality of the Siri remote. For example, if you were to swipe down to bring up the full guide overlay (the same way you bring up the quick guide), you would not be able to navigate up and down within the full guide because a swipe up on the Siri remote would hide the guide.
So maybe we make this as a feature for the universal remotes as an option assignable to one of the color keys. For example, a full guide overlay could be assigned to the yellow button. When the yellow button (or key assigned to the yellow button) on a Harmonry, Sofabaton, etc is pressed, the full guide overlay comes up and then you can navigate freely up and down in the guide. When finished, a press of the yellow button removes the guide overlay. I wonder if it would be possible to accomplish the guide overlay conundrum this way.
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At least on AppleTV, this is solved by double-clicking the new channel in the grid, as opposed to just single-clicking. Double-clicking makes the new channel go to full screen, and closes the previous channel's PIP window too.
I will give that a try. I still say that's not very intuitive though, and not how most other live TV guide interfaces work (I have family in other households that would need to be 'trained' on the feature since that is not the normally expected behavior).
Yeah, I'm just sharing a current workflow that "gets it done." I agree it's not ideal UI, but I also understand that PIP behavior is largely dictated by Apple's tvOS and the API that's provided. Hopefully this interaction can become more elegant and intuitive.