Standard Android App Coming?

Hello! I'm very interested in the remote capabilities that Channels DVR offers, but I don't see compatibility with standard Android just yet (at least the app is listed as incompatible with my Pixel 2 XL)... do you know when you plan to release a regular Android app with this capability to match iOS? I wouldn't be able to justify the $8/month if there is no way to remotely schedule and watch shows. Thanks!

1 Like

There are no immediate plans for an Android phone/tablet app. However the DVR comes with a web UI that can be used from any device with a browser.

Oh! Thanks, that’s good to know. I didn’t realize there was a Web UI…can it be accessed from anywhere out-of-home or would I have to set up a complicated VPN? I thought there might be an easy way just to install the Android TV apk on my phone.

The DVR server comes with a remote access feature you can enable. For most routers it will work automatically.

The android tv apk does not work on phones as it was built with android tv sdks and designed for the big screen.

Thanks again! I hope you’ll consider a full-fledged Android app in the future :slight_smile: really appreciate the quick response!

The web UI has nearly everything you need for Android, if videos defaulted to opening full screen I’d be perfectly content with it as an app release.

1 Like

Ah that makes me feel better about investing the time/money to take advantage of what Channels has to offer.

I have the guide page bookmarked in chrome. This is how it looks, simply click on the guide to bring up the option to watch. If you click the gear icon as shown you have the option to record. you can also go to the other "pages" you have in the full app to search for shows, schedule recordings, and watch recordings. Not quite as "pretty" as the iOS app but it works great. Like I mentioned, the videos don't open in full screen so there is an additional step of clicking the "full screen" icon which is rather small, but that is the only annoyance I have with it and I understand why its necessary being that you might not want full screen in a full desktop web browser.

1 Like

Speaking of, @tmm1 would it be hard to make to make the web ui default to full screen video depending on the browser or window size? I don’t know much about web design but I’m guessing there is a way of it knowing if it is a mobile browser and/or the scaling of the page, could if be coded with an if/then argument to behave differently if it recognizes that the browser is on a phone or tablet as opposed to a laptop/desktop?

What does the player look like fullscreen? Does it still show all our custom controls?

On iOS none of those are available which is why it defaults to <video playsinline

On Android the controls the come up in full screen when you tap the screen are pause, skip back, skip forward, volume, and cast.

The skip buttons don’t work for me but pause does. There is also a cast icon at the top left of the video that seems unnecessary since it’s also on the control bar at the bottom.

Actually the screenshot above shows exactly how it looks in full screen, the overlay auto hides after a few seconds.

We have a beta available: BETA: Channels for Android phones/tablets