Picasa Finally on the WizTV main menu

diesel · Post by **diesel** » Thu Apr 09, 2009 19:31

Logged into WizTV tonight and noticed that Wiz Partners has been replaced by Picasa function - so it is no longer a hidden menu.

Also, IceTV have a easter special running - save $30 on an annual subscription

pauliking · Post by **pauliking** » Thu Apr 09, 2009 20:37

So how do you use this picasa function. I never knew there was a hidden menu for it. How do you see any hidden menus??

DaveR · Post by **DaveR** » Thu Apr 09, 2009 21:19

pauliking wrote:So how do you use this picasa function.

You can view the currently listed picassa photos albumns, or sign up on the picassa website, load your own family photos etc, and then view them on your TV via wiztv. If your friends and relatives have a wiz they can also view your photos via wiztv.

pauliking wrote:I never knew there was a hidden menu for it. How do you see any hidden menus??

The Picassa menu was hidden from public view while it was being developed.

pauliking · Post by **pauliking** » Thu Apr 09, 2009 21:56

Yes got it going. Pretty cool stuff.

diesel · Post by **diesel** » Thu Apr 09, 2009 22:08

Dave? wrote: The Picassa menu was hidden from public view while it was being developed.

Nothing a **** couldn't reveal

DaveR · Post by **DaveR** » Thu Apr 09, 2009 22:44

diesel wrote:
Dave? wrote: The Picassa menu was hidden from public view while it was being developed.
Nothing a **** couldn't reveal

Yes, but I wasn't going to say it on the public forum...

pjc3 · Post by **pjc3** » Fri Apr 10, 2009 06:27

Finally a useful (edit: useful for our family) WizTV function. Even impressed the wife.

Well done Dave/Peter et al

diesel · Post by **diesel** » Fri Apr 10, 2009 09:27

Mrs diesel thinks the weather app is useful

Wildone · Post by **Wildone** » Sun Apr 19, 2009 23:19

A question,

I can view each picture one by one but is there a way to just press play and just watch all the photos in the album? say 3-5 seconds each picture.

Thanks

Wildone

DaveR · Post by **DaveR** » Sun Apr 19, 2009 23:43

pjc3 wrote:Finally a useful (edit: useful for our family) WizTV function. Even impressed the wife.
Well done Dave/Peter et al

The forum member by the name of Scumbag deserves the bulk of the credit.

If your family liked this one... keep checking WizTV.

pjc3 · Post by **pjc3** » Mon Apr 20, 2009 06:07

Then I thank Scumbag as well.

Scumbag · Post by **Scumbag** » Mon Apr 20, 2009 13:11

Wildone wrote:I can view each picture one by one but is there a way to just press play and just watch all the photos in the album? say 3-5 seconds each picture.

Not currently possible in the WizTV environment. Thought it should be easy for BeyonWiz to add that feature, and the Picasa viewer could be updated.

y12345678 · Post by **y12345678** » Sun Oct 11, 2009 14:39

could anyone tell me how to access the unlisted or sign-in requried photos?

Scumbag · Post by **Scumbag** » Tue Oct 13, 2009 00:06

y12345678 wrote:could anyone tell me how to access the unlisted or sign-in requried photos?

Sign-in would require https authentication/Google account support and would not be possible. Access to unlisted photos is feasible - but would require you to enter the "secret" auth key. This would be painful using the remote keyboard input screen.

I don't have the specs for performing keyboard entry. Peteru handled that part of the Picasa viewer.

download · Post by **download** » Tue Oct 13, 2009 08:16

Scumbag wrote: Access to unlisted photos is feasible - but would require you to enter the "secret" auth key. This would be painful using the remote keyboard input screen

Why not create a BeyonWiz default password. That way people could set their Picassa accounts to that password if they wanted to. Its not ideal but it would essentially protect the photos from most anyone.

Regards

Peter Gillespie

prl · Post by **prl** » Tue Oct 13, 2009 08:29

download wrote:
Scumbag wrote: Access to unlisted photos is feasible - but would require you to enter the "secret" auth key. This would be painful using the remote keyboard input screen
Why not create a BeyonWiz default password. That way people could set their Picassa accounts to that password if they wanted to. Its not ideal but it would essentially protect the photos from most anyone.

Regards

Peter Gillespie

Beyonwiz owners are somehow more trustworthy than the general population? No offence to other Beyonwiz owners, but I don't think that's likely. Anyway, widely known passwords like this are pretty much no protection to anyone.

glow · Post by **glow** » Tue Oct 13, 2009 10:55

It might be more convenient to configure details from the WizTV website?

tonymy01 · Post by **tonymy01** » Tue Oct 13, 2009 11:25

But there wouldn't be encryption support or anything, would you really trust giving important passwords in clear text?

peteru · Post by **peteru** » Tue Oct 13, 2009 15:19

As others pointed out, security is the reason. WizTV is currently not handling third party credentials and frankly I do not believe it should. It means that user account details and passwords would have to be stored on the WizTV servers in plain text in order to perform authentication with a third party service. Storing such information brings with it a whole truckload of security, privacy and other considerations that are just not worth addressing for a few online photo albums. If the owner of the pictures is concerned about their privacy enough to require authenticated access then you need to use a (hopefully) secure computer to access such content.

Scumbag · Post by **Scumbag** » Tue Oct 13, 2009 23:52

The authkey that I was referring to is not really a password. When you create a private album then the url to access it is something like this:

Code: Select all

http://picasaweb.google.com.au/<username>/<albumname>?authkey=Gv2sXgCM7bk6_L18maoAF

Specifically each album has a unique authkey which is probably a hash of the internal album id.
You can't set the authkey yourself - therefore you couldn't set a default BeyonWiz password (regardless of how insecure that is).

The other level of Picasa security is that you can require Google account login to access specific albums (e.g. your own private albums), or private albums that someone has explicitly shared with you.

Thinking about it a bit more now, it probably is possible to handle the Google account authentication - since this would be handled in the PHP code on the WizTV server. As discussed, this then raises the issue of how to securely handle that authentication information. You wouldn't want to pass it in plain text over the BeyonWiz->WizTV server link. This then leaves you with the option of registering that information on www.wiztv.com.au, and trusting that your password is stored securely.

Maybe WizTV could create a Google/PicasaWeb account, and any "private" photos you want to display on the Wiz would have to be explicitly shared with that user. Then the only account username/password would be the WizTV one - which you would assume they handle appropriately. As mentioned, this doesn't prevent anyone else from looking at your photos from a BeyonWiz - and therefore doesn't buy much privacy.

prl · Post by **prl** » Wed Oct 14, 2009 08:08

Scumbag wrote:The authkey that I was referring to is not really a password. When you create a private album then the url to access it is something like this:
Code: Select all
http://picasaweb.google.com.au/<username>/<albumname>?authkey=Gv2sXgCM7bk6_L18maoAF
Specifically each album has a unique authkey which is probably a hash of the internal album id.
...

A password by any other name...

Scumbag · Post by **Scumbag** » Wed Oct 14, 2009 11:53

prl wrote:A password by any other name...

Agreed. But there is one per album. Do you really want to configure 10 passwords if you have 10 albums?

Also they are not particularly easy to type in using a remote. Can you imagine trying to share an album with a relative - I couldn't even get my parents to enter the username properly.

Picasa Finally on the WizTV main menu

Picasa Finally on the WizTV main menu

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