Hardware Reference
In-Depth Information
Figure 8-4:
A
list of videos
available
through the
CollegeHumor
Xbmc add-on
Similar add-ons are available under the Music and Video menus, and operate in the same
way. Using these add-ons, you can view picture content and stream audio content from sites
such as Flickr, Picasa, The Big Picture, Grooveshark, Sky.fm and SoundCloud.
Streaming Local Network Media
The Xbmc software supports the
Universal Plug and Play (UPnP)
media streaming standard,
allowing it to connect to a range of devices on your home network. UPnP support is included
in most modern mobile phones, games consoles and
network-attached storage (NAS)
devices
for sharing and streaming videos, music and pictures. Many laptops and desktops also come
with support for UPnP or the closely linked
Digital Living Network Alliance (DLNA)
stan-
dard—check your documentation to find out how to enable this feature on your own devices.
Xbmc isn't just limited to UPnP connections, however—the software can also connect to
network servers running the
Network File System (NFS)
standard common to Unix-based sys-
tems, the
Server Message Block (SMB)
standard common to Windows servers and the
Zeroconf
standard common to OS X devices. No matter what network-attached device you use to store
your media content, it's likely that Xbmc will support at least one way of connecting to it.
