Share some moments with your family on a private channel
If you’ve read through Parts 1 and 2 of the roku tutorial, you’ve made some very minor modifications to an example channel. Now it’s time to package it up and publish!
I just wanted to highlight again that the ability to create a private channel is wonderful for sharing touching or personal creativity and moments with friends and family. In this case, my little girl is already a toddler, and I wanted to be able to watch some videos of her on our tv without having to upload the videos to youtube or other 3rd party site. Sure, there are some parents that want to share their kid with the world, and there are others who would rather maintain their family’s privacy.
All of this information, in a very different order and in a much longer document, can be found in the “ChannelPackagingAndPublishing.pdf” file in the Roku SDK documentation folder. Remember, I’m here to speed you through this process so you get excited about customizing your channel. Am I right?
Packaging:
1) Set your ROKU_DEV_TARGET environment variable.
export ROKU_DEV_TARGET=your roku IP address
2) Create a zip file with make. On your development machine, go to the directory where you edited the code. You will see a Makefile. Edit just this one line in the middle of the Makefile:
APPNAME = your_happy_little_app_name
3) Type make
4) Type make install
5) In your web browser, type in http://YOUR_ROKU_IP_ADDRESS
6) Remember those keys we generated in Part 1? Here they come into play. From the Roku documentation. I can’t shorten this and they’ve explained it better than I could:
Install your zip file:
Select your application zip file using the “Browse…” button and then press “Install”. The box now has a copy of your application installed, plus the keys are still resident on the device from when you performed the “genkey” operation.
Now, just to be *extremely* verbose, and don’t fall over with boredom, but you already installed your zip file when you did the “make install”. This “Install” is just a verbose copy of what that make file does. Because this part of the roku development is a little off, but it’s still not too bad. So, one way or another, your zip file should now be on your roku machine.
7) Generate a package:
Click on the “Packager” link at the top of the page. This screen allows you to enter an app name/version string to embed in your package and the password to allow access to the keys on the device. Pressing the “Package” button will take the application currently installed on your box, encrypt it and sign it with your developer specific keys. When complete, it will generate a finished .pkg file ready for deployment. The .pkg file can be downloaded to your PC from the link displayed on the page when packaging is complete.
So on this little grey patch of a website, you have an installed zip with a crazy id number to the left of it. You have two items you need to fill out:
- App Name / Version – I would do something like “ToddlerCuteness/ 1.0″, but if you need to do “WoolyMammoth/2.1″, I understand.
- Password – THIS MUST BE THAT GENKEY PASSWORD FROM PART 1! You know, the one I said was really important and that you need to save. That one.
Click the “Package” button.
8 ) Save your package to your computer. There’s nothing to let you know that you have to click on the really long, nonsensical string of letters and numbers to the left of the “Package” button, but that’s what you have to do. Click on that link to save your package.
Publishing:
1) Log into your roku.com account. Go to the “Developer Site” in the upper right-hand nav.
2) In the Developer Site area, find the “My Channels” section and click on “Manage My Channels”.
3) In the private channel area, click on “Add Private Channel”.
4) Fill out the information for your private channel. These are only areas I’d worry about here.
- Your Channel’s name
- A vanity “access code” you select (short and sweet is best!)
- Short Description
- Long Description
- Primary Category
- Your SD channel poster image (290 x 218 pixels)
- Your HD channel poster image (218 x 144 pixels)
On the next page, you should see a page that looks something like this:
Now you’ll have to browse to the package you built in the “Packaging Section” and upload it to the roku website. The name of the package is that really long, nonsensical string from the packaging description above (step 8). Once you save, you should see that your packaged has been published!
View:
Viewing your channel on your roku. Yeah, I know you’re going to tell me I’m lame for not changing the intro “TED” example image that’s at the end of your channels list. That and a bunch of other images, but hey I got you this far! The fun art of customizing, because now you have things to work with. :)