Service add-ons

Service addons will be automatically started when XBMC starts. These addons must offer the xbmc.service extension point. You can specify when you want your addon to start, using the start tag. If it's isn't here, your addon will automatically start after user login. If you want it to start on XBMC startup, you need to set the start tag to startup. Here's a typical example of the addon.xml the addon needs to provide:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" standalone="yes"?>
<addon id="service.example"
       name="Example service"
       version="1.0.0"
       provider-name="">
  <requires>
    <import addon="xbmc.python" version="2.1.0"/>
  </requires>
  <extension point="xbmc.service" library="service.py" start="login" />
  <extension point="xbmc.addon.metadata">
    <platform>all</platform>
    <summary lang="en"></summary>
  </extension>
</addon>

If your addon is meant to be run while XBMC is running, you need to periodically check if XBMC is exiting. The addon is responsible for terminating when XBMC wants to exit. This can be checked by creating a xbmc.Monitor instance and calling the abortRequested() method. To wait for this event instead, call waitForAbort().

Example service that prints "hello addon!" every 10 second until XBMC exits:

import time
import xbmc

if __name__ == '__main__':
    monitor = xbmc.Monitor()
    
    while True:
        # Sleep/wait for abort for 10 seconds
        if monitor.waitForAbort(10):
            # Abort was requested while waiting. We should exit
            break
        xbmc.log("hello addon! %s" % time.time(), level=xbmc.LOGDEBUG)

Gotham and earlier

abortRequested() and waitForAbort() are new in Helix. In Gotham and earlier, use xbmc.sleep and check the xbmc.abortRequested attribute periodically.

Example:

import xbmc
 
if __name__ == '__main__':
    while True:
        if xbmc.abortRequested:
            break
        # some code
        xbmc.sleep(500)