Archive:Kodi v15 (Isengard) FAQ

NOTICE: Kodi v15 (Isengard) final has not been released yet. As such, these API changes is for the current Kodi mainline which is a work in progress, and the APIs are still subject to change.

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See also: Releases, Kodi v15 (Isengard) changelog, and Isengard API changes

FAQs Devices

Kodi v15 (Isengard) FAQ

Frequently Asked Questions for upgrading to the upcoming Kodi v15 (codename Isengard) from a previous version. Includes how to enable some of the new features, where some controls got moved to, etc.

General FAQ

See also: All platforms FAQ for an FAQ that applies to all versions of Kodi.

What is Kodi? What is Isengard?

Main pages: Kodi name change FAQ and History of XBMC

Kodi is the new name for XBMC media center. "Isengard" is the codename for version 15, just as "Gotham" was the codename for XBMC v13 and "Helix was the codename for Kodi v14". You will often see "v15" and "Isengard" used interchangeably in the community. It might be a little confusing with so many new names being used, but this is simply the new version of Kodi/XBMC. As long as you call it version 15/v15/Isengard, then everyone in the community will know what you are talking about.

• Kodi v15.0 "Isengard" Kodi 15.0 Isengard – Alpha 1 was released on February 28th, 2015.

• Kodi v15.0 "Isengard" Kodi 15.0 Isengard – Alpha 2 was released on April 1st, 2015.

You can download these and other experimental (development builds) of Kodi 15.0 “Isengard” by going to Development builds

Changelog

See: Kodi v15 (Isengard) changelog (and add-on developers should also see Isengard API changes)

What are some of the major new features?

See Kodi v15 (Isengard) changelog for a condensed list of the most important new features and functions as well as other key changes.

For example, other than new under-the-hood features/functions some of the most notable usability changes to the user interface include:

• Improved Live TV, PVR/DVR, EPG, and OSD frontend GUI interface inside Kodi
• Added an accessibility settings section to provide one configuration area for the visually and hearing impaired
• Improved and expanded the internationalization and regional settings options in the GUI
• Updated community maintained translations to over 60+ languages to date for Kodi via Transifex Translation System
• Restructured settings windows and descriptions for almost every setting and configuration
• Improved GUI settings configuration levels
• Added adaptive skipping/seeking through audio and video playback, also known as “skip steps”
• Added a Chapter Selector Window with visual thumbnails
• Improved Stereoscopic 3D rendering support
• Improved Closed Captions support
• Updated music, movies, tv shows, and music video scrapers

Upgrading

How do I upgrade from XBMC version x.x to Kodi v15?

Main page: Migration from XBMC to Kodi

Note: Always backup your settings before upgrading, just incase!

• In most cases you can just install Kodi v15 over XBMC v13 or Kodi v14. All your settings and library are saved and will continue to work in the new version.

• WARNING: Android users: Do not uninstall XBMC v13 before installing Kodi v15 (or Kodi v14). Doing so will erase your settings before the upgrade takes place.

• After you install Kodi v15 (or Kodi v14), you can then uninstall your old XBMC v13 install. XBMC v13 must be manually uninstalled in most cases since the upgrade has a new application name, depending on your OS.

See Migration from XBMC to Kodi for full details.

PVR add-ons for Ubuntu

• PVR add-ons for Ubuntu need to be reinstalled as they will have new Kodi- names.

MySQL

Main page: MySQL/Upgrading

• As long as your MySQL server is set up to allow XBMC/Kodi to make new databases for the upgrade itself (see MySQL/Upgrading) then you don't need to do anything for upgrading a MySQL set up for Kodi. Even if you use "XBMC" in your advancedsettings.xml file, you can leave this the same and everything will still work.

Where did it this or that go?

Play button on remote no longer pauses

• Custom keymaps might need to be adjusted to use the action ID playpause instead of play. "Play" alone has new behavior to only play and not pause. This can be done with a basic text editor and going into your userdata folder and into the keymaps folder.

Live TV

• The Live TV home menu option has been renamed to just TV.
• Some Keymap window IDs for PVR have changed and will need to be adjusted accordingly.

Audio encoder options

Main page: Ripping CDs

For Ubuntu users (and possibly other linux-based OSes), audio encoders are now binary add-ons and must be installed through apt-get. See Ripping CDs#Adding audio encoders for Ubuntu for details.

Setting: "Remote control sends keyboard presses"

• The setting "Remote control sends keyboard presses" from Settings → System → Input devices has been removed. This setting allowed remotes that emulated keyboards to be able to select letters on the on-screen-keyboard. This is now automatically enabled, and the setting is no longer needed.

Userdata folder

• The userdata folder's parent settings folder has been renamed from "xbmc" to "kodi" (or .kodi for some OSes).
• If you are upgrading from an older XBMC install, then Kodi will move/rename your "xbmc" folder to "kodi".

Troubleshooting

Main page: Troubleshooting

What are some of the known issues in Isengard?

See: Common issues

What might break when upgrading to v15? (add-ons, skins, remotes, etc)

Most things from v13 will work in v15 (and v14). However:

• Some add-ons may not work, prompting Kodi to ask you to disable them. You can keep using them if you wish (by choosing not to disable them), but doing so is unsupported.

• Some skins might not be updated for v15 Isengard when you update. Be sure to check the relevant section of http://forum.kodi.tv for your skin to see if an update is planned.
  • Skins that have not been updated might not show the on screen keyboard.

• Should your repo appear empty, or you are missing the new subtitles services, you may need to trigger a Force refresh on the Kodi add-on repository.

• The default username for remote smartphone apps is now kodi and might need to be changed in the settings of those remote apps. You can also change the username back to "xbmc" or use a custom username (and optionally, a password) in Service settings.

No menus on screen when starting up

• When using the default skin, Confluence, if you only see the blue bubble background and no menus or buttons, this might be due to the start up window option. If the start up window option was set to open up PVR/Live TV in v13, then Kodi gets "confused" in v14 and doesn't show anything. To fix this, press escape until you see the home screen and then go into Settings → Appearance → Skin → Startup window and re-set this to either "home screen" or "TV" if you want to keep starting up on Live TV.

Add-ons don't show Kodi updates

• Sometimes add-ons and/or add-on updates might not work until you do a force refresh on the add-on repositories.

No letters on the on-screen-keyboard

• If you cannot see any letters on the on-screen-keyboard then you need to switch to a v15-compatible skin or wait for an update for your existing skin.

No Live TV button on home screen

• If you use IPTV Simple and your "Live TV" option disappeared, this is not because of the v15 upgrade. The Live TV option for IPTV Simple will disappear if it cannot access the playlist for the channels, such as a URL change or a server issue, or if someone has deleted the playlist.
• Make sure you are using the included version of IPTV Simple and not an installed version (except for Ubuntu). If you've installed IPTV Simple from another add-on repo or zip file, uninstall that using the add-on manager and then enable the built-in version by going to System → Add-ons → Disabled add-ons → PVR.

Empty TV shows are removed when the library is cleaned

• See here for full details and the future of this behavior: http://forum.kodi.tv/showthread.php?tid=214908&pid=1891410#pid1891410
• In v15 you must set the <hideemptyseries> tag to true in advancedsettings.xml to prevent empty series from being removed during library cleanup.

Apple TV 2: Kodi v15 does not work properly on Apple TV 2 (ATV2)

• ATV2 is not supported as a platform in Kodi v15, nor is future support planned until if and when Apple released a proper public SDK for the Apple TV 2 and Apple TV 3 as well as any other future hardware versions of the Apple TV platform. Until then you can still use Kodi v14 on Apple TV 2 (ATV2) as-is, but no further bug-fixes will be released of Kodi v14. For more info read the kodi.tv news post "Farewell to future Apple TV2 development" here http://kodi.tv/farewell-to-future-appletv2-development/

iDevices: iPad/iPod/iPhone with older than iOS 5.1 do not work

• Kodi v15 have moved to using iOS 8.1 SDK, which means that minimum iOS 5.1 is now required. Please upgrade your iDevice to at least iOS 5.1 as otherwise you will just have to be satisfied using as older version of Kodi (Kodi v14 or older).

Linux: Media keys don't work (play, fast forward, volume)

• In some Linux distributions (Ubuntu, Linux Mint), the OS might be "stealing" media keys (play, fast forward, volume, etc). A temp workaround is to "un-map" the media keys in the OS's keyboard/shortcut settings.

Raspberry Pi: Can not playback RAR files

• On most Raspberry Pi builds of Kodi, the ability to browse RAR files has been turned off to prevent out-of-memory crashes with some problematic RAR files. The feature can be manually turned on by going to: Settings -> Appearance -> File lists -> Support browsing into archives

Where can I get more help?

The general and platform specific FAQs, the Kodi support forums: http://forum.kodi.tv, and/or the #kodi IRC chat channel on irc.freenode.org.