Howto: SVN installer on XBMC live to enable automatic skin and plugin upgrades/installs

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For ages I’ve wanted to know how to put the plugins back into xbmc.  When you do a fixed disk install from the XBMC live iso, they’re just not included.  Why?  It’s probably that the XBMC team don’t consider the live disc to be important, yet it is the best out of the box media centre around simply because it’s light, has no extra applications you don’t need, uses it’s own window manager, free and works out of the box!

So here’s how I used SVN XBMC to do it.

ssh into your xbmc media centre

$ ssh <youripaddress>

Become root

su <password>

ensure unzip is installed

# apt-get install unzip

Become normal user

# exit

Enter plugins directory

cd /home/xbmc/.xbmc/plugins/programs

Download installer

$ wget http://xbmc-addons.googlecode.com/svn/packages/plugins/programs/SVN_Repo_Installer.zip

unzip SVN Installer

$ unzip SVN_Repo_installer.zip

Delete the original zip file

$ rm SVN_Repo_installer.zip

Configure XBMC

Go to settings, skin settings, (left hand menu), home window and turn on the show programs option in the main menu.

Go to main menu and choose Programs

There will be program plugins and under that your new installer.

You’re done!  Using the installer is fairly self explanatory, check out the skins, you’ll be really impressed.