HOW TO: Setup and Install Stream – An XBMCtorrent Fork

Stream is a fork of the popular XBMCtorrent addon. Follow along step by step as I show you how to set everything up, and how to install it. I also have some screenshot of the addon itself so you can see how it works.

[alert-warning]NOTE: Before you read any further I urge you to look into Pulsar, a much better, updated version of XBMCtorrent/Stream. More info here: HOW TO: Setup and Install Pulsar on XBMC/Kodi – An XBMCtorrent Alternative[/alert-warning]

If you aren’t familiar with the addon “XBMCtorrent”, it’s an addon that lets you stream torrent files directly in XBMC. It’s quite amazing stuff when you think about it. Torrents are traditionally split up into thousands of chunks which makes the file(s) unusable until the entire download has finished. The brains behind this project are using some cool wizardry to download all the chunks in order, and start playing the file before it’s done (most of the time). The fork by brysonreece isn’t much different, but offers a better browsing experience. This is what he has to say about his fork:

One of the noticeable differences between Stream and XBMCtorrent is the user interface. XBMCtorrent provides a basis for accessing media while Stream helps offer better categorical organization, media headings, and plenty of backend upgrades.

I will be reviewing the addon in another post, this will serve as the setup guide.

[alert-success]Looking for a HTPC to run this on? Take a look at the HomeMediaTech Budget HTPC Builds. I give you a blueprint to building your own![/alert-success]

Pre-requisites

• Winrar – I show you some steps that involve winrar. If you’re using winzip or 7zip, the steps will be slightly different, but I’m sure you will be able to figure it out.

The Git repo for the addon is here:
https://github.com/brysonreece/stream 

Once you go there, you will need to download the ‘master’ zip file

Next you need to extract the zip file

After you have extracted it you need to go into the folder. Right click on ‘addon.xml’ and edit/view the file. You’ll notice an ‘addon id’ variable, highlight and copy that.

Close the XML file and explorer window. Go to where the folder is, and re-name the folder to plugin.video.stream (from the xml file)

Now we need to make a zip file of this. Here is where it will differ if you don’t use winrar. Right click, and chose add to archive.

Change the format to ZIP. Make sure you keep the name the same as well.

Now you’ll have a shiny new zip file properly named.

Now is the fun stuff. Open up XBMC, go to system, Settings

Go to Addons

Choose Install from zip file

Navigate to where you saved the zip file. In my case this is my desktop. Click the zip file and OK.

At this point you will see “Stream – Addon enabled”

Now go back to Home. Choose Videos, addons

Choose Stream

Here is the main menu. You can choose from videos or tv. Below is a list of movies and me choosing one. You can see what happens when you do. It will start to connect to peers and download/upload. After a certain threshold the media file will start to play.

Once it starts to play it’s just like any other file

And there you have it. You can browse around and find something. There are some additional settings like saving the file after it completes, or deleting it. You can explore those in the context menu at your leisure.

Thanks,
Alex