Hi folks....

I wanted to share one of my low cost video and audio cue server on the basis of vlc with you.

this solution uses the free VLC media player on a pc on the local network remote controlled via the grandMA2 telnet command.

What you need:
-vlc media player
-grandMA2 console or onPC (duh!)
-pc connected to local MA-Net

start your vlc media player on the pc in the folder of your video or audio files with these options:
vlc -I qt --extraintf rc --rc-host [ip-address]:9999 -vvv

--you can freely choose the port, but do yourself a favor and use something above 1080
I chose 9999
--"-vvv" makes the output more verbose, good for debugging, omit later
--put in the [ip address] of your MA-Net network interface ON YOUR PC
e.g. vlc -I qt --extraintf rc --rc-host 192.168.1.2:9999 -vvv

now you can remote control vlc from the grandma2 with:
telnet [ip-address]:9999 "[vlc comand]"

e.g. telnet 192.168.1.2:9999 "add 1.wav" --adds 1.wav to playlist and plays it
telnet 192.168.1.2:9999 "enqueue 1.wav" --adds 1.wav to playlist
telnet 192.168.1.2:9999 "next" --jumps to next item in playlist

you can get all the commands in the rc documentation at videolan.org
OR
login to your vlc with : telnet [ip-address] 9999
and type: help

NOTES:
I used this on Linux, you might need another -I option instead of qt

if you want to cue videos and images you should:
-use "enqueue 1.jpg" and "next" for a flicker free tranistion and delete the cue list from time to time with "clear",
-with "add video.mp4" vlc will sometimes loose fullscreen when switching from video to image e.g. black
-switch the option "stop video on last frame" on, otherwise enqueue a black jpg after the video to avoid flickering and loosing fullscreen

if you want to cue audio:
-to play a file clear the playlist first: telnet 192.168.1.2:9999 "clear" then play with: telnet 192.168.1.2:9999 "add 1.wav"
-you can also load a playlist at the start and then jump to cues with "goto" but it WILL play the next song in list when finished, also the playlist starts at index 4, check the command: playlist

have phun!!

greetings
hoshy