Questions about 3.3.8's built-in Schedules Direct support and the guide display

[BrettB]

With my current configuration (which I've been using since Schedules Direct was created--before GBPVR had built-in support for SD), I use xmltv.exe to download the guide data from SD and then use UltraXMLTV to "enhance" the data before NPVR imports and processes it. The enhancements I use are:

1. Mark new episodes with an "*" so that my recurring recording rules could pick just the new episodes (I pretty sure that NextPVR now has support for this type of functionality when scheduling recurring recordings, but it doesn't have any visible display in the guide to indicate new or not)
   
2. Update the description field to include the original air date
   
3. Add the guests and actors to the end of the description field
   

From my understanding of the replacement tool that SD is providing, I think that I should be able to continue with my current setup. But I'm wondering if now (with 3.3.8 just released) would be a good time to bite-the-bullet and switch to just using the built-in SD support.

At a minimum, since almost all of my recurring recordings have the "*" at the end to limit to "new" episodes, I'll have to recreate all of those without the "*". I think that I can do that by editing the recurring recordings export file, deleting all of the recurring recordings, and then importing the edited export file. So it might not be too bad.

Then I'm also pretty sure that I'll end up having to remap all of the channels to the guide data.

My questions are:

1. Am I correct that the built-in Guide does not have any visible indication of "new" episodes?
   
2. Are the additional SD fields containing the original air date and guests and actors stored in the EPG table when the built-in SD mechanism is used?
   
3. And, if that data is stored, is there any way to have it displayed in the guide and recordings screens?
   

Thanks in advance for answers, comments, suggestions.

[johnsonx42]

1. No visible indication, however, "new" episodes are flagged in the database, and the "Record NEW Episodes on this Channel" recording type does indeed get only new episodes. This has worked for awhile, it's not new.

2. Yes, 3.3.8 and the new SD-JSON service include original air date, season/episode number, actors, guests, hosts, producers, directors, genres etc. as appropriate.

3. So far only the Season/Episode number and the primary genre are displayed. I think the extra data could be added by updating the skin, but I'm not sure. I think the new "Metadata" recording screens would be the target for this additional data, but it's not there yet.