Why do some channels have wrong or no icons?

[markosjal]

I am working from a couple of different playlists, each with its own xml guide data. It would not surprise me to find that a channel or two display the wrong icons , however I have many channels displaying the wrong icons. Which icon does NextPVR use the icon in the m3u or in the xml? I believe in some cases they are defined in both.

One of the sources that often displays the wrong icons is using Xumo TV by way of Cabernet , although I have seen the same issue with other sources and it really depends on the playlists I load. The same source is not consistently affected. 

Also I have one source that is an HDHomerun tuner and get guide data by way of zap2xml These channels mostly have icons defined in the xml but seem to not be used even though the links to the icons are valid and tested.

My clients are Kodi 19.4 Libreelec

Mark

[BrettB]

NextPVR direct clients display channel icons from the data directory folder media\channels. (On Windows the default location would be C:\Users\Public\NPVR-Data\media\channels.)

The files are matched by the "Channel Name" in the NextPVR configuration/database and the base filename in the media\channels folder. I believe that the preferred format is .png (all of mine are .png), but other formats like .jpg may be supported as well.

I'm sure that your next question will be "How do the files get into the media\channels folder?". There are various methods.

• You can manually place files there. (Some users maintain libraries of channel icons which they make available.)
  
• You can go into the NextPVR web app settings page and select Guide in the left menu. There you will find a button labeled "Download Channel Icons". If you are a Schedules Direct user, this will download the channel icons specified by SD for any channels which do not already have a file in media\channels. (It shouldn't overwrite any files for channels which are already there since you may have specifically customized the icon display.)
  
• I know that sub also has some code to get channel icons from XMLTV files (and possibly other sources). And that has been tweaked over time as people have requested when their particular XMLTV file has something "different". You can search forums for posts about those. I'm not positive what triggers those updates. I think that it is clicking that same "Download Channel Icons" button.
  
• I think that icons for IPTV sources are similar to XMLTV files, but I don't use IPTV sources, so can't say for sure.
  

As I recall, kodi adds another layer of caching of the channel icons. So, if you change the icon file in NextPVR's media\channels folder, the change may not immediately/automatically propagate to kodi. I believe that you must manually clear the entry in kodi's cache to get the add-on to download the new/updated icon.

[sub]

I am working from a couple of different playlists, each with its own xml guide data. It would not surprise me to find that a channel or two display the wrong icons , however I have many channels displaying the wrong icons. Which icon does NextPVR use the icon in the m3u or in the xml? I believe in some cases they are defined in both.

One of the sources that often displays the wrong icons is using Xumo TV by way of Cabernet , although I have seen the same issue with other sources and it really depends on the playlists I load. The same source is not consistently affected. 

Also I have one source that is an HDHomerun tuner and get guide data by way of zap2xml These channels mostly have icons defined in the xml but seem to not be used even though the links to the icons are valid and tested.

Whenever we've investigated reports of incorrect channel icons in the past, NextPVR has always been using the icon it's been told to by the user's source.

In the case of IPTV, when you initially import the channel, it'll pull in the icon from the m3u url. It uses the 'tvg-logo' url for this icon.

When you're using xmltv as your EPG source, and you later update the EPG, if a channel doesn't already have an icon, but the xmltv file has one specified in the <icon> tag, then it'll download.

If you're using two different sources for the same channel, then it'll depend which m3u you imported first. This would have had first go at specifying the channel icons. The second m3u8 import would have had the chance you fill in some more icons, if some of those channels didn't already have them. Lastly, when you updated the EPG, it would also have had a chance at downloading some icons for channels that didn't already have them.

If you're wanting to use the ones from your xmltv file, you can probably just delete the existing files from the [data]/media/channels folder, then update the epg.

[markosjal]

BrettB the method you described "Download channel icons" does not seem to work unless using schedules direct.

The following error is produced.

Channel Icons
×
Unexpected error downloading channel icons from Schedules Direct. Have you entered the correct username/password, and do you have mapped to Schedules Direct?


The other thing is that it is inconsistent which icons show and which channels show the wrong icons.

[markosjal]

Sub,

But here is what you are not getting...
The icons are correct in both the playlist and xmltv files .

I am certain this is an issue with how the icons are processed.

[sub]

Sub,

But here is what you are not getting...
The icons are correct in both the playlist and xmltv files .

I am certain this is an issue with how the icons are processed.

If you want to supply a sample xmltv file, I'm happy to take a look.

We've not seen any reports of issues with this, so I wouldn't expect there to be issues with this logic.

[mvallevand]

BrettB the method you described "Download channel icons" does not seem to work unless using schedules direct.

The following error is produced.

Channel Icons
×
Unexpected error downloading channel icons from Schedules Direct. Have you entered the correct username/password, and do you have mapped to Schedules Direct?


The other thing is that it is inconsistent which icons show and which channels show the wrong icons.

Could you confirm that

<SchedulesDirectUsername></SchedulesDirectUsername>
<SchedulesDirectPassword></SchedulesDirectPassword>

are empty in config.xml?  We probably can see this if you upload the zipped log after going to the guide page.

Martin