Some feedback from a newcomer

[carsten1212]

Hello,

as you might have seen in some other posts here, I switched to NextPVR and wanted to share my experience with you 
and maybe give some suggestions for further development. Happy to test any betas if you like or providing some kind
of user stories for features if you like. 

I have a quite old Asrock E350M1 system with 8GB memory and with Digital Devices quad tuner DVB-C/DVB-T PCIe card.
The system is running as a server Openmedivault. I used docker before with TVHeadend and MrMC and TVHClient on 
Apple TV for viewing. MrMC was forgetting his PVR settings every two days and TVHeadend implements skipping in an
awful way (buttons increase/decrease playback speed). This was especially annoying, as I use Logitech Harmony as a
remote to control all devices, I know it works much better with original remotes (stop playback and scrub). Docker file
is also attached.

I should mention that I am not able to use the we client, as the system is too slow to transcode anything. I played around
with KODI on my Mac and it sends direct stream video, but Audio is still transcoded for unknown reasons.

Suggestion: Allow transcoding to be switched off transparently (current options are not so clear) for video and audio,
either in general (quick solution) or for different clients (I know that's a lot of work. Seen that in jellyfish). 

Having seen the client in the AppStore, I install the original docker nextpvr/nextpvr_amd64 and it worked pretty quickly. 
First issue was I did not find my provider in the list for scanning, but it found all channels also by using de-Berlin. If you
feel more comfortable, you find attached a de-WillyTel with the major frequencies in it (please note that one will be 
sufficient, as they somehow send the other frequencies to scan on each bouquet). 

Suggestion: Include provided de-WillyTel in /usr/share/dvb/dvb-c

Suggestion: When doing a channels scan, remember all the channels and offer a possibility to add or deselect channels
afterwards without to repeat the whole scan, which took 20 minutes in my case.

Problem: When switching web user interface to German, the entries on the screen (Safari and Chrome) show up with squared
brackets around, e.g. Channels menu entry shows like [Kanäle]. No change when reloading or deleting caches. Really every
German entry is in square brackets. 

In the next step I wondered why some channels got EPG information through DVB-C and some not. A bit later, I bought 
the client App and realized that it also will not playback these channels. That was when I got into the docker and saw that
there is a configuration file for each adapter and I looked into it, finding out that in these cases, where the EPG wouldn't 
load and there was no playback possible, the frequencies and symbol rates look weird.

Problem: Here the original, buggy entry of Das Erste HD:

Code:

[Das Erste HD]
        SERVICE_ID = 10301
        NETWORK_ID = 1
        TRANSPORT_ID = 1039
        VIDEO_PID = 5101
        AUDIO_PID = 5102 5103 5107 5106
        PID_0c = 1176
        PID_0b = 5172 2171
        PID_06 = 5108 5105 5104
        PID_05 = 1170
        FREQUENCY = 4294967293
        MODULATION = QAM/256
        INVERSION = AUTO
        SYMBOL_RATE = 6900033
        INNER_FEC = NONE
        DELIVERY_SYSTEM = DVBC/ANNEX_A

and the corrected version:

Code:

[Das Erste HD]
        SERVICE_ID = 10301
        NETWORK_ID = 1
        TRANSPORT_ID = 1039
        VIDEO_PID = 5101
        AUDIO_PID = 5102 5103 5107 5106
        PID_0c = 1176
        PID_0b = 5172 2171
        PID_06 = 5108 5105 5104
        PID_05 = 1170
        FREQUENCY = 370000000
        MODULATION = QAM/256
        INVERSION = AUTO
        SYMBOL_RATE = 6900000
        INNER_FEC = NONE
        DELIVERY_SYSTEM = DVBC/ANNEX_A

The buggy frequency is almost everywhere 4294967293, sometimes 4294967295. The wrong symbol rate almost 
everywhere 6900033, sometimes 6899978.

I was able to change the frequencies and symbol rate of the selected channels manually by using the frequency table 
of WillyTel, knowing that the symbol rate is always 6900000 Hz. All other entries where ok. I provided the original scan 
result and a corrected version. Please note I only corrected the faulty channels of the 14 I selected for use.

Problem: when correcting the problems, I accidentally forgot one [ in front of a channel entry. The system was not 
telling me that and the logs a a bit crowded, this is hard to find. As a result I wondered why reading the EPG will be
finished in 1 second with 0 entries read. Hard to track down such a problem. Even if maybe chosen by design, sometimes
a modal would be helpful if there is such a problem. On the other hand the basic idea might be: it works, why to bother
someone :-). 

So I used the client for the first time. When using Docker, the client will somehow offer server addresses that are not
the ones of the host network. But I was able to configure that manually. 

Suggestion: Put an entry in Configuration to specify a server and store this information. 

Suggestion: User Interface of client is only available in English, I would be happy to translate if you provide me with
a resource file.

In the next step, I created another docker with easyepg-lite and wanted to set all channels to this EPG instead of the
one from DVB-C. I used auto map and the table looked fine. Some channels did not map automatically, but I was able
to do that manually. Names where a bit different. Some channel icons where wrong. This was due to the fact that several
Graph files where present in the /config/media/channels folder and NextTVR was not selecting the one from the xml file. 

Problem: It was when I noticed that the mapping was not working correctly. Even if auto mapping table looked good,
the entries where not stored. I had to manually call the auto mapped entries and selected the xml file and the entry. 
Maybe this was due to the fact I had first only copied the xml file into /config, afterwards bind-mounting /config/epg
and the auto mapping used the first xml file, which I then removed from the configuration, I was not able to verify that.

Then I created some automatic recordings and I really love that I can record the news (Tagesschau) every day at a
certain time slot (20:00) as it will be broadcasted several times a day. This feature is brilliant, not even Sky receivers
are able to do that. 

Coming back to the AppleTV client: it is pretty simple but does what it should do. It works with my Logitech remote. When
using the left / right it will skip -30" / +1' and it works so quick I can quickly jump over something or find the right place. 
While writing, I notice I haven't tried the fwd/fbwd keys. I tried the original remote though and it works pretty much the 
same, including the stop/swipe thing. 

Suggestion: in Kodi, you can select from a kind of list with selections in front what left/right will skip, e.g. for right:
o +5" o +15" o +30" o +1min o +10 min o +30 min  and you select one or more. It would then use the first selected 
for one quick press, the second selected for two quick presses etc. 

Suggestion: in any case (when you change something here) please don't forget the people that don't use the original
remote that uses swipe gestures. 

All in all it took a day or two to set up everything, but it looks amazing and it does what I want for the the very first time. 
And it does it in a way that I put in into production. Okay, only one user but she is a very critical one in there of UI/UX :-).

Thanks for this great pieces of software! We especially love that it's from New Zealand, as we are already very exited to come 
to Aoteaora end of this year and having a good time travelling north and South Island. 

Greats,
Carsten.

[mvallevand]

1. 1. Transcoding is only enabled for web playback that requires optimization. Perhaps you are seeing thumbnail generation which sub decided should be enabled by default, but it can be turned off.

2. The scan files are sourced from Linux and changes should be send to various sites, I can give you the links if you want.

3. Deleting channels doesn't need a rescan, if you are ensure add. Channels can be disabled without rescanning, but unfortunately the API is not great and needs to be improved to hide these channels from clients.

4. For the scan not getting the correct frequency that appears to be a Linux issue as noted here https://forums.nextpvr.com/showthread.ph...#pid565026 and you should continue there as it wasn't completed. I still would like to see a LibreElec scan with the current version.

5. Maybe offer suggestions for Apple clients in the Apple sub forum

6. Skipping in the Apple client will be much easier if sub implements thumbnails (which is why they are on by default). You have to decide if you want to use a more powerful server to get this.

7. There was a complaint about the German translation for the web server so maybe have a look here https://forums.nextpvr.com/showthread.ph...#pid583813 if you want to help.

[sub]

First up, thanks for the feedback. We never get enough feedback from users.

I should mention that I am not able to use the we client, as the system is too slow to transcode anything. I played around
with KODI on my Mac and it sends direct stream video, but Audio is still transcoded for unknown reasons.

Suggestion: Allow transcoding to be switched off transparently (current options are not so clear) for video and audio,
either in general (quick solution) or for different clients (I know that's a lot of work. Seen that in jellyfish).

It's definitely not transcoding the audio. It's just sending a raw unmodified copy of the stream from the tuner to your kodi client.

First issue was I did not find my provider in the list for scanning, but it found all channels also by using de-Berlin. If you
feel more comfortable, you find attached a de-WillyTel with the major frequencies in it (please note that one will be
sufficient, as they somehow send the other frequencies to scan on each bouquet).

Suggestion: Include provided de-WillyTel in /usr/share/dvb/dvb-c

These files are not included with NextPVR. They're deployed with your operating system, or from it's update repositories. (usually in dtv-scan-tables or dvb-apps or dvb-tools package).

Problem: When switching web user interface to German, the entries on the screen (Safari and Chrome) show up with squared
brackets around, e.g. Channels menu entry shows like [Kanäle]. No change when reloading or deleting caches. Really every
German entry is in square brackets.

This was only a sample file for anyone intending to create a translation file - I didn't actually intend for it to be used as-is. It was a work in progress not completed. You can edit the file to remove the square brackets, and add any missing translations.

Problem: when correcting the problems, I accidentally forgot one [ in front of a channel entry. The system was not
telling me that and the logs a a bit crowded, this is hard to find. As a result I wondered why reading the EPG will be
finished in 1 second with 0 entries read. Hard to track down such a problem. Even if maybe chosen by design, sometimes
a modal would be helpful if there is such a problem. On the other hand the basic idea might be: it works, why to bother
someone :-).

Unfortunately NextPVR doesn't actually read these files itself, so doesn't really have an opportunity to tell you that. These files are created/read by libdvbv5 that comes with Linux.

Suggestion: User Interface of client is only available in English, I would be happy to translate if you provide me with
a resource file.

This is a very small project. One developer working on NextPVR in his spare time, and a small handful of awesome people helping out with testing/support and creation of some supporting utilities to make life easier.

I'd gratefully accept any translation files, but I have no resource files I can supply you. Because of the way the application evolved, translation was an after-thought so it doesn't use resource files for this stuff. We've supplied a couple of example translation files, that should cover the majority of the text in the application. Any remaining text should be translatable in the same way.