TV Wishes

[johnsonx42]

Currently, when NextPVR requests LiveTV, NRecord sets up the livetv recording and hands NextPVR a LiveTV Lease. NextPVR uses that info to connect to the recording and sets up a playback graph. Every 10 seconds it requests a Lease renewal, and NRecord grants it. Finally when LiveTV is stopped, the Lease expires and NRecord shuts down the livetv recording.

To me it would seem fairly simple to do two things:
1) add a little logic to NRecord that says once a LiveTV lease expires or is canceled, just keep recording it for 30 minutes (or some other appropriate length of time - maybe the length of the livetv buffer?)
2) add a little logic to NextPVR to use any existing livetv lease when the user selects LiveTV; then it resumes renewing the lease and viewing proceeds as normal.

sub, I think I have a genuinely good idea right there that would enhance NextPVR and give it a useful 'wow' feature that other software lacks - the ability to exit LiveTV and then go back to the show you were watching without losing your buffer. beyond the basic idea it'd be more complex, but if you could also make it work cross-client and add resume-location support, a user could pause livetv in the living room and then go resume at the same spot in the bedroom - that'd be a WOW feature currently only available on some high-end cable company DVR's.

I'd really like to hear what you think about it.

[sub]

sub, I think I have a genuinely good idea right there that would enhance NextPVR and give it a useful 'wow' feature that other software lacks - the ability to exit LiveTV and then go back to the show you were watching without losing your buffer. beyond the basic idea it'd be more complex, but if you could also make it work cross-client and add resume-location support, a user could pause livetv in the living room and then go resume at the same spot in the bedroom - that'd be a WOW feature currently only available on some high-end cable company DVR's.

I'd really like to hear what you think about it.

I must admit I'm not as enthusiastic, but I'll have a think about it - so thats a 'maybe'. I think the general idea is ok, but it is more complicated than it seems, particularly if you factor in cross-clients. I'm not sure I could justify the time required, at the expense of time spent on other features.

[martint123]

..... but if you could also make it work cross-client and add resume-location support, a user could pause livetv in the living room and then go resume at the same spot in the bedroom - that'd be a WOW feature currently only available on some high-end cable company DVR's.

But think of the nightmare scenario of multiple clients pausing live TV and keeping track of them all ??

[johnsonx42]

I must admit I'm not as enthusiastic, but I'll have a think about it - so thats a 'maybe'. I think the general idea is ok, but it is more complicated than it seems, particularly if you factor in cross-clients. I'm not sure I could justify the time required, at the expense of time spent on other features.

Yes, I know trying to make it work cross-client would be a lot more complex. Even if it worked only on the same client (counting the server instance of NextPVR as being a client), it would add a lot in my opinion (heck, even if it worked only on the server). Each NextPVR.exe should know which LiveTV lease it was last using, so having it work per-client shouldn't require too much logic beyond what you already have for tracking multiple client live tv streams (always easy for me to say since I'm not the one who has to implement it).

Nice to know you'll be giving it some thought anyhow.

[mvallevand]

I use LiveTV much more than I use recordings and I think this is a genuinely bad idea destined to cause confusion. I expect the use case for such a feature are minimum. I get 300+ channels and when I choose to stop live tv the expectation is not normally that I want to watch the same show or even the same channel the next time I go to live tv. If you want to watch the show you are watching hit record everything else smells like a hack because NPVR doesn't (live most DVR's) give you the ability to save the playback.

Martin

[mvallevand]

nevermind...

I do get the idea of keeping recording going when you exit LiveTV, and I'm sorry if I think it has very low value, the optional prompt makes some sense even if I wouldn't use it.

Martin

[johnsonx42]

sorry if you saw my original comment. just in a bad mood for other reasons. that's why I deleted it.

[mvallevand]

Yes I read it. Sorry about my tone in this thread. After twenty months I am still trying to figure out how the current LiveTV implementation is in any way better then in GB-PVR for those of us we were not watching in preview mode. I get stuck with unexpected long pauses too, and nothing frustrates me more than having to choose either to watch the rest of my show or discard it with no time shifting possibility. I think the thought of it continuing recording after I discard just puts salt on the wound.

Martin

[imilne]

Another problem with it is if it kept recording then it would stop the PC going into standby. I have a short timeout (5 minutes), on the assumption if you've stopped watching TV and aren't doing anything else then it's time for the PC to go nighty-night.

No one got any thoughts on suggestion number 2 then?

Iain

[sub]

No one got any thoughts on suggestion number 2 then?

Yes, I did like this suggestion, and will probably add it for the next release.