Using PostPocessing to move recordings

[ballfam]

OK, this was much easier than I thought, I was just getting in my own head with shell scripting, it all came back to me quickly. I knocked this up in about an hour this evening.

Of course, as always, the real version is more complicated than I made out. Only some channels need recoding, so I created an alternate recording location in ToRecode to place files that need to be recoded. In the script, I only rename files that are in ToRecode.

Martrin, what was the point in the dotnet command in your script, do I need to include that to make NextPVR do something?

Code:

#!/bin/bash
infile=$1
# only move files in the recode location
if [[ "$1" == *"ToRecode"* ]]; then
  # use string matching to replace ToRecode with Recode in the path
  plex_file="${infile/ToRecode/Recode}"
  # create target dir in case it does not yet exist
  target_dir=$(dirname "$plex_file")
  mkdir -p $target_dir
  # move the file to the Plex location
  mv "$1"  "$plex_file"
fi

[ballfam]

ahh, it just occurred to me, the dotnet command probably tells NextPVR where the file went to so it doesn't think the recording is gone. Is that right?

[Graham]

ahh, it just occurred to me, the dotnet command probably tells NextPVR where the file went to so it doesn't think the recording is gone. Is that right?

Yep ... NextPVR stores info about recordings in npvr.db3 ... https://github.com/sub3/NextPVR/wiki/components

nscripthelper.dll updates the database ... https://github.com/sub3/NextPVR/wiki/nscripthelper

[mvallevand]

For linux you will need to create this file to get NScriptHelper to work https://forums.nextpvr.com/showthread.ph...#pid544020

Martin

[ballfam]

OK, thanks, that might explain why it didn't quite work for my recordings last night. Everything was all good and Plex was happy, but there were 2 minor issues:

1. The XML file doesn't get moved. Since I never play the media in NextPVR and Plex seems to have no need for this file, it's not a big deal, but it may also explain point 2. I'm assuming it contains some meta-data about the recording. Is it useful to NextPVR? Should I move it also?
   
2. NextPVR loses track of the file as soon as it is moved, thich means that dotnet command is not working (I added it before recording yesterday) like so:
   

Code:

/opt/dotnet/dotnet /opt/nextpvr/system/NScriptHelper.dll  -rename "$1" "$plex_file"

           In guess the extra step you describe would explain it, but odes it also need the XML?

[mvallevand]

My example on moved .ts you'd need to be more complicated if you create the xml files. Just turn off xml creation or delete it in your script. It is only a backup of metadata The only value I could see for plex is if you could code a .xml to .nfo convert utility, it wouldn't be hard.

You definitely will need that .json file for NScriptHelper

Martin

[ballfam]

Not sure if this  is useful to anyone, but I'll post it just in case.

An additional problem I have is that the EPG being used (Australian broadcasters) does not distinguish between new shows and repeats, and some channels broadcast more than one repeat of diferent episodes of the same show on the same day. NextPVR is fine because it uses the timestamp to distinguish the file, but Plex cannot handle more than one episode of the same show on the same day if it has no original broadcast date (which does not exist in my EPG), and it ends up trying to recde the 2 episodes to the same target, since it only uses date stamp. It is a failing in Plex which they know about, but I have managed to work around it in my PostPocessing script; I just look to see if there is already another file in the target location with the same date (checked up to 5 times), and if there is, I change the date on rename. Not a perfect solution, but it avoids clashes in most cases. Anyway, here's the new version of the code:

Code:

#!/bin/bash
infile=$1
count=1
file_check=1
# only move files in the recode location
if [[ "$1" == *"ToRecode"* ]]; then
  # use string matching to replace ToRecode with Recode in the path
  plex_file="${infile/ToRecode/Recode}"
  # create target dir in case it does not yet exist
  target_dir=$(dirname "$plex_file")
  mkdir -p "$target_dir"
  # check if dated file already exists
  # check up to 5 times
  while [[ $count < 5 && $file_check == 1 ]]; do
    file_check=0
    copy_date=$(echo $(basename "$plex_file") | awk -F '[_.]' '{print $2}')
    while read -r file; do
      file_date=$(echo $(basename "$file") | awk -F '[_.]' '{print $2}')
      if [[ "$file_date" == "$copy_date" ]]; then
        new_date=$(echo $copy_date | awk -F '[-.]' '{print $3}')
        new_date=$(($new_date + 1))
        next_date=$(echo $copy_date | awk -v nd=$new_date -F '[-.]' '{print $1"-"$2"-"nd}')
        new_file=$(echo $(basename "$plex_file") | awk -v nd=$next_date -F '[_.]' '{print $1"_"nd"_"$3}')
        new_loc=$(dirname "$plex_file")"/"$new_file".ts"
        plex_file=$new_loc
        file_check=1
      fi
    done <<< "`find "$target_dir" -name *.ts`"
    count=$((count + 1))
  done
  # move the file to the Plex location
  mv "$1"  "$plex_file"
  # tell NextPVR where it went
  /opt/dotnet/dotnet /opt/nextpvr/system/NScriptHelper.dll  -rename "$1" "$plex_file"
fi

I'm also going to add a line to remove the XML file for now since I don't need it, but it may be handy to have at some point.

[ballfam]

One caveat that is worth mentioning. After adding the JSON file, the NextPVR rename was still not working. Not a big deal because I'm not using NextPVR to watch the recording; but then yesterday, I needed to restart the server after installing more memory, and I noticed that it started working.

The conclusion is that after adding the JSON file, NextPVR doesn't seem to pick it up until it is restarted. If anyone comes across this, remember to restart NextPVR after creating the JSON script.

[mvallevand]

That is very unlikely as it is loaded dynamically by the dotnet command and this script has nothing to do with NextPVR. It will be something else.

Martin

[ballfam]

Yes, that makes complete sense. Not sure what caused it but, but it just magically started working after a reboot, nothing else changed. Oh well, happy it worked, and I finally have a "set it and forget it" recording system, where stuff just magically shows up on my Plex clients after it has been recorded. NextPVR seems to be rock solid. Good job Sub.