ComskipHelper utility

[Pioneer4x4]

If you decide to use this, please let me know how it works. Also, read the ReadMe.txt file and comment on any other enhancements you would like. Cheers,
ZaDDaZ

I tried it out. I just put it in the post processing, I put it after rename, since it seems to look for everything right? I got good logs, and I deleted and faked comskip files. It seems to work great!

In the readme
Enhancements:
- Allow exclusion of programs on a per channel basis
- Allow exclusion of programs on a program name basis
- Allow multiple instances of comskip.exe to run based on
number of CPU's and assign instances to single CPU's
- Allow specification of priority of comskip.exe processes

Are these 'future' enhancements? or are they active now?
Mainly interested in the first one.

Thanks again!

[ZaDDaZ]

These are all future enhancements. I've started working on them, but am not complete.

I'm also going to add a setting to run ComSkip on in progress recordings. I'll do this in a separate thread, keeping ComSkip running on all in-progress recordings.

I think I'm also going to add a setting for the program to stay resident for a specific amount of time after running, monitoring for newly started recordings.

[Pioneer4x4]

Great! Some of what you are planning might be overkill. It seems to work so well, it shouldn't need to catch up much.

BTW how does it know what to scan? Does it only scan what is in GBPVR's database? I have some other shows I record off of On-Demand, that I use wintv2000 for. I might start using GBPVR to manually do it instead, just so it will show up in recordings, but either way, I don't need comskip on them...

[ydekmekji]

how can you automate comskip when the program first starts recording? I'd like to do that... but i have no idea how to do that? I just know how to put comskip in post-processing file!

[reboot]

Tried running comskiphelper commandline. It only did ONE file, then the log said, "It seems comskip has quit working".
Sure wish xvert did something.
Going to try downloading comskip again...sigh...

[ZaDDaZ]

ComSkiphelper didn't run, I've gone back to comskip.exe %1 and that ran okay.

If its not working, could you send the specific error? I have seen ComSkip lock up on occasion, so I put a one minute check to make sure ComSkip keeps using some CPU time. If I detect that ComSkip hasn't used any CPU time in a one minute period, I assume it has locked up and kill it. I will make this a setting as well.

how can you automate comskip when the program first starts recording? I'd like to do that... but i have no idea how to do that? I just know how to put comskip in post-processing file!

I think the best way to get this running ComSkip on in-progress recordings, the application needs to always be running, so I'm going to make it a service.

BTW how does it know what to scan? Does it only scan what is in GBPVR's database? I have some other shows I record off of On-Demand, that I use wintv2000 for. I might start using GBPVR to manually do it instead, just so it will show up in recordings, but either way, I don't need comskip on them...

It currently only scans files in your GBPVR.mdb database that have a status indicating that recording is complete. I guess I can add an option to have it scan folders as well.

[reboot]

I would really like it to scan all files in my recordings folder.
For some reason, I have recordings that don't show up in the database (I could add them manually I suppose).
I don't think I want it running as a service, but it would be nice if it started when a recording started, then when finished, quit.

[ZaDDaZ]

Unfortunately, there is currently no way to catch an event when a recording starts from GBPVR, so a service is the only way to do this. Also, if multiple capture cards are capturing at the same time, mutiple instances of ComSkip need to be started. I could make the executable stay "resident" for a specific amount of time, but when the time ran out, nothing would be able to start it when a recording starts. So I think a service is best.

[stefan]

I haven't used DirMon, but maybe you can get it to watch folders recursively? And in such case get it to start comskip on any *.mpg that show up?

[Pioneer4x4]

It currently only scans files in your GBPVR.mdb database that have a status indicating that recording is complete. I guess I can add an option to have it scan folders as well.

It seems that others would benefit from that, but I don't think I would need/want it. I didn't think about the multiple recorders part. I have manually ran 4 comskips at once, I manually set each one to a different priority via task manager, so the finished one at a time.