EPG Zap2it

[mvallevand]

There are no icons from gracenote.com they come from tmsimg.com

Martin

[mvallevand]

Thank you so much for posting this link.  Perl is a bit beyond my scope.  It's been so long since I set up zap2it that I'd forgotten about mc2xml.  I watch and record from two OTA ZIPs and a couple of IPTV streams.  I now have mc2xml up and running with four EPG xmltv sources.  Thanks again.

I liked using mc2xml in the days when it was supported but for me a question is how much risk are users willing to take in 2025 to get free EPG?   At least editing a perl file you know what you are getting

Here is the direct download link curl to get the mc2xml executable for those that are interested in taking risks.  The added risk is some unknown users dropbox file could change at anytime clearly proven by the Wayback machines reference URL not changing.

Code:

curl https://ucf759ac0a9ea30d0bff70eeb83f.dl.dropboxusercontent.com/cd/0/get/CnsieIY2kPE_40pYXiDfo8e6LQCfFySyKe_TTgkURv2fRuVCQuCZwZjCyuhfxQt9ALWS93D59ETX9qYUfYkiKSobQMwSzcXooYWylJdtE4sLNynUNcKMZQTnavmVH8tqmci8Zfjl2rb_zenbDoq-PUPl/file?dl=1#

The current binary was already sent to virustototal and does indeed call gracenote now but who knows in the future which version you will get.

Martin

[thebigz]

It looks like the DNS changes almost daily, so if you're going to do the hosts file, you have to stay on top of it.

Not related to the change - It usually takes about 2 hours to download/parse/update the EPG. This has been the case ever since I set it up years ago. Is there a setting I have wrong? I'm doing 9 days and have something like 47 channels

[mattman1968]

I also use mc2xml https://web.archive.org/web/202004260039...pace.info/ They updated their file. They removed zap2it and changed it to gracenote.com. I'll stick to SD for now.

It looks like the DNS changes almost daily, so if you're going to do the hosts file, you have to stay on top of it.

Not related to the change - It usually takes about 2 hours to download/parse/update the EPG.  This has been the case ever since I set it up years ago.  Is there a setting I have wrong?  I'm doing 9 days and have something like 47 channels

I also noticed that the DNS changes almost daily, However, as Metroid noted, mc2xml has updated their file and it has been updating flawlessly without any intervention since I started using it a week ago. 

As for your other issue, 2 hours is excessively long. My 38 channels for 14 days updates in about 1 minute. Unfortunately, I have no idea how to help you speed it up.

[gearsofwoe]

It looks like the DNS changes almost daily...
Is there a setting I have wrong?  ...

I'm manually updating the hosts file and running zap2xml every 5 days to download 7 days of the bare minimum of info for about 10 channels. That takes about a minute, and downloads 60 JSON files totaling 900KB. The -S 1 option adds 1 second between request to prevent flooding

zap2xml -u xxx -p xxx -Z xxx -S 1 -E "amp apos quot lt gt" -F

Time to sharpen my Perl programming skills. Anyways, something to compare to.

[thebigz]

That's interesting. I just copied the updateepg.bat on the instructions thread and it has a few more parameters than yours

cd /d C:\Users\Public\NPVR\Scripts
C:\Users\Public\NPVR\Scripts\zap2xml.exe -o C:\Users\Public\NPVR\Scripts\epg.xml -u USERNAME -p PASSWORD -d 1 -S 1 -D -A "new live" -E "amp apos quot lt gt" –F

Yours doesn't have -D -A "new live". I wonder what is going on.

the .bat is running now, so I'll try to remove those parameters later tonight and see if it does anything.

I have zero programming skills, so all this Perl stuff is over my head. To keep being a cheapskate, I'm stuck changing the hosts file every few days. Haha

[mattman1968]

I have zero programming skills, so all this Perl stuff is over my head.  To keep being a cheapskate, I'm stuck changing the hosts file every few days.  Haha

Why not try the mc2xml link previously posted? You won't have to manually update the host file every day and it runs exactly the same as xap2xml with just a few different commands, maybe, that are provided for on the site.

[thebigz]

I have zero programming skills, so all this Perl stuff is over my head.  To keep being a cheapskate, I'm stuck changing the hosts file every few days.  Haha

Why not try the mc2xml link previously posted? You won't have to manually update the host file every day and it runs exactly the same as xap2xml with just a few different commands, maybe, that are provided for on the site.

I didn't understand that it is a direct swap.  I'll give it a look

[mattman1968]

I didn't understand that it is a direct swap.  I'll give it a look

When you download mc2xml, you'll want to put the exe in it's own folder. Then click/open the exe. A box will show up with Gracenote selected. Choose your variables (-a new, etc...), and enter your zip code. After it runs for the first time you can then adjust your bat file. Mine looks like this:

E:\TVGuides\Gracenote
mc2xml -1 -c us -g XXXXX -d 336 -a -A -o GN-Guide.xml

-1 sets Gracenote as provider
-c sets country
-g sets zip code
-d sets how many days in hours to download
-a sets New programs
-A sets Live programs
-o sets the name I want for the xml to output

Don't forget that you'll need to remap/rescan your channels to the new xml that is generated.

Good luck!

[thebigz]

Got it easy and perfect. Thank you so much!!