Programs disappearing from pending list

[StephenW]

It'll tell the PC to wake up for the EPG, so if you have it in standby/hibernate, then you should be able to do it any time you want.

Unfortunately, standby or hibernate are not good options. The recordings go to an external eSata terabyte drive, which has to be switched on and off manually as Vista does not do that (Ubuntu 8.04 on the same notebook does). The drive makes enough noise to be annoying when it is spinning, and it must be consuming a noticeable amount of electricity too as it keeps itself warm.

So I need to be able to do EPG updates when the notebook is on.

[sub]

Ok, but I still recommend you find a way to update the epg when recordings are unlikely to be happening.

[StephenW]

Ok, here is another set of logs. Tonight, I was recording City Homicide (TV One, 20:30) and after the EPG update there were two listings for it, the upper one of which did the disappearing trick. And Private Practice (TV 2, 20:30) completely disappeared. All the others that I had pending for tonight are fine (Piha Rescue had recorded, The Force was recording during the EPG update, Forensic Investigators, Women's Murder Club and Zero Hour remained correctly in the pending list).

[StephenW]

I have just realised that on Saturday when "New Tricks" disappeared from the pending list, the EPG update happened at 20:00 and there were no recordings running at the time. The first pending recording was at 21:50, well after the EPG update. So, while doing an EPG update while a recording is running may be dangerous, it has nothing to do with this particular problem.

[tm12]

Are the EPG's for both tuners identical? It seems like "City Homicide" is scheduled to record on both tuners.

Code:

2008-09-08 20:07:32.720    VERBOSE    [11]    Found potential match at 8/09/2008 8:30:00 p.m.  ()
2008-09-08 20:07:32.720    VERBOSE    [11]     - scheduling this episode
2008-09-08 20:07:32.720    VERBOSE    [11]    Looking for capture source to record: City Homicide
2008-09-08 20:07:32.720    VERBOSE    [11]    Possible capture device: DEVICE:Hauppauge HVR-900:1
2008-09-08 20:07:32.720    VERBOSE    [11]    Possible capture device: DEVICE:AVerMedia Volar DVB-T:1
2008-09-08 20:07:32.720    VERBOSE    [11]    Checking 'HVR-900 (PN)' (DEVICE:Hauppauge HVR-900:1)
2008-09-08 20:07:32.721    VERBOSE    [11]    Checking 'Avermedia Volar (PN)' (DEVICE:AVerMedia Volar DVB-T:1)
2008-09-08 20:07:32.722    VERBOSE    [11]    RecordingFactory.save()
2008-09-08 20:07:32.732    VERBOSE    [11]    Save(): Inserted new scheduled recording
2008-09-08 20:07:32.737    VERBOSE    [11]    Requesting recording service schedule reload
2008-09-08 20:07:32.737    VERBOSE    [11]    Found potential match at 8/09/2008 8:30:00 p.m.  ()
2008-09-08 20:07:32.737    VERBOSE    [11]     - scheduling this episode
2008-09-08 20:07:32.737    VERBOSE    [11]    Looking for capture source to record: City Homicide
2008-09-08 20:07:32.738    VERBOSE    [11]    Possible capture device: DEVICE:Hauppauge HVR-900:1
2008-09-08 20:07:32.738    VERBOSE    [11]    Possible capture device: DEVICE:AVerMedia Volar DVB-T:1
2008-09-08 20:07:32.739    VERBOSE    [11]    Checking 'HVR-900 (PN)' (DEVICE:Hauppauge HVR-900:1)
2008-09-08 20:07:32.739    VERBOSE    [11]    RecordingFactory.loadScheduleRecordingByOID()
2008-09-08 20:07:32.741    VERBOSE    [11]    Checking 'Avermedia Volar (PN)' (DEVICE:AVerMedia Volar DVB-T:1)
2008-09-08 20:07:32.742    VERBOSE    [11]    RecordingFactory.save()
2008-09-08 20:07:32.750    VERBOSE    [11]    Save(): Inserted new scheduled recording
2008-09-08 20:07:32.754    VERBOSE    [11]    Requesting recording service schedule reload

[StephenW]

Thanks for that. I did not know how to interpret those log entries. So when I get duplicate entries in the pending list, it looks like the program is being scheduled on both tuners at the same time. That is what saw with "City Homicide", so I canceled the first entry for it in the pending list and it recorded OK. But "Private Practice" completely disappeared from Monday's schedule and I had to add it again from the guide.

There is only one EPG, and both tuners are set up with identical channel lists using the same EPG data.

[StephenW]

I think I may have an idea as to what is causing the problem. Tonight, my firewall/server PC was down getting a new hard drive added to it, and it was down at 20:00 when the EPG update is done. So the EPG update failed to download anything as it could not access the Internet. The result was that the UpdateEPG.bat file I am using deleted the listings.xml file but failed to create a new one. So there was no EPG file! All sorts of things went wrong with GBPVR after that, but I think only after I used the guide to tell it to record the TV One late news.

So GBPVR really does not like not having its EPG file missing. Then when I had a look at the UpdateEPG.bat file, I could see that even when it downloads a new EPG file, it deletes the old one, unzips the new one, and then renames the new one to the correct listings.xml name. That always leaves a short period when there is no listings.xml file. So I have made some changes to UpdateEPG.bat so that, firstly if it is unable to download a new EPG file, it does not touch the old one, and secondly so that when it does download a new EPG file, it moves it on top of the the old one so that there is never any time that there is not a listings.xml file.

So I will see if these changes help with my problem tomorrow.


Sub:

The Wiki is a little short on details for how UpdateEPG.bat should work, so I have some questions:

1) Does GBPVR wait for the UpdateEPG.bat file to complete before it looks for an updated listings.xml file?

2) Does GBPVR check for a return code from UpdateEPG.bat?

3) What happens if GBPVR looks at listings.xml at the same time as the file is being updated?

[tm12]

I don't think it found Private Practice for 8/09, it is scheduled for 15/09.

If you check your recurring recordings, do you have two entries in there for these shows?

[StephenW]

I don't think it found Private Practice for 8/09, it is scheduled for 15/09.

If you check your recurring recordings, do you have two entries in there for these shows?

Without a way of sorting the recurring list, it is hard to know for sure that there are no duplicates. But I just checked carefully and I am sure that Private Practice does not have a duplicate. If I remember correctly, after the problem happened that day, I did have to delete a duplicate pending entry for Private Practice next week.

When the problem happens, it is common for the affected programs to disappear from that day's recordings, and appear as duplicate recordings for next week. So one of the things I am now suspecting is that if there is not any EPG data for the program next week at the same time as it is on this week, then the problem might not happen. If so, that might explain why TV One and TV 2 are affected and TV3 is not, if TV3's EPG data does not normally extend beyond 7 days. I can not confirm that theory at present, since the current listings.xml only has data for all of TV One, TV 2 and TV3 up until midnight on the 16th, only 6 days in advance.