Blank EPG

[sheppy99]

This problem has started happening again, can anyone help me troubleshoot? XML file is created by the latest version of RT GUI and a quick look suggests it contains data but GBPVR only shows one channel and right clicking reload doesn't help. Looking in the config utility everything seems right and nothing should have changed, clicking reload epg makes it look like all is OK but the results are the same, only 1 channel is shown in the EPG.

[martint123]

If you want to make the xml file available, I'll try loading it on my test machine and see what I get.

[sheppy99]

Thanks - have PM'd you a link to it.
I have a spare bit of time so have loaded NPVR which seems very unhappy with the XML file so maybe that's the problem, please let me know what you think.

[martint123]

OK - well it looks like a problem for sub or Alan Birtles depending on what special characters are permitted in XML EPG data.

This is in the NPVR log

Code:

2011-01-19 14:56:36.810    [ERROR][10]    Error reading xmltv file: An error occurred while parsing EntityName. Line 1205, position 371.

And line 1205 of the data.xml file has

Code:

<desc lang="en">How this light but moving drama continues to deliver entertainment with punch is little short of miraculous. After more than 140 episodes it&apos;s as good as ever. This week, when everyone hears the story of two African brothers who have been left at the Dumping Ground, they decide to hide them in the attic in case anyone comes to send them home£&133;.</desc>

(position 371 is at the end of the line with the escaped characters.).

You could possibly edit this out of the XML file and try re-importing it to see if it works ok.


Update: Well the epg viewer doesn't barf when that escaped set is removed. So I guess the import will work fine now.

Now - where does the responsibility lie......

Radio Times for including an illegal character (if it is such)
Alan Birtle for not filtering it out
or sub for not filtering it out.

With the external viewer chocking, I'd say one of the first two.

[steeb]

Looks like AB has this sorted?

http://www.birtles.org.uk/phpbb3/viewtop...?f=5&t=393

steeb

[sub]

Now - where does the responsibility lie......

Radio Times for including an illegal character (if it is such)
Alan Birtle for not filtering it out
or sub for not filtering it out.

Its definitely Radio Timesresponsibility . NPVR will only accept a valid XMLTV file. This is an invalid XMLTV file, with characters not being escaped correctly.

[Pob]

£&133;

Update: Well the epg viewer doesn't barf when that escaped set is removed. So I guess the import will work fine now.

Thank you - editing the data.xml in notepad and deleting the one instance of the above characters got my guide back to normal. I have had guide data for only a few channels for the last couple of days, and I was stumped as to why because XMLTV.gui appeared to be working fine - no errors, data for 85 channels downloaded etc. Even reading the recent posts in this thread I did not think they applied to my problems. Very suprised more people have not posted about guide problems because of this - quite a few use RT data? Annoying thing is that I thought I was saving backups of my data.xml files via the update batch file, but when I needed a backup I found the most recent one was from August 2010! Turns out I had a typo in update.bat, but it now seems OK with;

Code:

@echo off
G:
CD\
if exist data.03 del data.03
if exist data.02 ren data.02 data.03
if exist data.01 ren data.01 data.02
if exist data.xml ren data.xml data.01
"C:\Program Files (x86)\XMLTV GUI\XmltvGUI.exe" /Grab

[martint123]

You shouldn't need the backup thingy any more if using the latest xmltvgui as it doesn't overwrite the xml file if teh RT provides blank data ??

[Pob]

You shouldn't need the backup thingy any more if using the latest xmltvgui as it doesn't overwrite the xml file if teh RT provides blank data ??

True, but in this case xmltvgui was downloading all the data - but GBPVR could not read it. Because until you posted I did not know what the problem was, a backup would have been useful...

[martint123]

True, but in this case xmltvgui was downloading all the data

Ah yes, must engage brain earlier. I'm guessing the updated xmltvgui was only just created to fix it.
And I don't have CBBC in the epg so missed it myself.