UK OTA EPG New Programmes

[ShadowMask]

Hi,
I'm using UK OTA EPG with nextpvr but have an issue identifying New programmes in the EPG, this results in a lot of scheduled recordings that I need to prune every day.

I've noticed that nextpvr marks everything as New, and have searched this forum and noted that the reason for this is that nextpvr will do that if it cant get the programmes new status from the guide data. That all makes sense, however I have used the same setup with tvheadend for many years and that did seem to figure out which programmes were new:

With tvheadend on LE using kodi, the EPG would show "New: " appended to the front of programmes that were actually new, is it worth investigating how they are doing this? 

I know I could pay to have better quality EPG, but it's bugging me that tvheadend could somehow get the new status of programmes via the UK OTA EPG?

Thanks

[mvallevand]

Ota is typically not great at uniquely identifying new shows only. There is an settings option to only show the new flag when sub is able to parse the new text from the ota data but you can expect that not all new shows will be correctly identified for recording rules.

If this is critical Schedules Direct guide source would be much better

[ShadowMask]

Ota is typically not great at uniquely identifying new shows only.  There is an settings option to only show the new flag when sub is able to parse the new text from the ota data but you can expect that not all new shows will be correctly identified for recording rules.

If this is critical Schedules Direct guide source would be much better

Yes, I understand that, but I've never used any guide data other than OTA for any PVR system I've tested, so how did tvh identify new programmes correctly given the same OTA data?

I get that the data itself may not contain an obvious "New" or "premiered" type flag, but they definately figured out a way of doing it, at least with UK Freeview OTA guide data?

Just curious as to how nextpvr parses the data and what they could have been doing differently?

Thanks

[mvallevand]

Did you try the setting change to not mark all shows new to see if that approximates TVHeadend?

[sub]

I've noticed that nextpvr marks everything as New, and have searched this forum and noted that the reason for this is that nextpvr will do that if it cant get the programmes new status from the guide data.

If NextPVR doesn't know if a show is new or a rerun, it assumes it's new. This is safer, because it'll default to recording a show if it doesn't know (in the case we're you've told it to record only new shows).

Unfortunately the DVB EPG specification doesn't include a way to identify if a show is new or rerun. Some broadcasters do stuff like sticking "New:" at the beginning of show names etc. It's often used very inconsistently though, with some channels doing, and some not (or worse, some channels doing it for some shows). It's generally not something we've been able to rely on.

In the next release, there has been quite a few changes to the guide data processing. I've included two new setting in config.xml which you could try changing. <DVBRemoveNew> and <DVBAssumeNew>, both of which default to true. If you set them to false, it'll default to assuming everything is a rerun, and rely on the 'New:' prefix (which is stripped) to determine if something should be marked new. If you're lucky, maybe it's something you can rely on with the UK broadcasters (or at least for all the main channels you care about).

'New: ' is one of about half a dozen prefixes removed from show names as part of tidying up the guide data. (since it interferes with recurring recordings, and grouping them together in the same folder etc)

[ShadowMask]

In the next release, there has been quite a few changes to the guide data processing. I've included two new setting in config.xml which you could try changing. <DVBRemoveNew> and <DVBAssumeNew>, both of which default to true. If you set them to false, it'll default to assuming everything is a rerun, and rely on the 'New:' prefix (which is stripped) to determine if something should be marked new. If you're lucky, maybe it's something you can rely on with the UK broadcasters (or at least for all the main channels you care about).

'New: ' is one of about half a dozen prefixes removed from show names as part of tidying up the guide data. (since it interferes with recurring recordings, and grouping them together in the same folder etc)

Ah thanks sub, that explains it, tvh isn't doing anything clever then but just shows the listings with the New: not stripped.

This seems quite accurate for UK data. I think only the bbc channels don't display this.

So, when <DVBRemoveNew> and <DVBAssumeNew> are implimented, I should be able to keep the New: prefix in the listings and when I schedule to record that programme it will only record it if it has the New: prefix. This worked quite well for me previously and will at the very least give the same experiene as tvheadend did.

Thanks for the help/info

[sub]

If you set <DVBRemoveNew> to false, it'll leave "New:" as part of the show title. That way if you scheduled it to record all "New: Love Island" episode, it's only going to match shows that have a title that include "New: Love Island" in the title, in effect giving you only the new episode (since these are the only ones with that exact name). The downside is that it'll end up in a folder called "New Love Island" or something like that.

[ShadowMask]

If you set <DVBRemoveNew> to false, it'll leave "New:" as part of the show title. That way if you scheduled it to record all "New: Love Island" episode, it's only going to match shows that have a title that include "New: Love Island" in the title, in effect giving you only the new episode (since these are the only ones with that exact name). The downside is that it'll end up in a folder called "New Love Island" or something like that.

That's great, and that's exactly how tvheadend worked.

I think it's worth having options like these as they may not be applicable for all configs, but for some, where they are relevant, they are a life saver! We record so many things like medical programmes that are repeated so many times throughout the week that this will malke a huge difference.

Thank you

[sub]

I think it's worth having options like these as they may not be applicable for all configs, but for some, where they are relevant, they are a life saver! We record so many things like medical programmes that are repeated so many times throughout the week that this will make a huge difference.

Most new shows air at a specific time, and using the "Record Season (Weekly, this timeslot)" will cause it to only grab the new ones.

[gEd]

While my perception is that the UK OTA EPG is better than that offered in many countries, I still believe that the EPG from Schedules Direct is just "better" and worth the relatively modest annual outlay.

"The cost of membership is currently US$35/year, with a 7 day free trial. A 2 month membership is also available for US$9 for those who do not wish to commit to an entire year."