xrecord problem

[djtaylor]

I like the ability of xrecord to find a programme by partial title etc but I'd like to know two things:-

When does it do the EPG search to look for programmes to record as i've waited several hours and nothing has been picked up yet even though they are in the EPG.

Second thing, how does it determine which capture_oid to use? This is important as I have capture oids of 4,6,7 and for some reason, all the recordings that it seems to be scheduling are set for capture source 1 which doesn't exist, results in a failed recording.

I had gone through the recording schedule table in the gbpvr.mdb database to ensure that all season recordings weren't set to use source 1 but they have re-appeared.

I have since deleted and re-set up my recordbypartialtitle recordings but like I said, nothing has appeared for hours.

David.

[Ton]

Hello David,

The recordings get scheduled when "PriorityRecordings.Exe" gets called. That usually happens from "PostUpdateEPG" (that would be around 3 AM default).

You can run it by hand if you want to speed things up.... Just go (from a cmd-prompt) to the gbpvr directory and run: "PriorityRecordings.Exe".

As for the scheduling of the tuners, I think (by default) it starts with the lowest defined capturesource in your system.

You can, if you want, define a capture-source per program (this will force the capture-source for all resulting recordings). If you spread the capture-sources around a little bit, it shouldn't result in too many conflicts...

Is there a reason you're not using capture-source 1?

[djtaylor]

Is there a reason you're not using capture-source 1?

When you create a capture source in GBPVR, it uses an access table as you probably know. The index is an autonumber field, the first being 1.

In order to re-order my capture devices and as part of adding a tuner, getting it wrong and then right, I removed and re-added tuners such that the numbers are now 4,6 and 7.

Point is that it shouldn't matter what the capture source number is within gbpvr, if xrecord is starting at number 1 then that logic is wrong, it needs to read them from the actual capture sources table if it isn't already doing that.

I can now confirm that xrecord has gone and found a whole number of shows that I set as a test last night and set them all to use capture source 1 which will now fail on every one.

Pity because I like the record by partial title but xrecord is so flawed in this respect that I can't use it and it stands to cause a loss of recordings for others it seems if they also remove and re-add a tuner.

David.

[KingArgyle]

If you don't care which capture source a recording gets scheduled on you can delete the CaptureSource element from each of the recording entries. This will tell the scheduler to grab any available capture source that the program appears, if the first one is used, it should go to the next available capture source that has the program.

Another method is to set the Configuration option in PriorityRecordings.xml so that that it has a DefaultForce, and a value of No.

Code:

    <Configuration>
        <MissingRecordingPriority>0</MissingRecordingPriority>
        <Conflicts>Delete</Conflicts>
        <DefaultForce>No</DefaultForce>
        <DuplicatesAllowed>Yes</DuplicatesAllowed>
    </Configuration>

The last option is to set a prefered capture source but also allow it to find another capture source if the current one is in use.

Code:

        <CaptureSource force="no">1</CaptureSource>

XRecord should also have an option to allow you to run the Scheduler from within it (i.e. make your changes, and then schedule the programs). The best way to debug though, is to make your entries, and then run PostUpdateEPG.BAT. Check the recording.log and it should tell you which capture source that it is scheduling the items. You can also post it here, and Ton and I will take a look at it.

XRecord should allow you to control all of this, but it is probably buried in the Power or Advanced scheduling options.

I don't use XRecord myself as my machine is just used for Recording, and I don't use the GBPVR front end. With this said though, I'll make this a high priorty item to get fixed, as XRecord should be setting each of those entries to force="no", which should be telling the scheduler to use whatever source it finds it on.

An add on to the Web Admin is in works as well, to allow scheduling and maintenace through the Web Admin, but it is in the very early stages of development.

[djtaylor]

Thanks for that, I can see where that's ending up in the xml file now. Rather than post the lot, here's a snippet:-

Code:

<Configuration>
    <MissingRecordingPriority>0</MissingRecordingPriority>
    <Conflicts>Delete</Conflicts>
    <DuplicatesAllowed>Yes</DuplicatesAllowed>
    <DefaultForce>no</DefaultForce>
  </Configuration>
  <Recording priority="1">
    <Search>
      <Title>
        <TextSearch>holly</TextSearch>
      </Title>
    </Search>
    <Quality>Medium</Quality>
    <CaptureSource force="no">1</CaptureSource>

As I said, for someone not expecting it, the problem is that it's defaulting to assigning capture source 1 in the gbpvr.mdb when in fact there is no capture source 1. It really needs to check to find out which capture sources actually exist and use those instead. The problem is that capture source 1 isn't just unavailable, it doesn't exist! It doesn't seem to know that it doesn't exist and passes it to gbpr which then fails to connect to that source.

I understand that all these bits are written by enthusiasts and i'm not asked for money, it has been frustrating to see failed recordings but i'm just posting this information as I appreciate that many people will have capture source 1 and upwards but obviously the other conditions need to be catered for.

I'm away from home for a few days so will fix it later when I get back but until then i've turned it off.

Cheers
David.

[KingArgyle]

There is code in place in the Scheduler to handle the situation you describe. If you can post your entire PriorityRecordings.xml and the recordings.log file as well, that will help track the problem down. If you don't want to post them to the list you can send them to me directly at d_a_carver@yahoo.com.

I'll take a look at the code that writes the information to the Recording table in the database, and make sure that their isn't a hard coded value in there somewhere.

Update: I did a little checking, and it looks the force Capature source code was only partially implemented. The flags are set but the code that determines which capture source to use is not implemented. It should work if you change the capture source from 1 to 0, then it will automatically look for an available capture source. I'll see if I can get this code corrected and post an update to this thread for testing.

[djtaylor]

Thanks that'd be great. I do like the fuzzy searching.

It'll be a couple of days before I send the logs but i'm also happy to test this out first before you make it public if you want.

David.

[KingArgyle]

I think I have a fix, but as I don't have more than one capture source I haven't tested this. What it does is check to see if the force capture source flag. If it is set to No, it will then set the captureSource to 0 and then check which capture source to use. A 0 indicates that no captureSource has been set, and it will try to find a capture source that has the program and is available. It then should schedule this correctly in the database.

Now this could just as easily crash, so backup your RecordingUtils.dll file, before applying the version included in this Zip. If you have problems, please post the recordings.log file, as well as the priorityrecordings.xml as that will let me know which capture source it is trying to schedule. In your case it should show either capture source as being 4, 5, or 6 depending on which one was available.

[djtaylor]

Ta. I'll give it a go in a couple of days time when I get back.

David.

[djtaylor]

I think I have a fix, but as I don't have more than one capture source I haven't tested this. What it does is check to see if the force capture source flag. If it is set to No, it will then set the captureSource to 0 and then check which capture source to use.

Hi, i've had a chance to do some testing with this now.

It works as directed but i've found another problem with Xrecord on this subject

Remember, I have 3 capture sources numbered, 4, 6 and 7. If I go into a power choice, I can choose from capture sources 1, 2 or 3. I wondered if these were just friendly user interface mappings to the 3 capture sources but it turns out they're not.

If I manually choose capture source number 3 then sure enough, it sets the database to capture on number 3 which will fail. From this, it seems like xrecord is still just looking at how many capture sources exist and totally ignoring their indexes in the capture source table.

This isn't a big problem for me because I don't have a need to force a capture source since all 3 of mine can capture the same stuff but people could still lose recordings even though they think they've set it correctly.

Cheers
David.