Comskip 0.78 build 2: Better heuristics

[erik]

After beta testing the new versions seems OK. Download from http://mk.kaashoek.com/gbpvr/comskip78_2.zip

Take notice of the last statement in the change list. You may have to do some retuning, but you also can experience some nice improvements.

Changes in 0.78.02
- Solved a bug where setting a new 'b'eginning of a commercial the written cutpoint was 10 frames earlier
- Solved a bug where after editing the cutpoints all output formats that where in time instead of frames could be wrong.
- Change the format of the TXT file to include the framerate to solve the bug above.
- Solved a bug where the output files where cleared if no 'w' was used when reviewing the .txt file.
Changes in 0.78.01
- Writing a new cutlist writes all selected output files instead of only the txt file
- Substantial changes to heuristics.

[erik]

Tipstir.

I do include the comskip dictionary for those that have a card that can decode CC. As far as I know the PVR150 and the PVR150MCE can not decode CC.
But as I live in Europe I can not test because there is no CC in Europe.
The easiest way for you to test if CC is doing something is to set
verbose=1
or higher in the comskip.ini file and have a look at the log file.
Search for the line that starts with

CC's detected on the following frames

and see whats underneath
There should be a number of lines saying

x - CC start - x end - x type - x
where the x is replaced with some numbers or other text.
If this is not in the log file then comskip did not process any CC data.

[erik]

Tipstir,

In order to determine what is going wrong we first have to establish how you intend to use comskip.
These options are mutual exclusive

1) Comskip only: To use this you MUST enable comskip processing in the processing tab of the GBPVR configuration utility. Just under the sentence "Commercial detection" select "Comskip.exe from current directory" and you should NOT have comskip run from postprocessing.bat


2) Postprocessing.bat: You should leave comskip disabled in the processing tab. The postprocessing.bat inside the comskip distribution can be used as an example

Which option for running comskip do you use?

When this is determined we can start further investigation on what is going wrong

[erik]

Do the following tests

1) Leave the box "Run during recording" ticked and start a recording. Use a process viewer to see if comskip.exe is running.

2) Remove the tick in the box "Run during recording" and do a short redording. Check with the process viewer if Comskip.exe is started when the recording stops

If both in 1) and 2) you do not see Comskip starting than there is possibly something wrong with Comskip.exe. Set the logging of GB-PVR to debug and see if there are any messages tracking the invokation of Comskip.

If both in 1) and 2) you see Comskip starting and immediately stopping without any trace then there may be some reason why comskip crashes. To test this start a cmd window in you GB-PVR home directory. (Start/run "cmd", cd to the directory) and run comskip.exe, first without parameters and the with one parameter being the fully qualified filename of a mpeg recording enclosed in double quotes in case the filename contains spaces.

Report back you findings and we will try to help you further.

[johnnyb]

I notice that the fps parameter is missing from the default ini file. With the old version of comskip (0.68) fps (frame rate) was set to 25 for PAL, or is the new comskip clever enough to work things out for itself ?

[erik]

After version 0.74 Comskip autodetects the framerate.

[erik]

Can you try to run Comskip manualy, then you will be able to see if it crashes

[-stattik-]

Should comskip be working with ATSC files? I noticed that comskip 78b2 crashes when trying to read ATSC files. I then went to .77 and it crashed as well. .76 and earlier seems to handle ATSC files but upon further inspection, it didn't detect any commercials. I tried using the ini file from 76 on 77. It crashed after 25 frames. I used the default ini's for both versions. I tried Program Stream and Transport Stream files.

[erik]

The current comskip version can work with video up to 800*600 but that is simple to fix. What resolution do you need?

Comskip also can not work on TS recordings.
I can have a look but for doing that I need a TS recording uploaded to my ftp server.

If you are willing to upload at least 100MByte of TS recording, preferrably including the transition between commercial and show, I will send you the upload details.

[erik]

Tipstir, do you record ATSC?