Lost capture sources!

[GoodGuys]

Hello,

Today, I made a change to my XMLTV grabber config, and wanted to re-load the EPG. [The change in XMLTV grabber only tried to get more titles split into subtitles correctly].

Since I had a previous problem that caused updating from the try icon to crash, I went into the config utility, edited the capture source, and hit Update-EPG.

The update appeared to complete successfully, and I returned to the list of capture sources (I had 4, for tuner + 3 line-ins of my PVR-350). The list was fine. I pressed OK, and the recording service was restarted.

I then started the frontend GUI and it said "Configuring ..." etc. There were no channels at all, so I entered the config utility again, and found out that all capture sources, and channels disappeared. All other settings appeared to be in order, though...

Very strange. I reconfigured (some 10-15 minutes of work, no biggy, but frustrating, menial work), and of course all season recordings were gone. The "Recordings" button also had nothing visible of the recordings I had stored. This itself is no big deal again, since I can use My Videos with correct configuration of a directory, but the whole thing is just plain weird, and not fun at all.

As a first-aid measure, I'd like to ask for a utility that backs up all databases, etc. I can then run the config utility from a batch file that first saves the settings, and if this happens again I can resotre things and see why this happens.

Any comments? Thanks.

[Darx-starz]

Just write a batch file that you can kick off every day from tasksched. Put something like this in the batch file:
#############################
@echo off
copy gbpvr.mdb gbpvr.bac.1
copy gbpvr.bac.2 gbpvr.bac.3
copy gbpvr.bac.3 gbpvr.bac.4
echo "GBPVR is the best and dont forget to send Sub some Paypal cash"
##############################
You get the idea. This will give you 3 copies. Run it everyday. Do it as part of your UpdateEpg.bat or your defrag or something. In UNIX land its called logrotate.

[GoodGuys]

Cool, thanks. I will check this out.

Still, if anyone has an idea how this happens, please let us know so we can avoid.

[Kevina]

Well, I can't tell you the whole story, but I can give you at least part of it. I had a similar thing happen to me, where I edited my settings in config, and once done, I clicked OK and then relaunched GBPVR. When I did, instead of GBPVR launching, I got a Windows Installer window appear that said it was "configuring application" or something to this effect. This took about a minute or so, and when it was done, GBPVR lauched. The problem was that my source settings were gone, as well as all of my recording information.

In looking at my gbpvr.mdb, it appeared to be clean (as in replaced with a fresh copy by Windows Installer). I'm guessing other files had been overwritten as well, but I'm unsure as to which ones. In looking at the logs, I found error messages indicating that gbpvr.mdb could not be found. You tell me where it went!

Hope this helps!

[GoodGuys]

Sounds like exactly the same thing that happened to me. I didn't check the logs, though.

Are there other files for other settings? If yes, which?

For me, the other settings seemed to remain as I set them. I specifically mean the settings I have changed...

Thanks,

[sub]

Check if you've got a gbpvr.old file. If so, you might be able to rename it gbpvr.mdb and get your recordings and capture sources back.

[goveRtime]

same thing happened to me. I couldn't get the installer to stop coming up, even after uninstalling and reinstalling it. I had to do a system restore to fix it.
I had changed some channels in Zap2It and then the problems started.

[Kevina]

Sorry, no gbpvr.old or anything similar. I remembered what setting that I had changed when it happened, just in case it matters. I had previously set GBPVR to launch 2 MVP servers, and I had just changed the setting from 2 to 1 and attempted to relauch GBPVR when Windows installer kicked in.

Hope this helps.

Kevin

[sub]

Sorry, I dont know. The windows installer seems to have a mind of its own.

[Kevina]

You're probably already aware of this little tidbit, but just some food for thought. One of Windows Installer's "features" is its ability to "self-heal" an application if it detects that critical files are missing. During the building of the installation, certain files are marked as "key" files, and it is these files that are monitored for damage, deletion, overwriting by other apps, etc.

It's obvious that in the case of GBPVR, the gbpvr.mdb file is a "key" file. This explains why when mine took a leave of absense, Windows Installer immediately kicked in and attempted a repair of the application. The problem of course with this technology is that its not foolproof. If a key file is found missing, Windows installer will deliver all the files within that key file's subgroup. If the master key file is missing, it will deliver the whole stinking applicaiton!

I give all of this as background information for those not familiar with Windows Installer. The big question in my case is why did my mdb file disappear?

Thanks for all the help!