Definitive TVGuide setup w/ icons for North America

[Legolas]

Okay, I am sure a lot of you have faced problems setting up the TVGuide
in MP. I know I did. I expected this to be trivial but wasn't.
In this post I am eagerly plagerizing from previous posts. So, credit
goes to a lot of others. I am trying to compile this information in
one place.

I have tried this for Dish Network USA setup, but am sure will work
w/ others.
Media Portal Version Used : v0.1.1.1

STEP 1: Download XMLTV from sourceforge
Latest version for today (10/Apr/05 : 0.5.39
http://sourceforge.net/projects/xmltv
Unzip contents to C:\Program Files\xmltv-0.5.39-win32

STEP 2: Create Zap2it Account
http://labs.zap2it.com/ztvws/ztvws_l...MS01-1,00.html
Specify certificate code: 'ZYZM-TE5O-SBUT' (Letter O)
http://nolanparty.com/mediaportal.so...rtificate+code)

(Go through the steps to chose your channels etc. In my case I found
that if I was trying to download a whole bunch of channels (which I don't care for), MP seems to crash)

STEP 3: Configure XMLTV to download from sourceforge
Open cmd window : Start -> Run -> cmd
cd "C:\Program Files\xmltv-0.5.39-win32"
$> xmltv.exe tv_grab_na_dd --configure
(Input, whatever it asks...)
This creates a .xmltv folder w/ tv_grab_na_dd.conf file

FROM OTHER POST:
xmltv.exe tv_grab_[your specific zone] --configure [see XMLTV docs]
Set your time zone, user id, password, and desired TV Listings, as per your zap2it.com account [see docs supplied with xmltv for a perferred certificate and visit labs.zap2it.com to sign up].

STEP 4: Create xmltv batch file
Create an update batch file, update.bat, and insert the following using plain text and appropriate spacing.
xmltv.exe tv_grab_na_dd --days 7 --output tvguide.xml

STEP 5: Run xmltv batch file
From a command prompt in the XMLTV directory, run update.bat and watch for errors. Rerun configuration above, if settings need to be changed/adjusted to match your listings. This example provides 7 days of listings for Canada & US according to your channel selection.

STEP 6: MP setup for inputing
-- Delete
C:\Program Files\Team MediaPortal\MediaPortal\database\TVDatabaseV18.db

-- Copy contents of C:\Program Files\xmltv-0.5.39-win32 to
C:\Program Files\Team MediaPortal\MediaPortal\xmltv
(Some other posts asked to rename update.bat to tvguide.bat, but not
sure why. So, just rename it for safety)

-- Configure MedialPortal to use tvguide.xml
MP-> Tools -> Options.... -> Television -> Program Guide -> Scheduler
Set Grabber to "TVguide.xml File"
(Again, not sure if this is needed)

STEP 7: See the results of your work
Start MediaPortal, goto to My TV->TVGuide and press [F3] to refresh the guide.

(In my case I had to do this couple of times before I got it to load!!)

STEP 8: Want channel icons?
-- Download icons using xmltv.
Open cmd window : Start -> Run -> cmd
cd "C:\Program Files\xmltv-0.5.39-win32"
$> xmltv.exe tv_grab_na_icons
(Input, whatever it asks...)

The icons will be dowloaded to
C:\Program Files\xmltv-0.5.39-win32\share\xmltv\icons
(In my case it didn't download all the icons)

They would be something list this.

10/28/2004  08:52a                 740 AMC.jpg
06/29/2000  10:13a                 862 ANGEL1.jpg
06/29/2000  10:13a               1,027 ANIMAL.jpg
03/19/2004  11:23a                 977 ARTS.jpg
06/29/2000  10:13a                 860 BBCA.jpg
06/29/2000  10:13a                 832 BET.jpg

-- Rename the files so MP can accept them

MP wants the files name according to whats in your xmltv .conf file
(tv_grab_na_dd.conf in our case), ie

AMC.jpg should be "130 AMC.jpg"
SITV.gif should be "159 SITV.gif", etc.

Using a smart editor (like VIM) I created a rename batch file
(00rename.bat in attachment) to rename the files.
At the command tool, run the batch file to rename the files.

-- Copy these file over for MP
Copy all the files into
C:\Program Files\Team MediaPortal\MediaPortal\thumbs\tv\logos

-- Restart MP
-- Now the TVGuide should have the icons for the channels.

To make life easier for others, I would like to attach the icons file that I
generated for DishNetwork, but this forum doesn't support attachments?


THINGS YET TO FIGURE OUT
-- How to use the Grabber feature that I see in
MP-> Tools -> Options.... -> Television -> Program Guide -> Scheduler
-- Where to get remaining icons
-- How does xmltv-automate fit into this picture ?
http://www.meedio.com/pub/Tools/XMLT...V-Automate.htm

[Legolas]

THINGS YET TO FIGURE OUT
-- How to use the Grabber feature that I see in
MP-> Tools -> Options.... -> Television -> Program Guide -> Scheduler
-- Where to get remaining icons
-- How does xmltv-automate fit into this picture ?
http://www.meedio.com/pub/Tools/XMLT...V-Automate.htm

Hi
Can someone help clairify the above for me :?:

[Richtv]

After you've set up xmltv in MP's xmltv folder, you can use the Program Guide Scheduler instead of your batch file.

Select your grabber and specify how many days to grab. For example tv_grab_na_dd, Basic Multiday Grab, Days to keep in guide 7.

Press "Run Grabber" to update the scheduler interactively or set up a Windows task to run periodically.

[Legolas]

Originally Posted by Richtv

After you've set up xmltv in MP's xmltv folder, you can use the Program Guide Scheduler instead of your batch file.

Select your grabber and specify how many days to grab. For example tv_grab_na_dd, Basic Multiday Grab, Days to keep in guide 7.

Press "Run Grabber" to update the scheduler interactively or set up a Windows task to run periodically.

Thanx, I will have to try this out... This should be documented somewhere.
This mechanism isn't intuitive, atleast not to me.

[broadband412]

As the original poster tittled the topic for setting up xmltv? I think this is topic should be made sticky as it is the most easiest and most complete guide for setting up the tv guide with xmltv. I had numerous problems myself with it but somehow finally got it working properly. I still have a bit of a problem with how the chanels are obtained because they don't seem to come up it proper order but for the most part there is not too much of channel rearragement. This is after I altered my lineup at zap2it labs to reflect my level of service for digital cable. Second I had a really rough time with the guide being behind/or fast and hour or 2 or more. I fixed this by playing around with the compesnate time settings in the configuration part of the mediaportal program. I would like to know what are the approprate settings for the time zones. I am in the Eastern part of the USA located in New York and it is daylight savings time here. The time zone for this part of the world is -0400? Is this correct? That is what I have set up in xmltv and I have a -1 imputed in the left box of compensate time zone in hte config app and the listings are correct.

Somebody needs to figure out a definitive way to reorder the channels by channel number.

For those of us in Comcast land, here are high quality logos from the GBPVR project, et al.

http://www.bladerhq.com/pmwiki/pmwik...ckChannelLogos

[ASiDiE]

To Legolas...

"I have tried this for Dish Network USA setup, but am sure will work
w/ others."

I am interested in this... Are you just testing with the Dish Network Guide or were you actally hitting dishnetwork satellites and pulling down video. At this point most of us have assumed this does not work.. Any info on this would be great.

i still cannot figure out how to make it automatically update the TV guide (without running my .bat file manually).

if anyone would explain i would appreciate it.

[Boilermaker]

y0bailey,
this may not answer your question since it doesnt directly involve mp. i have windows task scheduler to run a .bat file automatically twice a week.