Export/Import TV channels is buggy???? (1 Viewer)

KevL

Portal Pro
March 3, 2005
224
1
Cambridge, UK
Home Country
United Kingdom United Kingdom
TV-Server Version: 1.0 RC2
MediaPortal Version: 1.0 RC2
MediaPortal Skin: Blue Two 0.9.2.0
Windows Version: winxp mce2005 build 2600.xpsp080413-2111: SP3
CPU Type: Athlon 4850e
HDD: Samsung Spinpoint F1 1000GB
Memory: 4GB DDR2
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-MA78GM-S2H Bios F4
Video Card: onboard HD3200
Video Card Driver: Catlayst 8.4
Sound Card: Onboard Realtek
Sound Card AC3: optical SPDIF out
Sound Card Driver: 5.10.0.5532
1. TV Card: Blackgold BTG 3540 6in1
1. TV Card Type: DVB-T x 2 , DVB-S x 2
1. TV Card Driver: 6.0.0.25
2. TV Card:
2. TV Card Type:
2. TV Card Driver:
3. TV Card:
3. TV Card Type:
3. TV Card Driver:
4. TV Card:
4. TV Card Type:
4. TV Card Driver:
MPEG2 Video Codec: Nvidia Pure Video with HW acceleration
MPEG2 Audio Codec: AC3Filter 1.46
h.264 Video Codec: CoreAVC 1.7.0.0
Satelite/CableTV Provider: Digital Terrestrial, Multisat motorised system
HTPC Case: Antec Fusion
Cooling: Zalmann (huge copper thing)
Power Supply: 320W Antec Fusion
Remote: Harmony via USB UIRT
TV: Pioneer PDP508
TV - HTPC Connection: HDMI

I have noticed on a few 1.0+SVNs and on the new RC2 that exporting and reimporting TV channels is not working correctly (or as well as might be hoped).

I'm not sure if the below is 1 problem or many different problems so I will try to give lots of info.

I have a single TV card (BTG 3540) with 2 off DVB-T tuners + 2 off DVB-S tuners (and also 2 off analogue tuners but I dont use these)


I have setup the 2 x DVB-T tuners for Sandy Heath Freeview and one of the DVB-S tuners for Astra 28.2East.

With this config I have hundreds of channels - quite a complicated setup.

For ease of watching TV I have used the channel groups function to make groups such as DVB-T News, DVB-T Music DVB-S News etc.
I use about 10 groups.


When I export the channel list and then reimport it I can see that some of the channels are getting mixed up by the process.

Some channels are getting flagged (incorrectly) as encrypted - I can cure this by rescanning the channels - but it shows an error is present in the process.

Some channels are getting moved from 1 group to another. I can tell this because my Freeview DVB-T channels have epg data from the broadcast whereas the DVB-S channels dont get Epg data and I haven't got around to setting up XMLTV for them. So when I find a channel in my DVB-S group with EPG data I can tell it is really a DVB-T channel pretending to be a DVB-S channel.

Also QVC a shopping channel which is carried by both DVB-T and DVB-S gets "linked together" strangely in the channel list so that where as e.g. ITV1 is has seperate entries in the channel list tab of the config app for DVB-T and DVB-S. So in the channel list tab of the config app channles are shown as

QVC DVB-T, DVB-S.
ITV1 DVB-T
ITV1 DVB-S

This would be fine if attempting to tune QVC didn't lock up MP - though this might be another problem.


I would think that having the ability to reliably export and import TV server config settings and ALL channels (including Radio) would be a very important function (I would also like to see all of the other TVServer settings being exportable and reimportable).

I have been discouraged from testing many SVNs etc because of the time it takes to get the TVserver channels set up (many hours if starting from scratch). Many users might similarly be discouraged. Making testing easy will make MP better, quicker.



Kev
 

rsbrux

Documentation Group
  • Team MediaPortal
  • April 15, 2007
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    Reimport of analog channels also flaky

    I am having problems also w/ex-/import of analog channels. Many channels no longer tune correctly after migrating to 1.0 RC2 and importing channels from 1.0 RC1. This seems to be due to corruption of the channel details. Many channels suddenly have several sets. If I open one to correct the info, there seems to be none at all! I dread the thought of reconfiguring these all by hand, but experience has shown that I must do them all manually. Automatic scan delivers far too many hits and many duplicates. The automatically scanned frequencies are almost invariably wrong. I often get 2 -3 versions of the same channel at slightly different displacements from the correct carrier frequency.
     

    Attachments

    • Multiply assigned channels.jpg
      Multiply assigned channels.jpg
      90 KB
    • TV Channel Details Missing.jpg
      TV Channel Details Missing.jpg
      22.9 KB

    ronilse

    Retired Team Member
  • Premium Supporter
  • July 19, 2005
    4,422
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    Moss
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    Norway Norway
    Hi,
    Yeah you're suffering for the merge channels on import. We have had some discussions about the case, but no final solution to it yet.

    Regards
    Roy
     

    rsbrux

    Documentation Group
  • Team MediaPortal
  • April 15, 2007
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    Any workaround suggestions? It's worse than I thought. While trying to manually correct the mess, I manged to lose channels from the "Groups" section.
     

    Attachments

    • TV Channel Groups Lost Channels.jpg
      TV Channel Groups Lost Channels.jpg
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    ronilse

    Retired Team Member
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  • July 19, 2005
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    Hi,
    Workarounds is to edit export.xml(in notepad) so name field it's not the same as anyone else, Import will then sort them as different channels & not merge them, but if they already merged in export, theres no way around.

    Regards
    Roy
     

    rsbrux

    Documentation Group
  • Team MediaPortal
  • April 15, 2007
    1,137
    117
    Home Country
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    some progress

    Roy,
    Thanks for the tip. I got satrisfactory results with the following procedure:
    1. Corrected primary (1st detail) frequency, order of channels and grouping in TV Server Configuration.
    2. Exported channels
    3. Edited export.xml to eliminate all but 1st <tuning details /> entry
    4. Cleared existing Radio & TV channels in TV Server configuration
    5. Remapped TV channels in XMLTV import
    6. Reimported XMLTV.XML ("force input")
    7. Restarted TV Server
    8. Restarted MP Client
    My 1st attempt to view the TV Guide in the MP Client seems to have crashed both client & server.
    After restarting both client and server, I was unable to start live TV by clicking "TV on", but I was able to start it from the Guide screen.
    I now have only one frequency per channel without having to rename the channels.

    P.S.:
    Rejoiced too soon: only a fraction of the channels tune correctly.
     

    zunixnuz

    Portal Pro
    December 23, 2007
    291
    97
    Home Country
    Austria Austria
    TV channels and groups import and export works fine.
    Radio channels import and export works also but
    Radio groups will be lost at export, no radio groups are listed in xml file!
    -> BUG!?

    In general i think it is not logical to place the import and export function in the TV menue
    because also Radio Channels are involved.
     

    KevL

    Portal Pro
    March 3, 2005
    224
    1
    Cambridge, UK
    Home Country
    United Kingdom United Kingdom
    TV channels and groups import and export works fine.
    Radio channels import and export works also but
    Radio groups will be lost at export, no radio groups are listed in xml file!
    -> BUG!?

    In general i think it is not logical to place the import and export function in the TV menue
    because also Radio Channels are involved.

    The export and reimport function most assuredly does not work fine if you have more than one channel with the same name - as you might have if you have multiple cards etc.

    Lack of radio channels export import is a missing feature rather than a bug.

    Kev
     

    huha

    Extension Developer
    January 3, 2008
    890
    556
    Home Country
    Germany Germany
    Kevl,
    can you have a look at my plugin BackupSettings?
    The missing features should be fixed there.
    I found one issue in a TV Busines layer function public Channel GetChannelByName(string name), which was not case sensitive. So a sender arte was mixed up with ARTE. This should be fixed in the plugin BackupSettings, where i used my own function.
    I expect that the issue with identical channel names also exists in my plugin, as i have reused the code for importing/exporting channels. If you could describe the issue in more detail in the backupSetting thread and post a logfile from my plugin i could look further into it.
    greetings, huha
     

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