For The Record - The rule-based scheduling suite (1 Viewer)

[mortstar]

I'm getting a little confused by the svn posts on the 4tr forum. It seems that there are updated plugin binaries and a dummy tvplugin.dll to make this all work, if I use svn (which I do). Does 4tr inherently take advantage of svn improvements? For example, recent svns have picked up Ambass' excellent improvements. If I use 4tr am I losing all the benefits like this or will I not be missing much/anything?

I suppose I'm just confused as to how 4tr interacts with MP TVServer, MP TVClient, MP Frontend etc.

 

[dvdfreak]

For The Record supports MP 1.0 out of the box. If you want to use the SVN of MP you do indeed need to manually update the plugin binaries.

Except for specific changes to MP's own TvPlugin (which gets replaced) all improvements to MP code will be picked up by For The Record.

The interaction is as follows:

• For The Record runs as a standalone suite.
• To actually do the card allocation and recording it needs a recorder/tuner: this is the plugin for TV server.
• To play back these recordings (or live TV) it needs a visualization: this is the TvPlugin replacement plugin for MediaPortal.

The rest of the system runs on its own, without MediaPortal. So you can always use Web Access, the Management Console, the chat-bot,... regardless of whether the MP plugins are installed or not. For example, maarten77 wrote a Meedio plugin to play back the recordings. That way you actually combine the TV server plugin (recorder/tuner) for recording with Meedio for playback. It's a very flexible system, based on a service-oriented architecture.

 

[mortstar]

Thanks for the info dvd-freak. I've now got my head around how 4tr works. I think I'll wait for 1.0.1 MP and 4tr's imminent next release before trying it all out.

Skin wise (I use StreamedMP) Vuego has updated the 4tr skin files to match how the normal TVPlugin looks (https://forum.team-mediaportal.com/...development-bugs-54666/index4.html#post398759), this makes the switch over for the other non-geeks in the household much simpler. It seems that auto-thumb creation for recorded programs (a feature of the MP tv client) is not implemented in 4tr, any chance it may get a look in?

My other question is in regards to EPG data. I understand that 4tr handles mulitple sources of data very intelligently (which is fantastic - the more detail the better!). I take it the 4tr rules based around actors actually uses the <credits> xmltv tags, or does it just look inside the description field?

Also I just wanted to flag up some work DJBlu has done for UK & Italian DVB-S users. He has made it possible to get EPG data direct from the stream. His post here talks about a feature inside this EPG data called 'Series Link' which uses CRIDs to link a series. On Sky UK boxes this means that a series of, for example, Top Gear can be "series linked" and the box automatically picks up the first run of each new episode automatically and if an episode recording is missed, a repeat can be found just using the CRID. This is going to be an absolute killer feature within MediaPortal for UK users, it would be sweet if 4tr picked up the capability to series-link an entire series of a program.

 

[dvdfreak]

Skin wise (I use StreamedMP) Vuego has updated the 4tr skin files to match how the normal TVPlugin looks (https://forum.team-mediaportal.com/...development-bugs-54666/index4.html#post398759), this makes the switch over for the other non-geeks in the household much simpler. It seems that auto-thumb creation for recorded programs (a feature of the official client) is not implemented in 4tr, any chance it may get a look in?

Yes, BETA 1 of version 1.4 should already have this functionality (but only for MP SVN of course).

My other question is in regards to EPG data. I understand that 4tr handles mulitple sources of data very intelligently (which is fantastic - the more detail the better!). I take it the 4tr rules based around actors actually uses the <credits> xmltv tags, or does it just look inside the description field?

Both are possible But yes, the <credits> tags are preferred of course.

Also I just wanted to flag up some work DJBlu has done for UK & Italian DVB-S users. He has made it possible to get EPG data direct from the stream. His post here talks about a feature inside this EPG data called 'Series Link' which uses CRIDs to link a series. On Sky UK boxes this means that a series of, for example, Top Gear can be "series linked" and the box automatically picks up the first run of each new episode automatically and if an episode is missed, a repeat can be found just using the CRID. This is going to be an absolute killer feature for within MediaPortal for UK users, it would be sweet if 4tr picked up the capability to series-link an entire series of a program.

Very interesting. I could imagine adding a field for specific series information that's grabbed like this.

However, I'd like to point out that even without this "series link" For The Record already does a pretty decent job of skipping repeat showings as it maintains its own internal history of a schedule's previously recorded programs.

 

[jonaskp]

Also I just wanted to flag up some work DJBlu has done for UK & Italian DVB-S users. He has made it possible to get EPG data direct from the stream. His post here talks about a feature inside this EPG data called 'Series Link' which uses CRIDs to link a series. On Sky UK boxes this means that a series of, for example, Top Gear can be "series linked" and the box automatically picks up the first run of each new episode automatically and if an episode is missed, a repeat can be found just using the CRID. This is going to be an absolute killer feature for within MediaPortal for UK users, it would be sweet if 4tr picked up the capability to series-link an entire series of a program.

Very interesting. I could imagine adding a field for specific series information that's grabbed like this.

However, I'd like to point out that even without this "series link" For The Record already does a pretty decent job of skipping repeat showings as it maintains its own internal history of a schedule's previously recorded programs.

No need to be moddest DVDfreak. I would say it does a fantastic job of keeping track of what shcedules have been recorded and if a series was not recorded, FTR will instead record this episode next time it is aired. This is one of the biggest features to me. It's not so much a problem after I got a second tuner, but when I only had 1 FloppyDTV, it was great that I could schedule recordings of i.e. movies without worrying that my regular series would not get recorded - because they would, when the rerun was on.
The priority system is a great part of this system also.




On a sidenote I have a feature request: In the webinterface, it would be great if there was an option when scheduling a recording to make a "quick Schedule". This button would just save the recording without going through the "configuration screen". The configuration is great when you want to schedule advanced recordings, but for the most part, when I am using the webinterface it is because there is something that I just noticed was on and want to do an "emergency recording" - and so I don't really need the advanced settings that is currently available that often.
Perhaps this "quick record" could also be the default with an option to "Go Advanced" if the user wants more?
Just a thought

 

[winniwinter]

Hello

I have some problems with the configuration.
I have a special setup. I have 1 TV Card on my HTPC and one TV Card on my Server. Now I want to link them together so If I record a channel it's using the server tv-card...

I installed these components of 4TR:

Server:
* For The Record Core Services
* Web Access
* MediaPortal TV Server Recorder/Tuner
* Management Console

Go the the Services control panel on your main machine, look up the For The Record Services service and change the account on the Log On tab from Local System Account to an admin account with full network access.

HTPC:

* MediaPortal TV Server Recorder/Tuner
* Management Console

This works so far. The shares are on my Server and thats working. But now I'm having problems adding my tuners to the fortherecord like this:

Then use the Management Console to configure your system with two recorder/tuners: add MediaPortal TV Server twice and edit the second entry from localhost to the IP or hostname of your second machine. Test both recorder/tuners with the Ping button.

The TV-Servers look like this:

HTPC:



->the IP is the Server (is that right?)
Server:


Is this right??
What do I have to enter in "Recorder/Tuner TCP port"

When I add a tuner to the management console and try to ping it. It fails...
Ports added on Firewall and I also tried with disabled fw

 

[dvdfreak]

You didn't show your recorder/tuner config screen? Did you add MediaPortal TV server twice, like the instructions asked you to? You should be able to ping them both.

The recorder/tuner configs themselves (which you did show) need to have the machine name or IP of the machine where your Core Services are running (your real server). You don't need to change the TCP port.

 

[winniwinter]

ok I get it to work!
Now I have another question. If I want to watch TV on my HTPC it should use the internal TV Tuner and not the server ones. How do I have to setup the priorities?

I expect the following:
I watch a tv show. I want to record it. Now when I start record it should use the servers tv-tuner for recording. now i would be able to change the channel on my htpcs tuner...is that possible?

Another question comes with the EPG data. The CoreServices of 4TR are running on the server. Now I always have to grab new epg data and place this file in to the 4TR folder? (correct?)

 

[dvdfreak]

All your questions are answered when you consider the fact that For The Record treats a multi-recorder/tuner setup exactly the same as a multi-card setup. All priorities are respected (the top-most recorder/tuner has a higher priority, and the card(s) get their priority from TV server).

 

[winniwinter]

You say that the TV-Server set's the priority?
But what does the priority in the record/tuner in the management console mean then?