Help Please with TV Guide Setup for OTA (1 Viewer)

[tbrigh01]

I am posting to see if someone can and is willing to help me in setting up my TV Guide for Media Portal. I have the TV configured and can watch TV on all stations I receive, I can't however seem to figure out the Guide portion. I have the most recent version of portal, and am running it on Window 7 x64 Home Premium.

I can't find a single thread that gives enough detail to help someone like myself (not a computer programmer) to get it working. I don't care at this point if it is set up through Titan or Microsoft, but need someone to fill in all the steps.

I have enabled both WebEPG and XmlTv Plugins. I have found/ran/downloaded the xc2xml. If I click on that file it seems to have the data I need for my local stations. The file I have is using Microsoft and I currently have it saved in a folder on my C: drive.

And that is where I am stuck. What do I do with that file? Where do I get or create a .dtd file? How do you create the tvguide.xml file? I am sure most reading this at this point are probably just going . Why is this guy here, just use WMC. I would love to but it will not work with my OTA signal. I either can get all the channels with the wrong zip (which leaves me without a guide) or use the right zip and it wont pull my tv signals. Anyway I digress.

I am using a Hauppauge 2250 and am just trying to get this thing up and running for service with OTA signal.

Any help and guidance (that doesn't refer me to another thread that I bet money I have tried to read and use) would be greatly appreciated.

If you need more info. just ask. I would love a start to finish guide for dummies.

Travis

 

[bighick]

If nobody helps by tomorrow I will try to type something up start to finish. I pay the $20 a month or so to schedules direct but it shouldn't make much difference as I am using mc2xml.
Starting unless I get to tired...
1. Download mc2xml edit- also download xmltv.dtd off their site its a weird green highlight
2. find where your xmltv.dat file is, mine was in "C:\ProgramData\Team MediaPortal\MediaPortal TV Server\xmltv"
How would I use mc2xml with MediaPortal? *
3. as follows.. this is all in a command prompt! and using WMC for epg grabbing
md "C:\mc2xml"
cd "C:\mc2xml"
copy "C:\downloads\mc2xml.exe" "C:\mc2xml"
copy "C:\downloads\xmltv.dtd" "C:\mc2xml"
notepad "C:\mc2xml\mc2xml.chl"
mc2xml -c us -g YOUR ZIPCODE -o tvguide.xml
4. the mc2xml window will pop up check your settings here... I choose -a -A

5. Open TV server Config and go to plugins/ xmltv
Choose where you set up your mc2xml. EX C:\mc2xml
Check import new tvguide.xml and delete old programs before import
Click Import next to force import...this can take quite a while

6. Choose Mappings
Load/Refresh
try to map them as best you can ( I had to change a few times just checking the wrong channels)
Click SAVE
7. Go back to general and force import again
8. Open up MePo and see what happens.

If you need help with setting up a task to run the mc2xml every day just ask.
Hope this helps!!!

 

[tbrigh01]

I am finally getting around to trying this, but could use some more help:

1. Download mc2xml ----DONE
2. find where your xmltv.dat file is, mine was in "C:\ProgramData\Team MediaPortal\MediaPortal TV Server\xmltv" ---DONE MINE IS IN MY C:mc2xml folder
How would I use mc2xml with MediaPortal? *
3. as follows.. this is all in a command prompt! and using WMC for epg grabbing
md "C:\mc2xml" ----DONE
cd "C:\mc2xml" ----DONE
copy "C:\downloads\mc2xml.exe" "C:\mc2xml" ---TRIED THIS BUT GOT AN ERROR THAT IT COULD NOT FIND, I ASSUME THIS IS MOVING THE MC2XML.EXE TO THE C:MC2MXL DIR WE CREATED SO I HAVE DRAG AND DROPPED IT IN THE NEW DIR
copy "C:\downloads\xmltv.dtd" "C:\mc2xml" ---DIDN'T GET THIS FAR, HOWEVER I DO NOT SEE A XMLTV.DTD FILE ANYWHERE AND A SEARCH OF C: DOES NOT FIND IT, WHERE DO I GET THIS FILE?
notepad "C:\mc2xml\mc2xml.chl" ---THIS SAYS NO FILE FOUND, BUT ASSUME THAT SINCE PREVIOUS STEPS NOT COMPLETED THIS MAY NOT WORK
mc2xml -c us -g YOUR ZIPCODE -o tvguide.xml
4. the mc2xml window will pop up check your settings here... I choose -a -A

ON SIDE NOTE THE VERSION I USE OF MC2XML WILL DO WHAT YOUR LAST STEP SUGGESTS BY JUST DOUBLE CLICKING AND EXECUTING THE PROGRAM, IT POPS A WINDOW THAT ASKS FOR MY ZIP AND PROVIDER (MICROSOFT) AND I CAN CHOOSE THE -a -A YOU SUGGESTED. THAT CREATES A XMLTV AND XMLTV.DAT FILES. Sorry for the caps, I just realized I still had it on and don't feel like retyping.

Going forward can you help with where I got stuck, or can I somehow use the xmtv and xmltv.dat files that were created?

Travis

 

[bighick]

Ok so it looks like the last few things you have are mc2xml.chl renaming the xml , set a schedule to auto update and linking them in MePo.
mc2xml.chl - Just right click -> NEW -> Text Document and name it to mc2xml.chl (all you need is an empty txt file.)
Now make a batch file... right click -> NEW -> Text Document and name it update.txt
----open update.txt and paste the following into it
cd\
cd mc2xml
erase tvguide.xml
mc2xml.exe
rename xmltv.xml tvguide.xml

save the file as a .bat ( file save-as, update.bat, FILE TYPE - All files)
Now double click that and you should see a brief command prompt, a xmltv.xml file created then renamed to tvguide.xml
Now create a scheduled task in windows to run that update.bat daily (I run my every day at 3am)

 

[2BitSculptor]

If nobody helps by tomorrow I will try to type something up start to finish. I pay the $20 a month or so to schedules direct but it shouldn't make much difference as I am using mc2xml.

I believe that's $25 per year.

I can't really interject any help, as much as I would like to. I've got 2 dual tuner HDHomeruns for OTA, and SchedulesDirect, with the SD plugin ... and everything is working.

Chuck

 

[RAWPWR]

So does this mean that I have to keep my htpc on 24/7 to get the scheduled task to run that update.bat?

Because right now I just generate a new tvguide.xml file manually every couple of weeks when my EPG list is blank/no info. not a problem for me.

I really like the idea though, that my EPG can be updated automatically, but I don't want to keep my htpc on all the time 24/7 just to update the EPG.

Maybe I'm not fully understanding how this whole EPG thingy works?

I could never figure out how to do the auto EPG, with all the vague info previously posted. So this should help a lot.

Thanks bighick.

 

[bighick]

If nobody helps by tomorrow I will try to type something up start to finish. I pay the $20 a month or so to schedules direct but it shouldn't make much difference as I am using mc2xml.

I believe that's $25 per year.

I can't really interject any help, as much as I would like to. I've got 2 dual tuner HDHomeruns for OTA, and SchedulesDirect, with the SD plugin ... and everything is working.

Chuck

Ya my bad, a year not month. Good catch that could scare someone away.

So does this mean that I have to keep my htpc on 24/7 to get the scheduled task to run that update.bat?

Because right now I just generate a new tvguide.xml file manually every couple of weeks when my EPG list is blank/no info. not a problem for me.

I really like the idea though, that my EPG can be updated automatically, but I don't want to keep my htpc on all the time 24/7 just to update the EPG.

Maybe I'm not fully understanding how this whole EPG thingy works?

I could never figure out how to do the auto EPG, with all the vague info previously posted. So this should help a lot.

Thanks bighick.

Yes the way i posted means the machine is on 247/7 ( I have a media server thats always running with 4 tuners) BUT you could modify my batch file and have it run every time the pc boots. I am not sure if you can add a batch to the startup but you can make a basic schedule to run it every time windows starts. Let me know if you need help.
Actually I think you could actually just add your mc2xml.exe run at startup assuming it saves it to the tvguide.xml and no batch needed.

 

[Paranoid Delusion]

Why not do a windows scheduled task, enable it to wake pc up (mines 7am) and it goes back to sleep about 7.20 after being imported into database, really easy to do.