Scheduled recordings not always highlighted in guide (2 Viewers)

[mm1352000]

Ah - I ran MP using the watchdog, thinking that puts all logs to debug level. Do I need to set it manually in the TV server first? I'll do that next time if it'll help.

Yeah, the watchdog is an MP tool. It can only control the MP log level. The fact that it collects the TV Server logs in some cases can be considered a bonus. TV Server's log level can only be set manually via TV Server configuration and requires the TV service to be restarted.
I don't know that having TV Server debug logs will help to find the problem, but it may help.

I wonder... could be SQL timeouts because the machine was too busy like CyberSymian suggested above.

I really really doubt it. If queries were timing out then I'd expect to see errors in the logs... and I don't see them.

 

[RobNorthcott]

OK, thanks. I'll try to grab some logs with TV Server set to debug when I get the chance, just in case it's useful to somebody.

 

[CyberSimian]

TV Server was busy grabbing guide data right about the time you took those screenshots. So I wonder whether that has a contributing effect.

This is an interesting observation, and perhaps will lead to the eventual diagnosis of the problem.

My HTPC has a reasonably-powerful CPU (Intel Q6600) and loads of tuners (8), so when I configured EPG-grabbing in "TV Server Config", I enabled almost everything:

(1) It grabs when the tuners are idle.
(2) It grabs when recording/timeshifting.
(3) It fills in EPG holes.
(4) It updates existing EPG entries.
(5) It does CRC checks.

But I left the EPG refresh timeout at 240 minutes, and have not programmed the HTPC to wake up in the middle of the night to grab the EPG. Consequently, when I switch it on in the morning to check repeating recordings and schedule one-off recordings for that day, it is overdue for an EPG grab, and so starts grabbing the EPG immediately after wake from hibernation.

So this morning I checked to see if the EPG had any scheduled recordings that were not highlighted. I first checked immediately after starting MP after wake, but I did not find any missing highlights. However, I checked again a few minutes later, and this time I did find some missing highlights. Now I am running MP 1.9.0 pre, and this seems to have the log modes already set to DEBUG, so I had a look at the TV Server log:

(1) System woke from hibernation at 09:09:39.
(2) System started EPG grabbing at 09:09:45.
(3) EPG had a missing highlight for the programme "Call the Council" on "BBC One HD" when I checked at 09:23 (I took a screen shot, but that does not tell us anything, so I have not included it).
(4) System finished EPG grabbing at 09:26:41.

I searched the TV Server log from the start of EPG grabbing for ERROR or WARN entries, but did not find any. I have included the logs, but I don't know whether they will be of any use (unfortunately I had not started MP from the Watchdog, so MP is using the "aMPed" skin). Nevertheless, the point of me writing this post is to suggest that perhaps we have now identified the circumstances in which this error occurs, and hence be able to reproduce this error on demand when an MP developer has time to investigate it.

Finally, is there a workaround that avoids this problem? It occurs to me that one could change the EPG refresh time from 240 minutes to 1440 minutes (i.e. 24 hours). If one could then contrive to get TV Server to perform an EPG grab at (say) 03:00:00, it would continue to grab the EPG at that time on following days, and not when the user was using the HTPC.

However, increasing the EPG refresh time also has its disadvantages. I have been using MP as my DVR for just two months, and yet in that time there have been three occurrences (that I know about!!!) when programmes that I have scheduled to record have had last minute EPG changes that altered their start times and/or their end times. I mostly use option 8 for recording ("weekly on this channel"), so changes in start/end times are automatically picked up provided that the EPG is updated. If the EPG were updated only once every 24 hours, these last minute EPG changes would not be detected, and TV Server would record the programmes at the old (i.e. wrong) times. These are only the occurrences I know about; there must be many more such changes for programmes that I don't record. So increasing the EPG refresh time to 24 hours is not really a solution (at least, not in the UK).

-- from CyberSimian in the UK

 

[regeszter]

from 240 minutes

240 minutes are 4, not 24 hours.

 

[RobNorthcott]

from 240 minutes

240 minutes are 4, not 24 hours.

Yes, but he says "change EPG refresh time from 240 minutes to 1440 minutes (i.e. 24 hours)". 1440 minutes *is* 24 hours.

 

[Chasseur93]

I'm trying to figure out why sometimes there is no red dot in the guide, or at least to find a workaround. Does it really have something to do with EPG refresh time? I'm using the ScheduleDirect plugin to get guide data.

 

[CyberSimian]

I'm trying to figure out why sometimes there is no red dot in the guide, or at least to find a workaround. Does it really have something to do with EPG refresh time? I'm using the ScheduleDirect plugin to get guide data.

The tentative supposition so far in this thread is that there is some problem when MP needs to display the EPG and TV Server is simultaneously grabbing the broadcast EPG. But that may not be a correct supposition.

I am afraid that I do not know anything about Schedules Direct. Is it one of those solutions whereby you download data from the internet, convert it to XML, and then import the XML file into MP/TV-Server? If so:

(1) Does the import process always run at a time when no one is using the HTPC?

(2) Does Canada TV have a broadcast EPG and you have forgotten to disable EPG grabbing? (For example, in Win7 Media Center it is possible to use both the MIcrosoft downloaded EPG and the broadcast EPG; WMC uses the latter to fill in holes or last-minute changes in the former.)

If you are 100% sure that TV Server is not doing anything EPG-related when you try to display the EPG, that would be an important further datum to help identify the source of this problem.

Workaround? Don't rely on the red dot in the EPG to indicate what is scheduled to record. Instead, go to the "Scheduled Recordings" panel, and use the list there to see what is scheduled to record (that list seems always to be correct).

-- from CyberSimian in the UK

 

[RonD]

I'm trying to figure out why sometimes there is no red dot in the guide, or at least to find a workaround. Does it really have something to do with EPG refresh time? I'm using the ScheduleDirect plugin to get guide data.

Looked at my test tv server setup that also uses SchedulesDirect. For testing I just schedule/record 10PM news and keep 2 episodes. I set this up a few weeks ago. On this system, the TV Guide "red dots" showing recording scheduled only show up to Friday Nov 7, they don't show in the TVGuide grid view or in 1 channel view on any other day up to Nov 16. When I looked in the Scheduled recordings, all recordings show for up to Sun Nov 16, last day of SD EPG data.

As a test, scheduled every episode of "Big Bang Theory". This shows "red dots" in TV Guide for all days up till Nov 16. Deleted my 10PM News schedule, then added new schedule every day 10 PM News, now the "red dots" show for both shows up to Nov 16 the end of the SD EPG data. Not sure why delete/re-add the schedule fixed the "red dot" problem.

Maybe, pure speculation, this is side effect of SD data download changes that just started in last few days? Maybe check if all the expected recordings show up in "Scheduled" even if they don't show in TV Guide view.

 

[CyberSimian]

On that note: TV Server was busy grabbing guide data right about the time you took those screenshots. So I wonder whether that has a contributing effect.

For the last two weeks I have been trying a slightly-modified TV Server configuration. This modified configuration does seem to reduce the occurrence of missing EPG highlighting. However, before we get onto that, I want to describe a different anomaly which I noticed a couple of days ago, and which recurred this morning, namely vanishing EPG highlighting. Note: I was using my previous TV Server configuration (i.e. the one that encounters the missing highlights).

I was listening to a DVB-T radio recording which was in the form of a DVR-MS file (recorded by WMC). Such recordings playback with a completely-blank screen (no visualisations here! ), so I displayed the EPG. There was a recording scheduled on "BBC One HD", and the EPG cell was highlighted (correct). But suddenly, the highlighting vanished, without me pressing any buttons on the remote control. I made a note of the time (08:13), and later looked in the TV Server log to see what was happening at 08:13. As I suspected, the EPG Grabber was in fact updating the EPG for "BBC One HD" at the time that the highlighting vanished (see log extract below).

I don't know anything about the internals of TV Server or MP, but the evidence suggests that the part of MP that is responsible for highlighting the EPG cells becomes confused when the EPG Grabber updates the EPG for a channel that should have one or more highlighted cells. Here is the log extract (I have included only EPG-related lines); it shows that during the one minute starting at 08:13 the EPG Grabber was updating various EPG channels, including "BBC One HD":

[2015-01-14 08:02:05,825] [EPG ] [DVB EPG timer] [INFO ] - EpgGrabbing: Start
...
[2015-01-14 08:12:57,323] [EPG ] [EPG Update thread] [INFO ] - IdleEpgGrabber: BBC TWO HD lastUpdate:14/01/2015 04:06:56
[2015-01-14 08:13:04,162] [EPG ] [EPG Update thread] [INFO ] - - Inserted 187 epg entries for channel BBC TWO HD
[2015-01-14 08:13:04,167] [EPG ] [EPG Update thread] [INFO ] - IdleEpgGrabber: BBC ONE HD lastUpdate:14/01/2015 04:07:02
[2015-01-14 08:13:11,511] [EPG ] [EPG Update thread] [INFO ] - - Inserted 207 epg entries for channel BBC ONE HD
[2015-01-14 08:13:11,516] [EPG ] [EPG Update thread] [INFO ] - IdleEpgGrabber: ITV HD lastUpdate:14/01/2015 04:07:09
[2015-01-14 08:13:18,250] [EPG ] [EPG Update thread] [INFO ] - - Inserted 216 epg entries for channel ITV HD
[2015-01-14 08:13:18,256] [EPG ] [EPG Update thread] [INFO ] - IdleEpgGrabber: Channel 4 HD lastUpdate:14/01/2015 04:07:18
[2015-01-14 08:13:25,649] [EPG ] [EPG Update thread] [INFO ] - - Inserted 252 epg entries for channel Channel 4 HD
[2015-01-14 08:13:25,656] [EPG ] [EPG Update thread] [INFO ] - IdleEpgGrabber: BBC THREE HD lastUpdate:14/01/2015 04:07:22
[2015-01-14 08:13:29,427] [EPG ] [EPG Update thread] [INFO ] - - Inserted 137 epg entries for channel BBC THREE HD
[2015-01-14 08:13:29,487] [EPG ] [EPG Update thread] [INFO ] - IdleEpgGrabber: CBBC HD lastUpdate:14/01/2015 04:07:32
[2015-01-14 08:13:39,060] [EPG ] [EPG Update thread] [INFO ] - - Inserted 276 epg entries for channel CBBC HD
[2015-01-14 08:13:39,217] [EPG ] [EPG Update thread] [INFO ] - IdleEpgGrabber: Sky News lastUpdate:14/01/2015 04:07:46
[2015-01-14 08:13:52,859] [EPG ] [EPG Update thread] [INFO ] - - Inserted 384 epg entries for channel Sky News
[2015-01-14 08:13:52,864] [EPG ] [EPG Update thread] [INFO ] - IdleEpgGrabber: Pick lastUpdate:14/01/2015 04:12:50
[2015-01-14 08:14:02,003] [EPG ] [EPG Update thread] [INFO ] - - Inserted 258 epg entries for channel Pick
...

Although this might be the cause of vanishing highlighting, it is not obvious that it would also cause missing highlighting, since it requires the EPG Grabber to update the EPG for a channel at precisely the same time as the user is viewing that channel in the EPG. So I am inclined to think that there is probably another problem that causes the missing highlighting.

-- from CyberSimian in the UK

 

[RobNorthcott]

That's interesting, and sounds possible.

I haven't noticed the problem on my system for ages so haven't had the chance to grab any more logs (which is a good thing I suppose!)