Re: [vdr] howto ignore lines in channels.conf

2012-01-16 Thread Klaus Schmidinger

On 16.01.2012 01:45, Tony Houghton wrote:

On Sun, 15 Jan 2012 23:18:40 +0100
cedric.dew...@telfort.nl wrote:


There is one bit of information that I would like to add to
channels.conf, and that's the channel number. This information cannot
be added the README, and other files, as this is information that
only I use. My channel.conf now looks like this (from memory, I'm not
in front of the machine right now)

#1
Nederland 1: *a whole lot of numbers*
#2
Nederland 2  *a whole lot of numbers*

This reminds me, it's now not possible to have a list of channels
with gaps in it. I would like it if I can create a list like this:

#1..5 My favorite channels
1 Discovery channel
2 MTV
3 Some other channel
4 Comedy channel
5 Some other channel

#10..15 channels of my wife (just married this friday :-) )
10 RTL 4
11 RTL 8

#20 channels we both like ;-)
20 animal planet
21 discovery channel (identical to channel 1)
22 ...


VDR can already do that. Before each numbered group add a line :@1 ,
:@10 , :@20  etc. Exclude the quites, but ISTR there was some
problem if I didn't include a trailing space.


There's no, need for a trailing space.


 I use this to make my
channels numbered the same way as Freeview and Freesat, so I'd prefer it
if channels lines had an LCN field instead of putting the numbers on
separate lines.


An LCN field would only make sense if you have only channels from a single
broadcaster in your channels.conf. As soon as there are several broadcasters,
the numbers would most likely not be unique any more, and therefore useless.


I think you can also use a : followed by a string without @ to add
comments, which are shown in the EPG.


These are channel group separators, which you can easily navigate through
with the Left and Right keys in live mode. The texts are *not* shown in the
EPG, though.

Klaus

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Re: [vdr] howto ignore lines in channels.conf

2012-01-16 Thread Tony Houghton
On Mon, 16 Jan 2012 11:51:26 +0100
Klaus Schmidinger klaus.schmidin...@tvdr.de wrote:

 On 16.01.2012 01:45, Tony Houghton wrote:
 
  VDR can already do that. Before each numbered group add a line :@1
  , :@10 , :@20  etc. Exclude the quotes, but ISTR there was some
  problem if I didn't include a trailing space.
 
 There's no, need for a trailing space.

I know it isn't necessary, and I can't remember exactly why I use them,
but one of the existing programs (either VDR itself, or scan) used to
append spaces. Making my own tool do the same made it easier to detect
whether the file needed updating or something.

   I use this to make my
  channels numbered the same way as Freeview and Freesat, so I'd
  prefer it if channels lines had an LCN field instead of putting the
  numbers on separate lines.
 
 An LCN field would only make sense if you have only channels from a
 single broadcaster in your channels.conf. As soon as there are
 several broadcasters, the numbers would most likely not be unique any
 more, and therefore useless.

Yes, you would need an additional field for the broadcaster or bouquet
or something and provide a way for the user to select which set of
channels they're viewing. Probably not easy or very practical to add to
VDR at this point. Fortunately there are few clashes between Freeview
and Freesat, and all I have to do is renumber a few radio channels which
I virtually never use.

  I think you can also use a : followed by a string without @ to add
  comments, which are shown in the EPG.
 
 These are channel group separators, which you can easily navigate
 through with the Left and Right keys in live mode. The texts are
 *not* shown in the EPG, though.

I shouldn't have called it EPG. I really meant the channel list view.
I'm sure when I used these group labels they were shown in VDR's OSD.

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Re: [vdr] howto ignore lines in channels.conf

2012-01-16 Thread Timothy D. Lenz
You could change the line to  a lable by starting it with : . If I 
understand it correctly, using a space after : instead of @ and it 
becomes a label for the channels after. A way to group them sort of. You 
can then using it as a quick jump to the channel that follows, but it 
should be skiped when just surfing and it shouldn't try to save EPG data 
for it.


On 1/15/2012 3:56 AM, Eric Valette wrote:

On 15/01/2012 11:26, Klaus Schmidinger wrote:


What charakter can i add in front of a line to let the line be ignored?


There is no comment character in channels.conf, because
VDR writes this file, and thus any comments would be lost.


IMHO This is not a sufficient answer: it could skip the line with a
comment character when rewriting (and unless it changed, it may not
rewrite it is no PMT/pid scanning is requested)

--eric





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Re: [vdr] howto ignore lines in channels.conf

2012-01-15 Thread Klaus Schmidinger

On 15.01.2012 05:07, cedric.dew...@telfort.nl wrote:

Hi All,

I would like to add some comments to channels.conf, and remove some channels
I never watch. I have tried adding lines beginning with #, but this does
not work, I still see those channels when I choose channels in VDR.

What charakter can i add in front of a line to let the line be ignored?


There is no comment character in channels.conf, because
VDR writes this file, and thus any comments would be lost.

Klaus

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Re: [vdr] howto ignore lines in channels.conf

2012-01-15 Thread Eric Valette

On 15/01/2012 11:26, Klaus Schmidinger wrote:


What charakter can i add in front of a line to let the line be ignored?


There is no comment character in channels.conf, because
VDR writes this file, and thus any comments would be lost.


IMHO This is not a sufficient answer: it could skip the line with a 
comment character when rewriting (and unless it changed, it may not 
rewrite it is no PMT/pid scanning is requested)


--eric





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Re: [vdr] howto ignore lines in channels.conf

2012-01-15 Thread Klaus Schmidinger

On 15.01.2012 11:56, Eric Valette wrote:

On 15/01/2012 11:26, Klaus Schmidinger wrote:


What charakter can i add in front of a line to let the line be ignored?


There is no comment character in channels.conf, because
VDR writes this file, and thus any comments would be lost.


IMHO This is not a sufficient answer:


Well, it stated the facts ;-)


it could skip the line with a comment character when rewriting (and unless it 
changed, it may not rewrite it is no PMT/pid scanning is requested)


VDR reads the channels.conf file and doesn't store any information about
comments. It only stores the channel data.
When it writes the file, it writes only the channel data, and
at that point any comments in the original file would be lost.

Klaus

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Re: [vdr] howto ignore lines in channels.conf

2012-01-15 Thread Ville Skyttä
On 2012-01-15 13:01, Klaus Schmidinger wrote:

 VDR reads the channels.conf file and doesn't store any information about
 comments. It only stores the channel data.
 When it writes the file, it writes only the channel data, and
 at that point any comments in the original file would be lost.

Even though they'd get lost when VDR writes it, allowing comments there
would be an improvement so distros (and VDR itself) could ship the file
with some comments in it that instruct users what they need to do before
things will work, or what the file is for, or...  Same thing applies to
remote.conf, setup.conf, and timers.conf.

If the AllowComments parameter exists just for the purpose of
disallowing comments in files where VDR doesn't preserve them, I suggest
removing that restriction altogether and allowing comments everywhere.
Allowing comments and preserving them are two different things.  For
files where VDR doesn't preserve them it could note that on the first
line of such files, for example like:

# Warning: VDR will overwrite this file without preserving comments.

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Re: [vdr] howto ignore lines in channels.conf

2012-01-15 Thread fnu
 Even though they'd get lost when VDR writes it, allowing comments there
would be an improvement so distros (and VDR itself) could ship the file with
some comments in it that instruct users what they need to do before things
will work, or what the file is for, or...  Same thing applies to
remote.conf, setup.conf, and timers.conf.

The mentioned files are nothing else than a table of the database VDR. There
is no solution out there, where it is possible to edit the channel list
outside the normal operation, or even to think about comments within it. It
is not possible within MythTV, not on commercial settop boxes, PVRs or any
builtin receivers in TV devices, not even with the famous DBox'es and
Dreamboxes. If you're lucky there might be tool where you could connect from
another PC to the box and edit your channel list within small boundaries, so
advantage VDR, 15:0 ...

So, the information has to be managed from datebases frontend, in case of
VDR the OSD or svdrp. The only sufficient solution might be to have a
switch in OSDs channel editor, to disable or enable a entry in channels
list, like it is available on commercial solutions. Same for all relevant
conf-Files, whereas I don't see any reason to put comments into timers.conf,
weird ...

Regards
fnu

-Ursprüngliche Nachricht-
Von: vdr-boun...@linuxtv.org [mailto:vdr-boun...@linuxtv.org] Im Auftrag von
Ville Skyttä
Gesendet: Sonntag, 15. Januar 2012 12:29
An: vdr@linuxtv.org
Betreff: Re: [vdr] howto ignore lines in channels.conf

On 2012-01-15 13:01, Klaus Schmidinger wrote:

 VDR reads the channels.conf file and doesn't store any information 
 about comments. It only stores the channel data.
 When it writes the file, it writes only the channel data, and at that 
 point any comments in the original file would be lost.

Even though they'd get lost when VDR writes it, allowing comments there
would be an improvement so distros (and VDR itself) could ship the file with
some comments in it that instruct users what they need to do before things
will work, or what the file is for, or...  Same thing applies to
remote.conf, setup.conf, and timers.conf.

If the AllowComments parameter exists just for the purpose of disallowing
comments in files where VDR doesn't preserve them, I suggest removing that
restriction altogether and allowing comments everywhere.
Allowing comments and preserving them are two different things.  For files
where VDR doesn't preserve them it could note that on the first line of such
files, for example like:

# Warning: VDR will overwrite this file without preserving comments.

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Re: [vdr] howto ignore lines in channels.conf

2012-01-15 Thread fnu
 At least when I started to use VDR a long time ago, channels.conf pretty
much *had* to be created with tools that weren't included with VDR (scan
or something like that from dvb-apps). 
 I haven't checked recently, but I suspect it's the same these days.

Well that is an other question and valid argument, why is there no
sufficient solution to scan for channels in VDR, like is quit normal on
commercial solution. Not that I like to have a stupid on, which provides me
4000 channels from satellite, whereas only 40-80 or so are really relevent
for me and do have trouble to sort it out laters, like it is also quit
normal on commercial solutions.

There is at a command line tool available, w_scan or a plugin
vdr-plugin-wirbelscan. But yes I can go with the thought, this should be
rather a nativ VDR function.

But this will be pretty difficult to implement, since VDR runs with a
uncounted number of DVB devices. Whereas commercial solutions do need to
work just with their one and only DVB device type. It doesn't matter if it
is avaiblable with DVB-C/T/S receivers, it's always just one type. So the
software does need to be able to run with 3 different DVB type in max. and
not with a thousend or so ...

Regards
fnu


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Re: [vdr] howto ignore lines in channels.conf

2012-01-15 Thread Udo Richter
Am 15.01.2012 14:49, schrieb fnu:
 Well that is an other question and valid argument, why is there no
 sufficient solution to scan for channels in VDR, like is quit normal on
 commercial solution.

I've been living with VDR's auto channel update quite well, back since
VDR 1.3.x eliminated the need of the AutoPID patch.

The only thing I need an external tool for is to clean up all the dead
channels from time to time. I never understood why people need external
scan tools anyway, at least on an average system.

Cheers,

Udo

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Re: [vdr] howto ignore lines in channels.conf

2012-01-15 Thread Ville Skyttä
On 2012-01-15 16:45, Udo Richter wrote:

 I've been living with VDR's auto channel update quite well, back since
 VDR 1.3.x eliminated the need of the AutoPID patch.
 
 The only thing I need an external tool for is to clean up all the dead
 channels from time to time. I never understood why people need external
 scan tools anyway, at least on an average system.

Does this mean that if one now starts up a new VDR installation from
scratch without any channels.conf whatsoever, VDR will find some
channels to show on its own?  How long does it take for it to find some
channels, and how does that look like from the user POV?  (I suppose I
could just try it out myself, but I'm too lazy to do that ATM.)

When I started using VDR sometime in the 1.3.x series, I don't think
that happened automatically at all, I had to use dvb-apps' scan to
generate a channels.conf.  This is on DVB-C, and I don't think I've ever
used an AutoPID patch.

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Re: [vdr] howto ignore lines in channels.conf

2012-01-15 Thread fnu
 I've been living with VDR's auto channel update quite well, back since 
 VDR 1.3.x eliminated the need of the AutoPID patch.

I said, I can go with the thought, it should be rather a native VDR
function. From the technical point of view you're right, it runs perfectly,
this function for people who know what to do. But where to hack is it
written down, that experts and specialist wouldn't like some comfort?
Whereas this might things easier for noob's starting to become an expert ...
;-)

But again, I also know this would not be easy to implement, unlike a small
function to enable or disable an entry in channels list thru OSD.

 How long does it take for it to find some channels, and how does that look
like from the user POV?

A couple of weeks ago I did use this feature in a friend's new installation,
it took around 15-20min in the background to gather ~ 500 channels from his
cable provider, while we did watch live tv in foreground. Ok, you need at
least one running entry in channels list, to make it happen. But this could
also be pre-defined iptv entry, like it is done w/ yaVDR ...

Regards
fnu


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Re: [vdr] howto ignore lines in channels.conf

2012-01-15 Thread VDR User
On Sun, Jan 15, 2012 at 3:29 AM, Ville Skyttä ville.sky...@iki.fi wrote:
 Even though they'd get lost when VDR writes it, allowing comments there
 would be an improvement so distros (and VDR itself) could ship the file
 with some comments in it that instruct users what they need to do before
 things will work, or what the file is for, or...  Same thing applies to
 remote.conf, setup.conf, and timers.conf.

 If the AllowComments parameter exists just for the purpose of
 disallowing comments in files where VDR doesn't preserve them, I suggest
 removing that restriction altogether and allowing comments everywhere.
 Allowing comments and preserving them are two different things.  For
 files where VDR doesn't preserve them it could note that on the first
 line of such files, for example like:

 # Warning: VDR will overwrite this file without preserving comments.

I see no real benefit in complicating file (which stores only channel
information) functions with what you've suggested. It just seems like
a bunch of unnecessary work inside VDR for something that isn't any
more useful than simply putting such info/comments in the README,
MANUAL, INSTALLATION, or other appropriate files.

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Re: [vdr] howto ignore lines in channels.conf

2012-01-15 Thread Ville Skyttä
On 2012-01-15 18:39, VDR User wrote:
 
 I see no real benefit in complicating file (which stores only channel
 information) functions with what you've suggested.

VDR already contains code in file functions whose only purpose IIRC is
to make it possible to disallow comments in some files.  *That* is
unnecessary complication (which also happens to get in the way in some
corner cases) and I suggested getting rid of it.

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[vdr] howto ignore lines in channels.conf

2012-01-14 Thread cedric . dewijs
Hi All,

I would like to add some comments to channels.conf, and remove some channels
I never watch. I have tried adding lines beginning with #, but this does
not work, I still see those channels when I choose channels in VDR.

What charakter can i add in front of a line to let the line be ignored?

Best regards,
Cedric

   




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