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[Bob t]

Hi,
Just getting started on this with J River 17 and my dell computer which has an (old) Hauppauge Win TV HVR 1200 card, so far it seems to be working quite well in terms of picking up stations and even recording them but i want to be able to set up to record when i'm not here for which i seem to need a program guide. But the default setting don't seem to include a TV guide for Australia still less the hunter region where i am located
Appreciate any help anyone can give.
Thx Bob t

[imugli]

Welcome aboard, Bob.

Check out this thread for how to get guide info in Oz

http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=67674.0

Cheers,

Justin.

[The Mastermind]

or try

http://epgstream.net/index.php/xmltv-download/

[Bob t]

Thanks for your replies guys - let you know how I go

Cheers

Bob T

[BrianD]

Is http://epgstream.net/index.php/xmltv-download/ a free service?

I am currently using a script to grab epg data from IceTV every night on a free monthly subscription but this will expire soon and I will have to start paying for it. 

[The Mastermind]

It is free.

[astromo]

Further Australian EPG info:
http://www.cse.unsw.edu.au/~willu/w/xmltv/grabbers/

[astromo]

... ahem ... my fellow Australians, I was hoping to post up a few packaged links to explain but if they're out there, I can't find them.

In the words of well known TV ad for a 4WD ute, "bugga" ...

Oh well, here goes. The epgstream.net scaper of the OzTivo EPG data is dealt with above and in the links. From my comments here:
http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=81875.msg558053#msg558053
I went in search of another EPG because OzTivo went off line over Christmas.

I'd tried to make Shepherd work some time ago, as per these links:
http://svn.whuffy.com/
http://svn.whuffy.com/wiki/Installation
but I numptied out. If someone else out there can put a guide together, great, I probably just missed something basic.

Anyway, from what I can make out from this:
http://www.pcmediacenter.com.au/forum/topic/46401-sydney-shepherd-data-broken/
Maxx Power and kalzdak (kudos dudes) run Shepherd and then upload it to this site:
http://www.siliconhill.com.au/shepherd/

So, all you have to do then is to set up a download grabber (cue MC developers to include this function within the software), so here's a run down of what works for me.

The job requires a couple of command line executables and I've bashed this together with an old school .bat file.

I'm using cURL for the downloader:
http://curl.haxx.se/
another option is wget.

After the EPG file is downloaded it needs to be unzipped from its .gz format. For that I've used gzip:
http://www.gzip.org/#exe

I've setup a folder on a drive (take your pick), for me that folder is:
E:\XMLTV Shepherd\EPG
and here's the base .bat code that I've put together:

Code: [Select]

E:
CD "E:\XMLTV Shepherd"
del /f .\EPG\output.xmltv.gz
cURL -O http://www.siliconhill.com.au/shepherd/ZZZ/YYY/output.xmltv.gz
gzip -d -f output.xmltv.gz
MOVE XMLTV.xml .\EPGWhere ZZZ is the city/town you get your TV from and YYY is your TV format either "fta" - free to air or "fox" for Foxtel.

Then just point MC to the folder where the EPG lives as per the standard deal.

I don't use the Windows on board task scheduler. I've posted what I work with here:
http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=81514.msg557123#msg557123
Use what suits you. Anyway, run the .bat at a time that suits.

Hope the above helps. It should at least give the simpletons like me out there, another option to make the EPG work.

I'll repeat though, it would be great if the MC developers could work in a downloader that could be directed to a URL with an option to kick in a unzip function. That would be ideal. I suspect that Australia's not the only place in the world where XMLTV EPG files are posted up to the interweb...   

[astromo]

Here's another option that I just found that could have promise. Looks like it uses some of the same sources (OzTivo and Siliconhill):
http://webgrabplus.com/

[Marra]

Astromo

Following your lead above, I get to the download grabber option and then get lost setting it up. Is there a simple one option "download" button on curl page.

And every time epgstream... options are suggested I get a page full of advertising.

[astromo]

I can see how it can appear confusing. To be honest, it's been so long I've forgotten exactly where I found cURL but the developers put together a selection wizard so it's not much more than point and shoot (I think     ).

Give this a go. Pick your operating system:
http://curl.haxx.se/dlwiz/?type=bin
and you should be on your way..  good luck.   

[astromo]

Following a prompt from Sandy B Ridge to check this post:
http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=77177.0

I've decided to give EPG Collector a go. I'm brazenly stealing Sandy's UK guide and modifying it with some local Australian experience, note italics, and chopped the UK satellite stuff and out of date info.
[EDIT at 1 April 2014:
Details are provided in the instructions below to initiate a command line executable that automates the process + various updates have been included to account for improvements relevant to MC19 (if you're using an older version you might notice some differences) ... Enjoy ..  ]

[EDIT at 1 August 2015:
Further detail is provided at the bottom of this post assuming that the user wishes to use the themoviedb and thetvdb scraping function within EPG Collector. This is a development to EPGC that has been added since this guidance was first written. Also, thanks to some good sleuthing and suggesting from RoderickGI, MC reads xmltv standard series, season and episode formats so that it aligns with EPGC. More detail on this can be found over at sourceforge Get EPG info working in Australia (Season + Episode). Note, EPGC has its imperfections when it comes to gathering TV show data - How to Force a theTVDB ID as the Default within EPG Collector?. One to be aware of.]


EPG Collector Instructions for the UK Lucky Country

The EPG Collector developer site is here http://epgcollector.sourceforge.net/
Download the EPG Collector files from http://sourceforge.net/projects/epgcollector/files/
Note you'll need the .NET framework installed to make the software functional.

For info, I went into the version folder (v4.1) and downloaded the relevant files individually including the software installer and the fixpack. If you just go for the download button all you get is the latest offering. The fixpack works by unzipping the files into the program folder and the relevant fixed files are copied straight over the top.

Install EPG Collector
Launch the installer and then run the fix pack (if relevant for the version selected). Initially I installed to a non-default location but this gave me execution problems when scanning channels. I re-installed to the default location and things have worked fine so far.

I found by trial and error that the channel settings for my area were out of date thanks to:
http://myswitch.digitalready.gov.au/
I can't find it now but I was able to get details of the changed frequencies for my area. Using that info, I navigated to:
C:\Program Files (x86)\Geekzone\EPG Collector\Configuration\TuningParameters\dvbt
and found my home town .xml and manually edited the frequencies that have changed by switching the read status in file properties and using a text editor. It's pretty self evident once you're in there. If you don't do this check, then you may not get all the channels during the tuner scan step that's covered later. Read further down this thread to find relevant detail that reviews the impact of the Digital conversion across Australia. Note that the standard channel config files from EPG Collector should be viewed with caution until that process is complete and the config files have been updated.

Run EPG Centre
This is the user interface for the command line tool (EPG Collector) that actually gets the data. This is the bit that you need to set up for your configuration.

Create Collection parameters
Go to File -> Create Collection parameters...

For free to air TV, select Custom Parameters

This opens the configuration window.

Tuning
The first tab (Tuning) will need to be set up to suit your requirements, so at Delivery System work the dropdown boxes as follows:-

Cycle through the details noted below for your area's frequencies:
Country --> Australia
Area --> State - City/Town (of your choice)
Frequency --> Pick the Freqs to suit your viewing choice
Collection Type --> EIT (Event Information Table - http://www.mythtv.org/wiki/EIT)

The other Collection Type option you can select is MHEG5.
If you do this, make sure that you navigate to the Advanced tab and set the Country to Australia. If this is left unmarked, the program defaults to NZ and it will use:
C:\Program Files (x86)\Geekzone\EPG Collector\Configuration\MHEG5 Parser Format NZL.cfg
For Ozzie conditions, this file is required (located in the same spot):
MHEG5 Parser Format AUS.cfg


Click "Add" and repeat until done.

Output
Check that the radio button is selected for "Create an XMLTV file"
Set the Path for the output file to somewhere sensible (you'll need to remember where because you need to put this into MC later)
Tick the boxes for the two 'create episode tags ...' options [I can't find this detail in v4.1 with EIT so have ignored it.]

Advanced
Set the Country to Australia as noted above to ensure that MHEG5 will function if that collection type is set

Channels
Click on start scan. This step takes time so grab a cuppa. Loads of channels should appear (if they don't, check your firewall exception settings and make sure EPG Centre and EPG Collector are whitelisted). What I do is click on 'exclude all' and then untick the excluded box for the channels that I actually want (and can tune).

Click on Save as and make sure that you save it as the default settings (called EPG Collector.ini). Move EPG Collector.ini to a noted location for later use.

Run EPG Collector
Do this via EPG Centre (look for the Earth globe icon or the command line) to check that the configuration works. Again this takes time, so here's your chance to finish that cuppa...  

Set Up MC
Next, you need to set MC to use this file.

Load Program Guide
Navigate to Devices > Television > TV Options > Load Program Guide

Set this to XMLTV, Next...

Load XMLTV
In the Load XMLTV .... Box, put in the location of the xmltv file ...
Refer details provided in the thread below to configure an excecutable to automate the process - link provided here:
http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=67992.msg586047#msg586047

, then Next...

Channel Match
Most of the channels should have auto matched to the xmltv file. You can correct any stragglers here. Next...

Setup Auto Load
Make sure the 'Automatically load...' box is ticked.
Set a daily download time that suits your viewing preferences. Consider a time when you're not using the system.
Then, Finish.


Get Movie & TV Info
To add themoviedb and thetvdb lookup functionality, follow these additional steps:

1. Open EPG Centre and load the configuration file that you've setup...
    File > Change Collection Parameters
2. Navigate to Output > XMLTV Options > Format of episode tag and select "Valid season and episode numbers only"
3. Then navigate to Lookups and enable (by check box) Movie Lookup and TV Series Lookup
4. I'd suggest setting "Type of image to download" to None to minimise data download as this is a function that MC can do more than adequately. If you take this step, manually create the following folders (this should be made unnecessary in later versions of EPGC-
C:\Users\[-your local user-]\AppData\Local\Geekzone\EPG Collector\Images\Movies
C:\Users\[-your local user-]\AppData\Local\Geekzone\EPG Collector\Images\TV Series
5. Now navigate to Lookups > Miscellaneous and set "Lookup matching method when multiple results returned" to Nearest.
6. For initial set up only, while you're in the vicinity, check the box marked "Reload all metadata". This forces set up of local databases that have TV and movie info that EPGC uses when it's doing a match on the OTA EPG data.
7. Now give the whole thing a whirl, i.e. Run > Collect EPG Data...
8. Once that's done you should have 2 files in C:\Users\[-your local user-]\AppData\Local\Geekzone\EPG Collector\ viz. TV Series Database.xml and Movie Database.xml that are full of data.
9. Now return to Lookups > Miscellaneous and uncheck the box marked "Reload all metadata". This minimises data download to changed info rather than a wholesale update.

[Marra]

Astromo and Sandy

Success with EPG Collector in Australia !

Some points
1. If your area is not listed in the dropdown options in Delivery System use "Australia - All Regions" (worked for Gippsland Victoria).
2. The Channel frequencies required are available in MC (Drives & Devices/Television/TV options/(scroll down) Advanced/Edit channel list).  Yeah, I got the frequencies over the internet before knowing this.
3. The guide at first quick look only is for today and half the following day.

Hopefully heading in the right direction.

Thanks guys for the detailed explanation (if I can get it to work others certainly can).

Marra

[dafloydman]

Thanks astramo, sandy Marta. After much fruitless searching this has worked.  thanks so much

[astromo]

The detail reflects a lot of personal pain and hours burnt.

In the vein of what goes around, comes around, this is all part of good forum karma. Enjoy ... 

[BradC]

HI

I have EPG working with jriver using DVGguide to grab the EPG data off the air.
It runs using a windows schedule

One catch was that I had to use mergex to merge the multiple xml files for jriver.

If anyone is still having trouble I can post my bat files

Brad

[astromo]

HI

I have EPG working with jriver using DVGguide to grab the EPG data off the air.
It runs using a windows schedule

One catch was that I had to use mergex to merge the multiple xml files for jriver.

If anyone is still having trouble I can post my bat files

Brad

Brad

Have you got the name right? From a quick keyboard finger walk, I can find this on the net:
http://www.dvbguide.com/

[BradC]

Yeah that's correct. A slight typo

[jmone]

Sorry Gents - Missed reading this thread.  I'm in Sydney and have been using EPGCollector for over a year.

I too was running it from Windows Task Schedule but I think I'll just see how the MC scheduler goes (see pic).

Here is my EPG Collector.ini for Sydney.  All very simple.

[GENERAL]
Output=M:\Media\EPG Centre\TVGuide.xml
Timeouts=10,300,5

[DVBT]
TuningFile=Australia.NSW - Sydney.xml
ScanningFrequency=177500,7,EIT

[DVBT]
TuningFile=Australia.NSW - Sydney.xml
ScanningFrequency=191500,7,EIT

[DVBT]
TuningFile=Australia.NSW - Sydney.xml
ScanningFrequency=219500,7,EIT

[DVBT]
TuningFile=Australia.NSW - Sydney.xml
ScanningFrequency=226500,7,EIT

[DVBT]
TuningFile=Australia.NSW - Sydney.xml
ScanningFrequency=571500,7,EIT

[astromo]

Sorry Gents - Missed reading this thread.  I'm in Sydney and have been using EPGCollector for over a year.

I too was running it from Windows Task Schedule but I think I'll just see how the MC scheduler goes (see pic).

Here is my EPG Collector.ini for Sydney.  All very simple.

You missed it?

Mate, what have you been doing? Tearing up the back paddock where it's one roo short of a jolly jumbuck? Can't imagine you've been distracted with waiting for the match up between the Wallabies and the ABs. There's more work needed on that front before we see the kiwis under threat.

Anyway, enough of the Australianisms. Thanks for the pics. Nudged me to consider another way to crack the nut. Bewdy, bonza cobber!  


[EDIT: Gave the jmone method for EPG Collector a go. Using the noted parameters, it worked like a freakin' charm.

Coupled with the User time selected EPG upload, I've got a power utility set up to wake the HTPC just before loading the EPG ... nice one. I'll be having a look tomorrow to see whether there's been a glitch ... touch wood]

[astromo]

Refer here for info on EPG Upload timing:
http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=82865.0

Neat piece of functionality.

[RoderickGI]

Hey Astromo and Sandy B Ridge, et al.

The thread at http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=83121.0 prompted me to ask a question or two about Australian EPG, and I thought it would be better to ask here rather than in that thread, since all the information is here. Thanks Astromo and everyone else.

I am still using an XMLTV download from IceTV for my Melbourne EPG requirements. However, as you may know, using an XMLTV download from IceTV means that I can't get any benefit from all their added value functionality, like setting and checking recordings from anywhere on the internet, including my iPhone, backup of all settings "in the cloud" on their site, better tagging of data like movies, repeats, etc., and so on.

So I'm thinking that if another reliable source of plain EPG data is available, it would do just as good a job as IceTV is doing now. I have approached IceTV and asked what their future is, particularly with respect to any Media Center application support and transferring their added value to applications other than Windows Media Center. Specifically, I asked about their IceTV Interactive software as it is integrated with WMC and provides all the added value functionality within WMC. I was hoping that they may even hook into the Freeview data stream and use it to improve the accuracy of recording start and stop times, removing the need for long padding times.

I even suggested that they contact J River and talk about working together to build a custom integration solution . . . but they are focused on a new PVR they are developing, and frankly seem to be having trouble working out their value proposition. Sad.

Anyway, I am thinking that I should try EPG Collector and save myself the IceTV subscription.

But just how reliable is it, and how complete is the data? IceTV does not provide data for all available channels, which means that J River won't list all channels in the Guide (no data = no display, I would prefer a blank line so every channel is shown, unless I hide it).

Do you get EPG data for all channels?

Do you use multiple XMLTV sources and merge them together, with something like Mergex as mentioned above? I might even consider using IceTV for the main channels, EPG Collector for all others, and Mergex to merge the data for loading into J River MC, if the IceTV data is more accurate.

Has anyone looked at what data is available in the MHEG5 format in our broadcast data streams? I believe that Freeview data is supplied in MHEG5 format, but I don't know if it is encrypted or readable, or how EPG Collector may present it. It would be great if we could harvest start and end time updates from the broadcast data streams and update MC in a timely fashion so that recordings start and end when programs do!

I've used cobbled together solutions in the past and really don't want to be tweaking and tuning multiple bits of software constantly just to get a reasonable EPG. Also as you probably know, in Australia EPG sources come and go, wax and wane, and generally can't be relied upon, except for IceTV up until recently, when EIT data and now Freeview data is starting to be reliable. All this usually means switching sources, and software used to harvest their data, far too often. I would rather avoid that, but I can cobble together bits one more time if the solution will last.

Anyway, sorry for a long ramble. Any thoughts, experience or answers you would like to share?

[jmone]

I used to use various scrapers than then were combined into one XMLTV file but I find this new setup better.  Here is an example of what it pulls for Prime Time tonight.  You can just give it a go to generate an XMLTV file and see if it is to your liking.  You can always go back to other sources.  I did also try ICETV but the cost model was nuts.

[RoderickGI]

Thanks for the info and especially the image. It shows quite a lot. I will probably try EPG Collector out soon.

I agree that the value proposition for IceTV is falling away, which is a bit of a shame since they had a lot to do with forcing broadcasters to provide decent over the air EPG data.

[astromo]

I used to use various scrapers than then were combined into one XMLTV file but I find this new setup better.  Here is an example of what it pulls for Prime Time tonight.  You can just give it a go to generate an XMLTV file and see if it is to your liking.  You can always go back to other sources.  I did also try ICETV but the cost model was nuts.

I'm with jmone, there's no sense to me in paying for something that is broadcast along with the tv signal. Couple that with the instructional info here in this post and you should be feeling couch potato-tastic in no time.

[astromo]

Sorry Gents - Missed reading this thread.  I'm in Sydney and have been using EPGCollector for over a year.

I too was running it from Windows Task Schedule but I think I'll just see how the MC scheduler goes (see pic).

Here is my EPG Collector.ini for Sydney.  All very simple.

For ease of use (copy, paste & edit to suit), here's a rundown of the EPGCollector parameters for loading an EPG to MC:
  Television > Options > Load program guide > XMLTV > Run an executable to retrieve XMLTV data >

Executable:
C:\Program Files (x86)\Geekzone\EPG Collector\EPGCollector.exe

Command line arguments:
/ini="[Drive Letter]:\[Folder 1]\EPG Collector.ini"

Load results from this file:
[Drive Letter]:\[Folder 2]\TVGuide.xml

Where:
 [Drive Letter] = your drive of choice
 [Folder 1] = the folder where EPG Collector.ini is stored
 [Folder 2] = the folder where TVGuide.xml is stored
I put the various files in separate folders.

[astromo]

Just a quick update. If you're having trouble scanning, check your firewall exception settings and make sure that EPG Centre and EPG Collector are whitelisted.

I found that a USB tuner didn't require this treatment but the network style tuner (I've got an HDHomeRun unit) was being blocked by Windows firewall and EPG Centre / Collector couldn't access the tuner.

Had me baffled until I thought about, "what's different?" and I als noticed an error message in the run log with, "Exit code = 13". A quick search on the net then gave me the answer.

[jmone]

FYI - With the retune in Australia - Here is the latest full list for Sydney "EPG Collector.ini" file

Code: [Select]

Output=M:\Media\EPG Centre\TVGuide.xml
Timeouts=10,300,5

[DVBT]
TuningFile=Australia.NSW - Sydney.xml
ScanningFrequency=177500,7,EIT

[DVBT]
TuningFile=Australia.NSW - Sydney.xml
ScanningFrequency=191625,7,EIT

[DVBT]
TuningFile=Australia.NSW - Sydney.xml
ScanningFrequency=226500,7,EIT

[DVBT]
TuningFile=Australia.NSW - Sydney.xml
ScanningFrequency=184500,7,EIT

[DVBT]
TuningFile=Australia.NSW - Sydney.xml
ScanningFrequency=536625,7,EIT

[DVBT]
TuningFile=Australia.NSW - Sydney.xml
ScanningFrequency=219500,7,EIT
Edit - fixed had CH9 twice and no Ch 10

[astromo]

And here's the sitch in:

[DVBT]
TuningFile=Australia.QLD - Brisbane.xml
ScanningFrequency=177500,7,EIT

[DVBT]
TuningFile=Australia.QLD - Brisbane.xml
ScanningFrequency=184500,7,EIT

[DVBT]
TuningFile=Australia.QLD - Brisbane.xml
ScanningFrequency=191625,7,EIT

[DVBT]
TuningFile=Australia.QLD - Brisbane.xml
ScanningFrequency=219500,7,EIT

[DVBT]
TuningFile=Australia.QLD - Brisbane.xml
ScanningFrequency=226500,7,EIT

[DVBT]
TuningFile=Australia.QLD - Brisbane.xml
ScanningFrequency=529500,7,EIT

Check here for more info:
http://sourceforge.net/p/epgcollector/discussion/1125945/thread/580245e2/
Feel free to add to that discussion link so that EPG Collector can be updated with the next Fix Pack.

[RoderickGI]

I must get on to this. The need to retune SBS recently saw me retune all stations and set up the Guide a bit better by adding channel numbers to the front of the name. It would be nice if we had a sort option on top of that though.

In doing so though I did notice that IceTV had some gaps in the provided EPG. Just more motivation to put EPGCollector in place. Just gotta find the time.

But, I noticed at least one comment a while back that the FTA EPG still required some tweaking. So how is the EPG quality these days? Does it need much attention to keep it right?

[Yaobing]

You can sort channels in Standard view.  I am still trying to figure out how to add the functionality in Theater view.

[RoderickGI]

You can sort channels in Standard view.  I am still trying to figure out how to add the functionality in Theater view.

Well, you can do all sorts of changes in Standard View, but I was talking about the Guide, which is only available in Theatre View. Unless I have missed something important along the way?

Also, I could kludge something together by changing the channel names, which now have the channel number at the beginning, but I want short names and the sort functionality to be invisible in the Guide.

If you have other suggestions, or I have missed something, please let me know.

[astromo]

But, I noticed at least one comment a while back that the FTA EPG still required some tweaking. So how is the EPG quality these days? Does it need much attention to keep it right?

Overall, the FTA EPG is as good as the TV stations produce.

The only issue is when a station does a late change. Infrequent but for well watched shows there are "backup" options via the interweb, i.e. iView or similar. I've had some infrequent hassles with daylight saving time but by the sounds of it you're in Sydney, so that shouldn't trouble you at all.

I'd say that the motivation to change will come when your IceTV subscription runs out.

Honestly, EPG Collector is a pretty straight forward deal. If I can do it, then it shouldn't be too hard to work with.

All the best when you get to it. Any probs, let us know.

[Yaobing]

Well, you can do all sorts of changes in Standard View, but I was talking about the Guide, which is only available in Theatre View. Unless I have missed something important along the way?

I am aware of what you meant.  I said I was trying to add the functionality in Theater view.

Also, I could kludge something together by changing the channel names, which now have the channel number at the beginning, but I want short names and the sort functionality to be invisible in the Guide.

You no longer need to Kludge by changing channel names.  MC can do that for you automatically now.  Just check the checkbox when you scan for channels.

[RoderickGI]

Overall, the FTA EPG is as good as the TV stations produce.

The issue is that IceTV do actually add some value over and above what the TV Station's EPG, such as identifying episodes of series correctly for recording, but also simple things like program descriptions, repeat fields, and such. I guess the only way to know is to suck and see.

The only issue is when a station does a late change. Infrequent but for well watched shows there are "backup" options via the interweb, i.e. iView or similar. I've had some infrequent hassles with daylight saving time but by the sounds of it you're in Sydney, so that shouldn't trouble you at all.

Late changes I know about. It can happen to IceTV or any source. Channel Ten/One just dropped MotoGP races other than the main race, less than a day before the first broadcast. They sold the rights for all other races, qualifying, etc. to SpeedTV on Foxtel. I recorded some useless late night show instead of MotoGP qualifying in Qatar. Not happy! Not even Freeview late change updates would fix that issue. 

I'm actually in Melbourne, and will suffer if there are Daylight savings issues. But I am pretty used to those, and as the PC updates the time correctly, problems should be minimal. Much less than on my old Topfield. Anything specific I should know to look for?

I'd say that the motivation to change will come when your IceTV subscription runs out.

Unfortunately my subscription is on auto-renew to get the best price, so if I am lazy it will just get renewed. But I have until June 5th to implement and test EPGCollector, so I should get it done.

[RoderickGI]

I am aware of what you meant.  I said I was trying to add the functionality in Theater view.

  I forgot that you are The Man, or at least one of The Men that make MC as great as it is. Not only that, you are The Man when it comes to TV functionality. My apologies. My memory slip lead me to think that you were trying to figure out how to do that sort as a user, not as The Man.

As user input, I would be happy to see the addition of "Move Up" and "Move Down" buttons in the "Edit Channel List" dialogue in Standard View, similar to what has been done in the "Group Channels" dialogue, but perhaps with some resizing of the existing buttons to save on screen space a bit. Maybe even combine some of those buttons in the same way that "Add" and "Delete" are combined into "Add/Remove" in the "Group Channels" dialogue. i.e. "Hide/Unhide", "Favorite/Not Favorite", "Add/Remove", "Move Up", "Move Down", and "Edit" buttons.

I wouldn't want to see the internal sort operator or a field representing position, as that adds no value to me. I also wouldn't need to resort in TheatreView. In fact, making dragging and dropping channels on the Guide, for example, would probably result in unintended dragging of channels out of my preferred sequence.

The bigger issue, how to get it to display in TheatreView, I leave entirely to you.  

You no longer need to Kludge by changing channel names.  MC can do that for you automatically now.  Just check the checkbox when you scan for channels.

Yes I noticed that and added the channel numbers during a recent rescan of all channels. Thank you for that functionality.    What I meant was that I could then go in and edit the name further to add a sort characters prefix. The shortest prefix I could use would be single alphabetic character, and I would require a space, so I would be adding at least two characters to the channel name, which I don't wish to do.

In Australia we have some bad channel naming and numbering, so the natural channel number sort isn't the best, and just a name sort is useless. For example, our broadcasters have primary channels of 2, 3,7, 9, 10 (but 1 is the HD version of 10, but they don't always carry the same content). They each have secondary channels which are mostly interesting, and possibly tertiary channels that are mostly not. So the best sort for me is to put the primary HD channel first, and then the secondary channel for each broadcaster, followed by the next broadcaster's primary and secondary, then somewhere else the tertiary and other channels, such as community and shopping channels. Then finally radio stations provided by TV broadcasters.

This would result in a sequence something like this:
2,22,30,32,7,73,9,99,1,10,34,44,11,23,24,33,72,74,78,90,94,95,14,15,37,38,39,200,201

So as you can see, not a lot of logic in the numbering scheme, from a viewers preference perspective.

Anyway, a little OT so apologies for that, but still relevant to how an EPG is used in the TV Guide in MC.

[astromo]

The issue is that IceTV do actually add some value over and above what the TV Station's EPG, such as identifying episodes of series correctly for recording, but also simple things like program descriptions, repeat fields, and such. I guess the only way to know is to suck and see.

Late changes I know about. It can happen to IceTV or any source. Channel Ten/One just dropped MotoGP races other than the main race, less than a day before the first broadcast. They sold the rights for all other races, qualifying, etc. to SpeedTV on Foxtel. I recorded some useless late night show instead of MotoGP qualifying in Qatar. Not happy! Not even Freeview late change updates would fix that issue. 

I'm actually in Melbourne, and will suffer if there are Daylight savings issues. But I am pretty used to those, and as the PC updates the time correctly, problems should be minimal. Much less than on my old Topfield. Anything specific I should know to look for?

Unfortunately my subscription is on auto-renew to get the best price, so if I am lazy it will just get renewed. But I have until June 5th to implement and test EPGCollector, so I should get it done.

Ahh, so that's what IceTV does for you. Very handy to get the series and episode data. I've just got involved with thetvdb instead.

That's a bit of mongrel about the minor races in the MotoGP. Not good for us povo types.

[RoderickGI]

Ahh, so that's what IceTV does for you. Very handy to get the series and episode data. I've just got involved with thetvdb instead.

While IceTV does provide better EPG data, as they edit and manage the content, unfortunately I can't make full use of it, particularly their Series Recording capabilities, because it only works properly when using their Interactive application with Windows Media Centre. They also use a proprietary Season/Episode numbering scheme, so it doesn't help a lot.

So I have taken the plunge and installed EPG Collector, configured it all and set it going. But I wasn't happy with the EIT data. So I tried using the MHEG-5 data stream instead. That is the data used by Freeview devices, and so there is some motivation for them to get it right, and make it more complete, so that it works in their proprietary EPG. Well, MHEG-5 data is better. At least it provides Episode titles, in the sub-title field, for many programs. It also does provide Season/Episode numbers in the xmltv_ns format, although often they don't conform to the standard and are again useless.

Anyway, I found all channels in Melbourne except Channel31, the community channel, have MHEG-5 data. So I set up EPG Collector to get MHEG-5 where it existed, and EIT for C31. I also edited the Melbourne frequency tuning file so that the frequencies that have MHEG-5 default to using it, while C31 defaults to EIT, then included comments listing the channel available in each frequency. I've attached that and my ini file for reference. (I renamed them txt files for ease of uploading.)

The other thing I did was make the XML files much more readable when checking the content. Now I can tell which channel the content applies to, instead of having to look up some cryptic XMLTV number like 1497.

I did this by entering a user "Channel No." on the "Channels" tab of the EPG Collector "Collection Parameters" for each channel in the broadcast transport stream, after scanning for all channels. The numbers I entered are the normal channel numbers for viewing in Melbourne. i.e. 1,2,3,7,9,10,22,23,24,72,73, etc., then changed the "Format of the Channel ID" in the "XMLTV Options" section of the "Output" tab to "User channel number". I included the duplicate channels just for completeness. i.e. 12,21,70,71. In order for the XMLTV import to work, MC needs to know which channel number in the XMLTV file maps to which channel that MC has scanned into its database. I went into the MC "Edit Channel List" and entered the "XMLTV Identifier" for each channel, making them the same as the "Channel Number" field in the same dialogue, and hence matching the values in the XMLTV file. I also hid the duplicate channels in this dialogue at the same time.

So while it is early days, it looks like EPG Collector is doing as much for me as IceTV was. More really, as now I have EPG data for more channels. Nearly all of them in fact. IceTV was only supplying data for the main channels. Because there is data for more channels, they now appear in MC's Guide, so I can see what is on all those extra channels, even if I don't want to watch them.

IceTV did provide much better program descriptions for some programs though, so I'm losing that information. I'll provide a simple example in my next post, rather than make this one longer.

[RoderickGI]

So I pulled out a couple of programs to compare the data provided by IceTV, EIT, and MHEG-5. I've attached the cut down XMLTV file for each, again as a text file for ease of upload and viewing. Open the three up in Notepad and view them side by side.

You will notice straight away that there is more information in the IceTV file. About the only data the MHEG-5 file has that the IceTV doesn't is more actors listed for the "QI: Hoaxes" program. Interestingly the EIT data gives QI a Category of "Sport", while the MHEG-5 gives it more correct Categories of Comedy and Series, while IceTV just says Comedy.

The EIT data is very basic, and inaccurate. Start and Finish time, XMLTV Channel, Title, Description, and useless Episode Number, with a thrown in useless Category. Not good at all, but we knew that.

So Astromo, if you are still just using EIT data, as indicated by the Tuning File you uploaded to the EPG Collector Open Discussion forum earlier this month, you should try MHEG-5 data instead. Have fun!

[astromo]

The EIT data is very basic, and inaccurate. Start and Finish time, XMLTV Channel, Title, Description, and useless Episode Number, with a thrown in useless Category. Not good at all, but we knew that.

So Astromo, if you are still just using EIT data, as indicated by the Tuning File you uploaded to the EPG Collector Open Discussion forum earlier this month, you should try MHEG-5 data instead. Have fun!

Yeah, thanks for pointing this out. Agreed, MHEG5 appears to be a much better option. Although it's rather daft that the series/episode info is so poorly set out when it should really be quite straight forward.

I had a look at working with MHEG5 and either I'm doing something wrong with setting up the config.ini file or MHEG5 doesn't work for Brisbane. I'll give it another go and see whether I can get it to work.

[astromo]

I was able to get MHEG5 to work by searching the interweb and finding this piece of advice:
http://sourceforge.net/p/epgcollector/discussion/1125945/thread/6510b1ce/
Turns out that the software isn't smart enough to work out what country you're in just through the Create Collection Parameters > Custom Parameters > Tuning tab.

I've used this opportunity to update the Australian EPG Setup post to make it consistent with MC19 and other technical details. Plus I've included some format changes that hopefully improve user readability. I've struck out redundant detail so that the change history is clear for anyone who's interested.


Back to MHEG5 - for the Brisbane EPG data, I couldn't see a noticeable difference in the info text quality. Regardless, it's always good to have options and thanks for prompting me to improve my understanding. I also note that I've not explored some of the other config options the software provides but I'll leave that alone for now.

[RoderickGI]

Yes I found that bit of advice before I tried an MHEG-5 run, so it worked for me first time. Sorry I didn't mention it. The setting hardly shows up in the ini file either, so you probably wouldn't have noticed it. The only change I could see was the third line under the [GENERAL] heading is "Location=AUS,0" when I think it was originally "Location=AUS". I'm not even sure of that. Regardless, it works.

The MHEG5 data isn't all that much better, but for many, not all, programs the inclusion of a sub-title value makes a big difference for me in reading the TV Guide. Also, seeing all stations in the Guide is a big improvement over IceTV which only included the major 18 channels. It is sort of nice to see the music channels in the guide and select them if I want. The shopping channels I will probably turn off, or I will just view the Favorites Guide instead of the full guide. I have the major stations set as favorites and they show on one page of the Favorites Guide.

I read ALL the documentation on EPG Collector. If I didn't understand a function from the description, I tried it, then read the description again to work out what it meant. Most of those extra settings don't add value in our situation. On the Advanced tab, only the Country setting is useful. Lots of settings are for use with DVBViewer and DVBLink, which we don't need, although we may be able to use them to improve the quality of the XMLTV data. We could also use Big Screen EPG to do that. I'm not going to look into that for now, but maybe in the future.

I have the TV and Movie lookups turned on for now, but I don't think they are doing anything useful to the XMLTV data, They just download images of movie covers. Note to get that working you need to manually create the "Movies" and "TV Series" sub-directories used for images, but I only get movie images.

The Edit tab could be useful to correct bad naming of programs, or make series selection easier. For example, I considered putting in an edit that changed "NCIS: Los Angeles" to "NOT WANTED" as I record NCIS but don't want to record the spin-off show. However I found just ticking the box to "Require an exact name match" in the MC recording rules correctly excluded "NCIS: Los Angeles". (I think that tick box is a new feature. Not sure.) At the moment the Edit tab is a good feature looking for a use with me. 

I have the "Check for program repeats" box ticked on the "Repeats" tab, but I think most of that functionality is tied up with and only works with WMC. It could be responsible for putting the <date> field in for some records, but I haven't tested properly. Anyway, a <previously-shown start="YYYMMDDD"/> or a <original-air-date> field should be created to make it work properly. IceTV did do this well for WMC.

The above are the only other settings I am using.

Finally, my installation isn't all functional yet. I have set up MC to run the EPG Collection at 8am every morning, but so far it hasn't run to schedule at all. But, I have been doing manual runs with testing stuff up until yesterday, and I seem to remember that the automatic run didn't kick off if a run had been done in the last 24 hours. At least I know it always worked with the IceTV software, so it should work for EPG Collector. I'll see if it runs tomorrow. I do have quotes around the executable to run, and you don't, but the process works if I click through the settings in MC, so it should run automatically.

The only other issue I have is that the EPG Collector Lookup process takes so long that my HTPC goes to sleep before it finishes. That shouldn't happen. MC, as the calling program, should keep the PC awake while the EPG process is running. I'll tackle that, and the possibility of running EPG Collector as a process, once I have it running reliably.

[astromo]

Finally, my installation isn't all functional yet. I have set up MC to run the EPG Collection at 8am every morning, but so far it hasn't run to schedule at all...

The only other issue I have is that the EPG Collector Lookup process takes so long that my HTPC goes to sleep before it finishes. That shouldn't happen. MC, as the calling program, should keep the PC awake while the EPG process is running. I'll tackle that, and the possibility of running EPG Collector as a process, once I have it running reliably.

Regarding EPG Collection via MC - if you've got a record in progress the process will wait for it to finish. That's normal behaviour and the reason why I pick a time early in the morning for it to run.

Regarding the second point, that's not right..      .. and warrants specific treatment.

There are plenty of posts on Interact around Sleep and Wake on LAN. This style of issue comes up now and again. I know in my case that I run MC in Server mode and enable network adapters for WoL and MC does a great job keeping PCs awake when needed and asleep when not. I'd ask that you split off into a separate discussion and ask for help with that in a new thread.

Your other on topic comment is relevant and worthwhile. Thanks for that input. I'm glad to benefit from your hard work researching through the details of EPG Collector.. 

[RoderickGI]

Regarding EPG Collection via MC - if you've got a record in progress the process will wait for it to finish.

Actually I'm not sure that is correct, unless there is only one tuner available. I'm pretty sure that I manually ran a collection using the MC dialogue while a recording was happening on the first tuner. As I have four tuners, EPG Collector just noted that the first was in use, and moved on to use the second tuner. I saw that recorded in the log file.

EDIT: Doh. I was talking about EPG Collector there, but you were talking about MC. So you are probably right. MC may not kick off the EPG collection process, and hence won't start EPG Collector on a schedule, if a recording is in process.

I picked 8am because I could look to see if it happened, and I have no recordings at that time, or anything else like backups. Plus I wanted to get the data as late as possible for use on the current day.

Regarding the second point, that's not right..     .. and warrants specific treatment.

I am pretty aware of the Windows Power Management functionality, WOL, Sleep conditions, etc., and have already researched MC and elsewhere, and found an external to MC solution. But I want an internal solution. As you suggest, I will start a separate thread seeking that solution.

Regarding sharing my learning (in a wall of text, as usual), I am happy to do that, as that is what we are here for.

[RoderickGI]

How are you going with the MHEG5 EPG data Astromo?

I have been having trouble with the Load Program Guide function not running on schedule, which I have now fixed. But while I was investigating that I looked at the guide data, and it was useless! There were overlaps of programs all over the place, with incorrect program duration being one of the causes. I don't mean a few minutes overlap, I mean multiple programs on the same channel in the same time slot. In MC these were correctly presented, which meant that the program names overwrote each other in the time slot. Of the 8391 EPG data records EPG Collector found, nearly a third at 2458 records had overlap!

Take a look at the image I have attached.

I did a bunch of diagnostic evaluation, clearing the Guide, running the load multiple times, reboots, reading the XML and log files, and it seemed to come down to bad data from the broadcast EPG. It wasn't even consistent, with overlaps sometimes and huge gaps with missing programs other times. Although it did consistently show a program on ABC that is schedule to run Saturday as being at the same time on Sunday.

My conclusion: The MHEG5 data probably can't be relied upon. It could be EPG Collector missing stuff or getting it wrong, or it could be the broadcast stations sending rubbish.

I'm going to give it a couple of days, especially as we have just gone on to Daylight Savings, so they stations might still be trying to sort out their databases or something. But if it doesn't get better, I'll try EIT (yuck), and if that is just as bad, back to IceTV.

[astromo]

Well, I've not gone back to check MHEG5 from the last time.

EIT works well enough for me up this way.

For info, the public broadcaster up this way is very variable with its EPG. Often there's no data at all. Sometimes they show quirky movies that are a bit of fun but no great loss if I don't know about them.

Our collective experience demonstrates to me that there is a distinct lack of consistent standard across Oz in this regard. So much for paying tax..  ?

[RoderickGI]

Thank you Yaobing. Thank you!

19.0.127 (4/9/2014)

11. NEW: The "Edit Channels List" tool in television configuration allows manual ordering of channels (with "Move Up" and "Move Down" buttons).  Channel sorting is automatically saved and applied in all TV channel lists as default sorting, including the Guide in Theater view.

As user input, I would be happy to see the addition of "Move Up" and "Move Down" buttons in the "Edit Channel List" dialogue in Standard View, similar to what has been done in the "Group Channels" dialogue, but perhaps with some resizing of the existing buttons to save on screen space a bit. Maybe even combine some of those buttons in the same way that "Add" and "Delete" are combined into "Add/Remove" in the "Group Channels" dialogue. i.e. "Hide/Unhide", "Favorite/Not Favorite", "Add/Remove", "Move Up", "Move Down", and "Edit" buttons.

Not exactly what I said, but close enough.   I haven't tested it yet, but I'm sure it works. This will make using the TV Guide so much easier.

EDIT: Implemented. Tested (lightly). It works. Much, much better now. Happy.  

[RoderickGI]

For those using EPG Collector and MHEG-5 data streams in Australia...

EPGC had a problem collecting data from the 226.5MHz ABC frequency recently. It appears that there was a change in the data format. A few iterations with Steve Bicknell in this thread; https://sourceforge.net/p/epgcollector/discussion/1125946/thread/31831fb2/?limit=25#879e  and the problems are all solved. Note there was a bug in the SBS collection as well, which was fixed.

As MHEG-5 data for nearly all channels is present in each Transport Stream, I now only run the collection against the ABC frequency of 226.5MHz. I also run an EIT data collection against 557.625MHz for the Community Channel, C31 (Channel 31, transmitted on channel 44 in Melbourne), as the C31 EPG data is not present in the MHEG-5 data stream. To get EIT EPG data you have to scan the Transport Stream for each network frequency as data is only present for the channels in that TS.

Because I am now only scanning two frequencies, EPG data collection for FTA channels available in Melbourne only takes two and a half minutes. Much better than the ten minutes or longer it used to take when I scanned all frequencies.

I am now on version 4.2 FP 0 of EPG Collector. I assume Steve will do a general release of that version in the near future.

[astromo]

For those using EPG Collector and MHEG-5 data streams in Australia...

Thanks for the alert. I'll give this a read, absorb and take it from there.

The deal of cutting out download of redundant info sounds like sussing things out will be worth the effort. I'd tend to have faith in Auntie, so will follow your lead there.. Sweet - 

[astromo]

Finally got round to doing this. EPG v4.2 seems to work fine.

I'm going to give this tip a go, XMLTV import not reading 'xmltv_ns' episode number?, and see if I can automatically extract season and episode data