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[NickF]

When I look at TV Options > Edit Channel List, there is a checkbox against each of the listed channels.  What is the purpose of this?  I had assumed that checked channels would show up as a separate list.  I can't find this anywhere, not in Standard View or TheaterView?

Nick.

[imugli]

Favourite channels are the ones that get scrolled through when you use the channel up or channel down buttons.

[NickF]

Thanks imugli.  I guess I had expected rather more than that.  What I believe we should have is a listing of favorites in TheaterView so that you can scroll up and down that list and select the channel you want.  The trouble with using channel up and down is that it takes several seconds to change channel and if you need to go up or down 20 or so channels, it would take ages.

I think there should also be a version of the guide containing favorites.

Yaobing, can you give this some consideration?

Nick.

[Yaobing]

You can create your own channel list in theater view.

[NickF]

You can create your own channel list in theater view, one for TV and one for Radio using a custom field.

Yes, I've already done that but it would be great if it worked off the favorites marking.  This doesn't seem to appear in any of the channel fields or did I miss it?

Nick.

[Yaobing]

Yes, I've already done that but it would be great if it worked of the favorites marking.  This doesn't seem to appear in any of the channel fields or did I miss it?

Nick.

Right.  This feature is not marked in a database field.  Maybe it should.

[Z0001]

You can create your own channel list in theater view.

How do I do this? I have managed to add in Theatre View a "Television" menu item under "Video" and under "Television" I added a "Channel List" menu item. In this I set the Media Type = TV rule and added under Details "TV Channel" and "TV Channel Number". But in Theatre View I get an Unasigned category and then all the TV channels are listed, not just the ones I have marked as Favourite. Is there a step by step guide to setting up a Favourites channel list in Theatre View if users don't have an EPG?

Thanks
Z

[NickF]

First, remove the entries from the details box.  You should then find your channels listed in the right place in TheaterView.  I went through the same process and still don't understand what should go in the Details box.

What I did was to add a Custom field.  Go to Tools > Options > Library & Folders.  Click on Manage Library Fields.  Under the column showing all the current fields, click the "Add New Field" button.  Name the field - I called mine Channel Type.  I left all the other settings at their default values but in the Acceptable Values box, I entered the different values I wanted.  This will create a drop down list when you populate the field later.  The values need to be separated by a semi-colon and dont put a space after the semi-colon.  I used Sat-TV and Sat Radio.  You may want Favorites and some others.

Now go to Options > TheaterView  and click on your Channel List.  Remove your entries from Details.  Add a new rule and choose "Channel Type" is "Favorites" or whatever value you want to show in TheaterView.

Close out of the settings and shut down Media Center, including the server in the system tray.

Restart MC and go to TV in Standard View.  I'm not sure whether there is a better way of doing this but this seems to work!  Double click on "All Channels".  MC will start to play the first channel in the list.  Press the stop button and go to Playing Now.  Click on your current active Zone and you should see a list of all the channels with their fields.  Right click on the title bar for the fields and select Channel Type.  The Channel Type field column will now show.  Go down the list and rename the value in this field for each of your favorite channels to Favorites.  Now, when you go into TheaterView, you should find your Channel List with your favorites.

Nick.

[Sandy B Ridge]

NickF,

I wonder if there's a way of doing this without the custom field. I'm not by the PC at the moment, away for a few says which allowed some time for thinking!

If you create a Smartlist with 'Media Type = TV', one of the field contains a lot of parameters separated by commas. If you were savvy enough with MCs database syntax (like a few forum members seem to be whizkids) I'm guessing that you could work out which parameter was the one for videostream type and have some sort of filter for your smartlist along the lines of:

if the value between the 6th and 7th comma is equal to none

It should bring up all the radio channels.

One of the parameters in that long list of CSV must be for favourite too I'm guessing.

Maybe if you post one of the channels then one of the RegEx boys can lend a hand?!

SBR

[NickF]

I had a look at a few channels and deduce that the Video PID is the 7th parameter in the string.

TV Channel DTV 2612 (32-9560)12523000, 0, 2, 2318, 5, 0, 0, 319, 0, -1, , 2318, 2, 27500, 11700, 0, 0, 20, 2, -1, -1 (DVB-S).tvlb

Is anyone out there clever enough to create a Smartlist expression to filter based on this parameter within the "Filename" field?

Unfortunately, the Favorite flag does not appear in this string.

Do Smartlists only appear under Playlists?

I am just reading up about them.  Only done a simple one so far based on my Custom Field which works OK and gives a new Playlist in TheaterView.

Nick.

[Yaobing]

Favorite channels are saved in the registry, unfortunately.  It is not found in any parameters in that string with many commas, not is it found in any other database field.  This may change in the future.

[Sandy B Ridge]

Thanks Yaobing.

Is there an expression that would filter out radio/TV channels in this way?

ie A list of TV channels is:

7th variable <> 0

How does one do this in MC speak? Is this possible or too complicated?

SBR

[Yaobing]

Thanks Yaobing.

Is there an expression that would filter out radio/TV channels in this way?

ie A list of TV channels is:

7th variable <> 0

How does one do this in MC speak? Is this possible or too complicated?

SBR

Not right now.  The channel string is meant to be internal.  I will have to make some additions.

[Sandy B Ridge]

Oh rats!

Never mind.

SBR

[Sandy B Ridge]

I had a look at a few channels and deduce that the Video PID is the 7th parameter in the string.

TV Channel DTV 2612 (32-9560)12523000, 0, 2, 2318, 5, 0, 0, 319, 0, -1, , 2318, 2, 27500, 11700, 0, 0, 20, 2, -1, -1 (DVB-S).tvlb

Is anyone out there clever enough to create a Smartlist expression to filter based on this parameter within the "Filename" field?

Would this work as a filter do you think?

Listitem([Filename],6)=0

I'll give it a go tomorrow.

SBR

[Z0001]

First, remove the entries from the details box.  You should then find your channels listed in the right place in TheaterView.  I went through the same process and still don't understand what should go in the Details box.

What I did was to add a Custom field.  Go to Tools > Options > Library & Folders.  Click on Manage Library Fields.  Under the column showing all the current fields, click the "Add New Field" button.  Name the field - I called mine Channel Type.  I left all the other settings at their default values but in the Acceptable Values box, I entered the different values I wanted.  This will create a drop down list when you populate the field later.  The values need to be separated by a semi-colon and dont put a space after the semi-colon.  I used Sat-TV and Sat Radio.  You may want Favorites and some others.

Now go to Options > TheaterView  and click on your Channel List.  Remove your entries from Details.  Add a new rule and choose "Channel Type" is "Favorites" or whatever value you want to show in TheaterView.

Close out of the settings and shut down Media Center, including the server in the system tray.

Restart MC and go to TV in Standard View.  I'm not sure whether there is a better way of doing this but this seems to work!  Double click on "All Channels".  MC will start to play the first channel in the list.  Press the stop button and go to Playing Now.  Click on your current active Zone and you should see a list of all the channels with their fields.  Right click on the title bar for the fields and select Channel Type.  The Channel Type field column will now show.  Go down the list and rename the value in this field for each of your favorite channels to Favorites.  Now, when you go into TheaterView, you should find your Channel List with your favorites.

Nick.

Thanks Nick that worked a treat when using one rule.  One thing I noticed, maybe its a bug, is that when I tried to set up 2 new custom library fields each with their own string (one field with string DVB TV, DVB Radio and one with string Favourite), once I had selected one of the rules in my Theatre View design, when i set up the second rule i could not select the string options, only "empty" was available.

Thanks again for your help
Z

[NickF]

Thanks Nick that worked a treat when using one rule.  One thing I noticed, maybe its a bug, is that when I tried to set up 2 new custom library fields each with their own string (one field with string DVB TV, DVB Radio and one with string Favourite), once I had selected one of the rules in my Theatre View design, when i set up the second rule i could not select the string options, only "empty" was available.

You can do this with one custom field which is set up to take multiple values.  In Library & Folders > Manage Fields, for your new custom field, set Data Type as List (semi-colon delimited) and set Edit Type to List.  Now you can include Favourite as one of the Acceptable Values.  In the File listing, when you Rename, you will have check boxes and you can select as many as you like.  The same applies to the Rule so you select the combination of values to filter the channel for inclusion.

Nick.

[Sandy B Ridge]

I had a look at a few channels and deduce that the Video PID is the 7th parameter in the string.

TV Channel DTV 2612 (32-9560)12523000, 0, 2, 2318, 5, 0, 0, 319, 0, -1, , 2318, 2, 27500, 11700, 0, 0, 20, 2, -1, -1 (DVB-S).tvlb

Is anyone out there clever enough to create a Smartlist expression to filter based on this parameter within the "Filename" field?

Would this work as a filter do you think?

Listitem([Filename],6)=0

I'll give it a go tomorrow.

I'm not getting any luck with expressions. 

In my smartlist of channels I've tried to add a 'Modify Results' with a Limit(advanced) with the following expression:

=[isequal(listitem([Filename],6,/,),0,1)]

But nothing works.

SBR

[NickF]

I'm not getting any luck with expressions.  

In my smartlist of channels I've tried to add a 'Modify Results' with a Limit(advanced) with the following expression:

=[isequal(listitem([Filename],6,/,),0,1)]

But nothing works.

SBR

I have struggled with this for hours - well you know I have plenty of time on my hands!!  I really can't get to the bottom of expressions within Smartlists.  Even the most straightforward expressions simply don't work.  What I have done is to create a Custom Field which I called TV Type in Options > Library & Folders Manage Library Fields.  I checked "Calculated Data" and inserted your expression:

IsEqual(ListItem([Filename],6,/,),0,1)

and checked the default search field (not quite sure whether that was necessary).

Now, in your Smartlist, add a new rule, select Custom and insert "[TV Type]=1"

Now yor Smartlist will contain only radio channels.  "[TV Type]=0" will give you TV channels.

For some strange reason, TV Type does not appear in the drop down lists of fields.

It is also impossible to get a rule to work within TheaterView Guide settings - very frustrating.

So your rule was basically OK but I don't know how you use it in Smartlists.

Nick.

[Sandy B Ridge]

So your rule was basically OK but I don't know how you use it in Smartlists.

Thanks!

Glad I'm not going bonkers.

In the expression builder wiki it says that expressions can be used in a search field too, but I failed to get anything sensible here too.

Expressions can be used as search filters, and in order to do so, the expression must be entered into the search field using the following format:
[=EXPRESSION]=1 or [=EXPRESSION]=0
All files that match the expression will return "1" and all that don't match, return "0". Decide which is required and use "1" or "0" accordingly.
Remember that the search field appears in many places throughout MEDIA CENTER, places that include:
The search field itself (in the top right corner of the program)
A view scheme search list
"Edit Files To Show" area of the Customize View dialogue
Play Radio Files
The last.fm submission filter
The links manager
and this method of expression application can be used in all of them.
An example of an expression formatted for use in the search field would be: [=isequal(formatdate([date imported,0],MM//yyyy),formatdate(now(),MM//yyyy),1)]=1 Which will list all files that have been imported this month.

I thought I'd tried:
[=IsEqual(ListItem([Filename],6,/,),0,1)]=1

Probably just me being a lemon....

I'll have a bit more time tomorrow night to try again.

SBR

[Sandy B Ridge]

OK, Eureka moment!

Create a smartlist for

Media Type = TV
Custom = [=IsEqual(ListItem([Filename],6,/,),0,1)]=1

And you get Radio channels!


Media Type = TV
Custom = [=IsEqual(ListItem([Filename],6,/,),0,1)]=0

And you get TV channels!

Sorted.

SBR

[MrC]

If the 7th param is always 0 or 1, you can simplify:

   [=ListItem([Filename],6,/,)]=0
   [=ListItem([Filename],6,/,)]=1

This works because the expression ListItem([Filename],6,/,) always returns a 0 or 1, in this case.

The [=expression] and =0 or =1 stuff is just syntactic goo to allow the placing of expressions into a smartlist "field".  The [=expression] means evaluate the expression inside the [=  ], and the =0 or =1 is used as the comparison against that result.

[NickF]

If the 7th param is always 0 or 1,

Unfortunately, it isn't.  If the channel is Radio it is 0 but if TV, the value can be a multi digit positive number.

For this one:   [=ListItem([Filename],6,/,)]=1 , can we have a >=1 instead?

Nick.

[MrC]

I don't think that works.

More possibilities as instructive examples:

This one only looks for matches, but allows you to switch the comparison operator inside Compare():

Radio:
  [=Compare(ListItem([Filename],6,/,), =, 0)]=1
TV:
  [=Compare(ListItem([Filename],6,/,), >, 0)]=1

Regex() is a little more difficult - this one looks for a 0 as the 7th item.  Non-zero's are selected by negating the comparison.

Radio:
  [=Regex([Filename], /#^([^,]+,\s*){6}0,#/)]=1
TV:
  [=Regex([Filename], /#^([^,]+,\s*){6}0,#/)]=0

The Math() function can be used, but it is slow, so better to use Compare().

[Sandy B Ridge]

@MrC
Much kudos to you guys that can do these RegEx thingies. It's just gobbledeegook to me! Probably why it's taken me a week to figure out a simple expression! Thanks for your help!

@NickF
I had a quick go at trying to massage the EPG Grid view in TheaterView into showing just Radio or just TV using this expression, but whatever I tried just destroyed the Grid - No data to show.
I'm guessing that you should be able to get a channel list of either TV or Radio up in TheaterView using this expression, but I didn't get around to trying. Whatever I did to try and filter the EPG just failed.

SBR

[NickF]

I had a quick go at trying to massage the EPG Grid view in TheaterView into showing just Radio or just TV using this expression, but whatever I tried just destroyed the Grid - No data to show.
I'm guessing that you should be able to get a channel list of either TV or Radio up in TheaterView using this expression, but I didn't get around to trying. Whatever I did to try and filter the EPG just failed.

Same for me with EPG.  Normal rules don't seem to apply.  I'd really like to know why, otherwise we have no flexibility in presentation of guides.

Your expression works fine in normal channel lists in TheaterView.  Well done and thanks to MrC.

Nick.