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[imeric]

I'm trying to set my Sage recordings in JRiver and i'm not sure about the syntax I need to use.  For example I want to record all games from a team that will play on different channels under different names and syntax. So far I haven't been successful.

I'm trying to find how to do this on the wiki but there's nothing there to help..Where can I find the documentation on how to do this?

We can't really use forums to find general info on how to use the software it really is time-consuming..Tried googling couldn't find anything...

[imeric]

For my specific issue it has something to do with "do not record reruns".  I know the game is not a rerun but there is not enough info for MC to tell if it is one or not...
So the behavior in this case should be that instead of ignoring the recording from the subscription it should let the user record it.

[imeric]

It's not it..I've tried everything and it's not possible to set a subscription for a specific soccer team...Help!!

[kstuart]

I think we need more specifics about what you are trying to do.

Although I do remember having similar problems trying to set Dish Network DVRs to record only specific sports teams.

[RoderickGI]

As Kstuart says, more information.

In fact I suggest that you write down the rules you use in your mind, in short simple sentences, and then let's see if MC can do what you want.

For example;
1. Record ALL Redsocks games.
2. Record all Yankees games played at home.
3. Record all games played at xxxxxx.
4. Don't record any retransmissions of a game already recorded.

You get the idea.

Also, you need to take a critical look at your EPG data. Particularly consistency of Naming and Description of games in the EPG. If your EPG doesn't have the data, or is inconsistent, MC is not going to always get it right.

[imeric]

All right:

Let's say I want to record 2-3 of the last Blue Jays games. They will run on 3-4 different sports channels sometimes labelled
MLB Baseball: Toronto against Yankees, other times It will be Toronto Blue Jays against NY Yankees, other times it will be Toronto against New York.

WHat I tried to do was to add all those different names with a semi column so that it would try to get any of the combinations possible but without success...If I could just get the syntax somewhere documented it would go a long way...(Semi column is an and or an or?  SHould I use a similar syntax like when creating a smart playlist?

I'll play around a little more with this but in the meantime if you have any suggestions or doc somewhere that would be great.  

[imeric]

In other words If I don't give it the exact name of the show it will not subscribe. (even though I unchecked exact name)

If I could get the option to choos e specific words to look for in both the name and program description it would work.  I think it's not doing what it's supposed to do (as all the options are there to do so)... Can someone please try it and let me know?

thx

Even with the exact name as another post below it does not subscribe.

[imeric]

I think we need more specifics about what you are trying to do.

Although I do remember having similar problems trying to set Dish Network DVRs to record only specific sports teams.

@kstuart what did you do to resolve it?

As Kstuart says, more information.

In fact I suggest that you write down the rules you use in your mind, in short simple sentences, and then let's see if MC can do what you want.

For example;
1. Record ALL Redsocks games.
2. Record all Yankees games played at home.
3. Record all games played at xxxxxx.
4. Don't record any retransmissions of a game already recorded.

You get the idea.

Also, you need to take a critical look at your EPG data. Particularly consistency of Naming and Description of games in the EPG. If your EPG doesn't have the data, or is inconsistent, MC is not going to always get it right.

@RoderickGI: I want EXACTLY #1 and #4.

[Yaobing]

What you tried to do won't work.  Unchecking "exact name" will only allow small variations, not the type of different things you are trying to do.

You can set up multiple subscriptions to achieve your goal, but then they will not be cross-checking against each other.  At least you will be able to record those games.

[RoderickGI]

@RoderickGI: I want EXACTLY #1 and #4.

Well exactly #1 and #4 isn't so hard, with caveats.

• Put "Redsocks" in the Name field of a subscription rule. MC will use the content of this field to match a program. The content does not have to be a program name, or include any part of the program name.  It can be matched to something in the Description, for example.
• Make sure "Require an exact name match" is NOT ticked. MC will match on partial program names, or any content in the EPG Name field. An "exact match" is just that. It only matches when the program name in the EPG is precisely what is entered into the Name field.
• If it is possible that "Redsocks" may not be mentioned in the Program name, but should be in the description, tick the "Search all fields for name" box. The content of the name field will be searched for in the EPG data. I suspect that it searches the Name, Series, and Description fields, and maybe the Season and Episode numbers?
• Tick both the "Do not record reruns" and "Do not record programs that have been recorded in the past". MC may get a match with these and not record duplicate programs, but that is entirely dependent on the EPG data being consistent, which is often not true, and often it is deliberately different.
• Set Compare fields to Name and Description. If the Series field has something useful in it, you could add that as well. But for a sports program I suspect the Series field will either be empty, contain inconsistent data, or contain something far too generic to be useful. Less is better when doing such a match.
• If the game may be shown on more than one channel, and you not sure which channel will show it, then select all the channels which may show it, or just "All channels" in the Channel field.

That rule will result in lots more programs being recorded than you want, as it will record ANY program that mentions "Redsocks" in the EPG data. However, it probably won't miss recording a game.

As Yaobing says, your earlier requirement of;

Let's say I want to record 2-3 of the last Blue Jays games. They will run on 3-4 different sports channels sometimes labelled
MLB Baseball: Toronto against Yankees, other times It will be Toronto Blue Jays against NY Yankees, other times it will be Toronto against New York.

can't be done, because MC doesn't have any AND, OR, NOR, etc. functions in the TV rule definition functionality. It just compares the text in the Name field with what is in the EPG. You may get close by using multiple rules, but MC would record a lot more copies of the Redsocks games. I always go for more recordings rather than missing a recording, but even I wouldn't want to be managing all the recordings that result from multiple subscription rules that meet all the above criteria.

This is an area that I would like to see improved in MC TV. We need multiple rules attached to one subscription, and those rules need to be linked with AND, OR, NOR etc. commands, among other improvements.

To get the best out of any rules it is also necessary to have good quality EPG data, which is often hard, and usually requires a curated EPG source, rather than OTA sources, web page scrapers, and so on.

[imeric]

All right...I've done everything you recommended Roderick thanks but if I just hit subscribe on the one game and it doesn't show up in my "to be recorded list" eventhough exact match is not checked but in this case it should be an exact match.  I've unchecked everything else so I'm sure it's something not working in MC.

[imeric]

So Yaobbing will you try to fix it so that it can work for people wanting to record games of specific hockey, soccer football teams?

Everything seems to be there it just doesn't seem to follow what it's supposed to do...(Or just give more flexibility like a playlist smart list creation)

[Yaobing]

It will not be a "fix".  It will be a new feature, down the road, someday.

[imeric]

I just did the EXACT same thing with MC20 where I just subscribe without tampering with the Name and I confirm that the recording will show up in "to be recorded". SO there is a fix required.

And the reason I say a "Fix" is because if it was doing the compare fields as per advertised in the description, name, etc...This should work.

For example if it was comparing fields for one of those words: Blue Jays; MLB; Baseball; Toronto in The name, series name and description.  This could work.

Works like a charm in Sage.  The only thing you need to specify is the team name.

[RoderickGI]

You are misunderstanding the functionality. It is either simpler than you think, or you are just applying your Sage point of view on to MC.

The Compare fields are only used in conjunction with the "Do not record programs that have been recorded in the past" to decide if the program has been previously recorded. To confirm, just untick the "Do not record programs that have been recorded in the past" flag and you will see that the "Compare fields:" field becomes inactive.
[Note to Yaobing: The "Compare fields:" field can be active when I first enter a rule to reconfigure it, even if the "Do not record programs that have been recorded in the past" flag is unticked. I suspect that that is unintentional.]

I do not believe that it uses the contents of the Name field in this comparison. It compares the full contents of the selected Compare fields from the EPG for each program to be recorded, with I assume the Library recorded of previous recordings. If they all match, the later showing is not recorded.

When you created a subscription rule earlier, if you got it correct, then it would have shown up in the "To be recorded" list. You did something wrong. While I haven't implemented MC21 yet, the functionality hasn't changed from the version I am using, so it works. Nothing is broken. I suspect that a setting was wrong, or if you had a big list of programs to be recorded, you missed the new one in the list. How did you have the list sorted? By day and time, which is the default, or by name?

The method I use to check rules is:
1. Create the rule.
2. Click on the "To Be Recorded" list.
3. Enter the Program Name, or the first part of it, into the search box in the top right corner of Standard View. I enter enough of the program name to get a short list as a result. This avoids scrolling to find programs.

You will then be able to see if your rule has selected a program to be recorded. If you want to check if the expected rule actually selected the program to be recorded, rather than some other existing rule, then;
a. In the "To Be Recorded" list, right click on the program that you are investigating.
b. Select "Configure Recording", "Subscription Options", "Next".
c. Check that the expected rule is opened for editing.

If you are just fine tuning a rule, then you can stay in the "To Be Recorded" list and use the right click method to tweak the configuration, and the list will be updated.

For example, I was just testing "Do not record Reruns" flag using a rule that selects a program which is repeated once within the current week. With the flag unticked, two showings of the program are in the "To Be Recorded" list. With the flag ticked only the first showing of the program is in the list. You may wish to know that this works even though the EPG does not have a "Rerun/Repeat" flag in it for either show. As MC knows the first showing is on the "To Be Recorded" list, it doesn't select the second showing.

I actually thought it would be the "Do not record programs that have been recorded in the past" flag in conjunction with the "Compare fields:" values that would decide if the second showing was to be recorded. But no, it is the "Do not record Reruns" flag. That begs the question; How does MC know a later showing is a rerun, if it doesn't use the "Compare fields:" values and there is no flag in the EPG? It appears MC must make some assumption about what constitutes a rerun.

Anyway, if I have this all wrong Yaobing, please correct me. Perhaps even confirm I am correct if you can, as that would be helpful in future discussions.

[imeric]

Roderick thanks for explaining the logic behind the Compare fields this definitely helps.

For the rest I've already tried all your suggested points (but htanks for taking the time to write them down it's confirming my approach was good)

However I do confirm that the behavior for MC21 (recording not in the to be recorded list) was different in my specific case than MC20 (recording was present in my to be recorded list).  I can check again tonight as it was getting late last night and I may have missed something...Will post back

The Bottom line is there is no way to build ONE subscription (to avoid overlaps, building more than one will just create overlaps) where I can tell MC to record all sports event for a specific team and a specific sport.  (AND I TRIED REALLY HARD TO MAKE THIS WORK...)

In the EPG it could have any different combinations of names in either the description or name of the show...

The logic required would be as follows: (Toronto OR Blue Jays) AND (MLB or Baseball) in any of the fields description and name.

If we could create subscriptions like we build smart lists I believe this would work.

AND There should also be a way to choose between conflicts (it's good that MC shows them but we should have the ability to favor one over the other...Just like Sage.)  I know I'm a pain with Sage but it's intuitive and it works even though it hasn't been developed for ages...

I know the MC folks are sick of hearing me bring up Sage and may take me the wrong way but my feedback is done to help make MC better..It has definitely gone a long way lately for TV wathcing/recording...Let's just find ways around these show stoppers so that MC is the best all around software ever!!!  (And that I can ditch Sage for good)

[kstuart]

Note that something may appear or NOT in the "To Be Recorded" list depending on the setting of the Day/Time at the top of the list.

For example, if you have setup to record a program on August 9th, and you set that Day/Time to August 11th, it will not show the August 9th program because it has been filtered out of the display - even though it is still set to be recorded.

[RoderickGI]

I agree that this is an area that MC needs to improve by quite a bit. There are plenty of examples in MC where multiple rules are applied to create a Smartlist, or a View, so TV subscriptions should be given the same treatment.

Don't worry about the Sage thing. You had Sage, I had TEDS Suite, others compare to all sorts of software they have used in the past. On the forum though, it does work better to ask "How do I do this" or "Could MC be enhanced to do that" rather than "Make it like the software I have been using for years, but I'm not happy with and want to replace". JRiver want specific, positive suggestions, and respond better to them.

If you set up a rule in MC21, then used the Search field on the "To Be Recorded" list, and the program didn't show up, then maybe there is an issue. I've never seen that problem, but I have missed seeing a recording in the list if I don't use the search function to look for it. When I upgrade I will look for that. Perhaps if you post some screenshots of all your subscription settings someone will take a look before I get to it.

On the conflicts issue, I have never had one in MC, since I have four tuners and there isn't that much I record. So I have never even seen the functionality! I would hope though, that the "Priority" field on the "Recording Options" page of a TV subscription rule is used to decide which program to record. There are five levels of priority, so there is plenty of scope for differentiating the importance of a recording. Maybe one day I will have a play with that.

[greynolds]

This is definitely one of the areas where the TV functionality in MC is pretty weak compared to most other DVR software options.  I've tried setting up rules to record Boston Bruins NHL Hockey games without much luck other than to end up with a bunch of extra recordings with shows about the Boston Bruins (historic games, specials about past stars, etc.) that I just don't want to have to manage.

I believe that with a relatively small amount of work in MC, the guide data can be leveraged to make it work.  WMC (yes, I know that saying make it work like another program isn't what they want to hear, but examples of how it works elsewhere can generate ideas...), which uses the same guide data (or at least did until the recent changes) as MC makes this work by allowing the user to setup a keyword search within a category.  So I can choose Sports -> Hockey -> NHL as the category and then enter keywords of "boston bruins at" and end up with just recordings of current Boston Bruins games in WMC once I edit the settings to only record new shows.  The same basic procedure works for recording Boston Red Sox games.

This limitation is one of the biggest reasons I haven't fully switched over to using MC for TV and continue to just experiment with it until these limitations (hopefully) get addressed.