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More => Old Versions => JRiver Media Center 22 for Linux => Topic started by: mwillems on September 06, 2016, 07:56:28 pm

Title: [Request] Expose some TV server configuration options on MC for Linux
Post by: mwillems on September 06, 2016, 07:56:28 pm
Some background: a while back I migrated my windows MC 21 server instance to a linux MC21 server instance.  I had previously setup TV with a networked tuner card (HDHomerun Prime) on Windows, and I fully expected to lose all TV functionality for the time being when migrating to Linux.  I made an interesting discovery though.  As part of the changeover, I exported my windows library and imported the library in the new Linux instance, and then went through fixing all my filepaths.  To my great surprise, while the Linux server couldn't watch TV itself or do any configuration, my previous TV configuration done on windows continued to work: guide data kept getting populated and I could watch TV on windows clients of the server.  That was a neat bonus, but it also made me realize that (at least with networked tuners) the server and EPG parts of the TV subsystem appear to already be working in Linux.

The bummer came when I upgraded to MC 22; the upgrade (unfortunately) wiped out my previous working TV config.  Because no TV configuration options of any kind are exposed on the Linux side, I couldn't easily re-do the setup.  I've been intending to spin up a windows VM solely for the purpose of exporting my library to windows, fixing TV config, and then reimporting the library on Linux but that seemed kind of silly. 

So before I spend the time to setup a windows VM and go through all that, I thought I'd ask if it would be possible to expose some of the TV configuration options (EPG and tuner discovery specifically) on the Linux side (appropriately flagged with an experimental tag or turned off by default in features) so that, to the extent the functionality already exists, I can engage with it.  I can understand if that's something that seems undesirable (especially with potential TV support on the horizon later in the 22 cycle), but I figured it can't hurt to ask.
Title: Re: [Request] Expose some TV server configuration options on MC for Linux
Post by: BryanC on September 08, 2016, 09:47:48 am
How did you migrate your settings originally? Library backup and restore? Or did you manually copy the library paths? Because it would seem that you could just restore an existing libary backup that contains your TV settings and then restore a newer backup without the settings option checked.
Title: Re: [Request] Expose some TV server configuration options on MC for Linux
Post by: mwillems on September 08, 2016, 10:47:07 am
How did you migrate your settings originally? Library backup and restore? Or did you manually copy the library paths? Because it would seem that you could just restore an existing libary backup that contains your TV settings and then restore a newer backup without the settings option checked.

I did a backup and restore for everything, and then used the rename tool to update all the paths.  I've made innumerable settings changes since the migration so reverting settings to the six-months-ago library settings wouldn't work for me, unfortunately.  If there's no way to do it natively, I'll just spin up a VM.
Title: Re: [Request] Expose some TV server configuration options on MC for Linux
Post by: bob on September 09, 2016, 10:13:01 am
That's interesting.
There are a ton of options in there however and all of the TV configuration is enabled / disabled by a single define so I don't think it would be too easy to change that.
Title: Re: [Request] Expose some TV server configuration options on MC for Linux
Post by: mwillems on September 23, 2016, 08:53:06 am
That's interesting.
There are a ton of options in there however and all of the TV configuration is enabled / disabled by a single define so I don't think it would be too easy to change that.

So I spun up my windows VM, did the export/input dance, and now my MC for Linux server is successfully serving TV to my windows clients again, so it wasn't just a fluke.  We'll see if the epg keeps updating, but I expect it will (it did before).  So for now this is a "secret" feature  ;D