Trying to get XMLTV working

Ton VH

I have a XMLTV file that contains all necessary information.
I want to use this in TVHeadend (running on Synology) so I daily put it in /volume1/@appstore/tvheadend-4.0/var/epggrab.
Also I understand from several topic that I need "tv_grab_file", DL'ed it, placed it in same folder as the XMLTV folder also I changed the "cat ...." in "cat /volume1/@appstore/tvheadend-4.0/var/epggrab/XMLgen.xml" and restarted TVHeadend.

From other message I expected that now I could set "Internal Grabber" into this file but I can only choose "disabled".

Does not work. Question: how to get an existing XMLTV file into TVheadend???

Help is much appreciated.

K Shea

I usually refer people to this page
https://freetoairamerica.wordpress.com/2014/12/03/some-hints-for-getting-free-to-air-satellite-channels-into-the-electronic-program-guide-in-kodi-or-xbmc-or-another-frontend/ but I can tell you that the tv-grab-file script goes in the /usr/bin directory (you'll probably need to use sudo to move it there) and it also must be made executable. However that assumes your system is capable of running bash scripts. The article referenced above explains all this so try reading that and then ask if you have any more questions.

Ton VH

Read those pages and downloaded the alternative "tv_grab_file, changed the "cat" so that it referred to the place where my XMLTV file is and placed this in "/user/bin" on my Synology.

Now I can select XMLTV as Module. Did so and "Saved Configuration"., Stopped TVHheadend and restarted.

No matter how often I do the above. Each time after restart the Module is set to "disabled".

K Shea

Ton VH wrote:
> Read those pages and downloaded the alternative "tv_grab_file, changed the "cat" so that it referred to the place where my XMLTV file is and placed this in "/user/bin" on my Synology.
>
> Now I can select XMLTV as Module. Did so and "Saved Configuration"., Stopped TVHheadend and restarted.
>
>

> No matter how often I do the above. Each time after restart the Module is set to "disabled".

That is very odd, I have never seen that happen. You really don't need to stop and restart TVHeadEnd after selecting it, but still once you have selected it and saved the configuration it should continue to work. I hope "/user/bin" was a typo because it should be in "/usr/bin". When you say you are using it on a Synology, did you install TVHe3adEnd on that or is TVHeadEnd preinstalled as part of some other package? Hopefully you aren't running OpenElec because that will fight you every step of the way. But also I would check to make sure that bash is actually installed (type "which bash" at a command prompt as that article suggests). And also, after you copied the file to /usr/bin did you make it executable? I know you have to use sudo to do that. If the script isn't executable then TVHeadEnd can't run it. And also did you pick some random time for the script to run every morning? If you didn't, or if you messed up and used an invalid time format, that might explain why it's setting it back to disabled - maybe it has some logic to disable the script if it can't be run, I don't know though, but those are the only things I can think of offhand.

Ton VH

It was indeed put in "/usr/bin", permission "rwxr-xr-x", I installed TVHeadend 4.0.8-1 from Synocommunity, all "tv_grab_file" contains is "cat /volume1/_Downloads/#Televisie/XMLgen.xml", is executable, checked it by running in Terminal, made no changed to "Cron Multi line", only selected the module. The really weird thing is that no matter what I change on that page it is always reverted to default. Looks like it is not written to the donfig-file.

K Shea

Ton VH wrote:

> It was indeed put in "/usr/bin", permission "rwxr-xr-x", I installed TVHeadend 4.0.8-1 from Synocommunity, all "tv_grab_file" contains is "cat /volume1/_Downloads/#Televisie/XMLgen.xml", is executable, checked it by running in Terminal, made no changed to "Cron Multi line", only selected the module. The really weird thing is that no matter what I change on that page it is always reverted to default. Looks like it is not written to the donfig-file.

That is not the correct tv-grab-file script. Go back and read that article, it tells you where to get the correct script, assuming your system has bash. If it doesn't but can execute .sh scripts, it tells you where you can find an alternative script that might work.

Seriously, read the article again, and don't get into the mindset that because someone gives you a file named tv_grab_file that it's the correct one. Obviously it isn't, or TVHeadEnd would probably not keep rejecting it. You have to use a little intelligence when trying to make this stuff work, especially if you are going to try to run TVHeadEnd on some oddball device that it was never designed to run on. I understand the appeal of trying to get it to run on some low-power device, but if that device doesn't run Ubuntu (preferably Ubuntu Server Edition) or Debian as the operating system, and you're not a real Linux guru, you are asking for a world of small problems like this. Yes, there are probably people who get it to work, but unless you know one of them personally and can get them to build your system for you, you are probably going to have a lot of frustration - particularly if when someone shows you an article that tells you how to do it, you refuse to follow the instructions in that article because you already have a file you think is the correct one despite the indications that it isn't. And even if you do get the correct file, you may still have issues, because I suspect that system doesn't include the bash shell.

I'm sorry but I'm afraid I can't help you any further. Maybe someone else can, but I can't. I don't (and won't) run a Synology, and you probably should be talking to someone who does.

Ton VH

I did read the article and did use the modified tv_grab_file from there. When this file is run on my NAS it produces the output of the TVXML file.

The problem is not with this file anyway. No matter what I change on that page and do a "save" upon reloading it again is in the original state. Changes are not written to disk. See https://www.dropbox.com/s/y6idtm89lwwkthn/TVheadend.1.mkv?dl=0

Synology (mine is certainly not "low-power") is not the problem here.The primary problem here is that the "save configuration" does not work!