ATSC EPG - Possible Implementation Strategy?

J.J. Smith · 2012-11-21T20:56:44+00:00

TVHeadend has made a lot of exciting progress recently, but developers have (pragmatically) focused on their local broadcast standards. For TVHeadend to beco...

Steve Smith

There is no "-d" switch for configure. Use "configure --help" while you're in the tvheadend program directory like you would be when you compile. Configure without the switch and it will work, but that has nothing to do with the gui not working.

This is NOT a problem with the version of tvheadend here. While I would like to add the solution to my tutorial, nobody has offered one and I'm not gonna look for it myself either. I don't own an RPi and I'm not going to emulate it.

I just don't understand why everyone uses windows to unzip the file. Doesn't an RPi have a browser and an internet connection. The research that I have done shows this. Can't you download the file onto the RPi and unzip using the tools supplied with a debian based OS like Xbian?

Look on the main tvheadend forums. I have seen mention of this before. Look on the internet and search for "windows symbolic links" and read that stuff. It tells me that is your problem. I have read that the windows version of 7zip does not correctly handle symbolic links as per the needs of the OS you are running.

Hasn't anyone figured this out? If you have, post your solution please and I will add it to my tutorial.

Good luck!
Steve

Steve Smith

Hi Lauri,

I previously said that your 4.0 version was consuming all of my cpu and crashing eventually. This was true, however I did not use a clean configuration when I did so. When I reverted back to your original version, it did exactly the same thing. I wiped the configuration and it is working fine. I plan on retrying your 4.0 version with a new configuration and report the results. I won't be making that mistake again, I plomise.:D

Later,
Steve

Steve Smith

It appears that I was wrong again. Upon adding more channels to Lauri's original version it also started to consume all of my cpu and crash. It seems as if the adding of one channel (LAFF) which is new to my area is causing this problem. I don't have any reception problems with this channel so it must have something to do with the format of it. If I don't record anything from this channel, no problem. The information gathered from mediainfo is attached. I have no idea what the problem could be but hopefully someone can look at the attachment and see something wrong with this channel. I have recorded three different programs on this channel and they all cause the crash. It has happened when the program was the only one recorded so my previous prognosis was wrong. It seems to have nothing to do with recording more programs than there are available tuners. If only someone using the main tvheadend program could see this behavior maybe it could be fixed. It is most certainly a tough one. At any rate, I don't think there is anything wrong with Lauri's version but I honestly don't have the expertise to give 100% assurance. I will no longer be recording the LAFF channel.
On another note, Lauri's new 4.0 version will not recognize the FOX frequencies for some reason. No matter how many times I try I cannot map the FOX frequencies even though they are in my mux list. It is not because of bad reception either. Anyone else have this problem? This is also the same and only frequency that records the wrong programs. Another tough one. I have a whole bunch of debug logs and backups of the configuration if anyone thinks they will help.
Later,
Steve

Rob Gale

Hi All. This is a great thread and I have got as far as building and testing the 4.0-atsc-epg branch. For a while I got stuck on the webui Error 500 problems but I found this seems to be due to symlinks stored as files in the repository. The way I got around this was to do a git clone to pull the repo locally. Then I switched to the 4.0-atsc-epg branch using "git checkout "remotes/origin/4.0-atsc-epg". There is definitely something funky about how the symlinks are being extracted from the zip and staying as files instead of being converted to links.

Rob

Steve Smith

Hey Rob.
Glad to see you got it working. Did you install it on an RPi?
On a previous post I said "Look on the main tvheadend forums. I have seen mention of this before. Look on the internet and search for "windows symbolic links" and read that stuff. It tells me that is your problem. I have read that the windows version of 7zip does not correctly handle symbolic links as per the needs of the OS you are running."
Installing it using "git checkout" bypasses the need to unzip it. However, that is not something a newbie could easily accomplish.
I have also wrote "I just don't understand why everyone uses windows to unzip the file. Doesn't an RPi have a browser and an internet connection. The research that I have done shows this. Can't you download the file onto the RPi and unzip using the tools supplied with a debian based OS like Xbian?"
I have also wrote "Hasn't anyone figured this out? If you have, post your solution please and I will add it to my tutorial."
I guess what I'm driving at is has anyone installed it onto an RPi successfully using the zip file? If so, would that person be willing to post a step-by-step procedure for this. If someone does, I will add to my tutorial for completeness.
Lastly, technically, and semantically, this statement "There is definitely something funky about how the symlinks are being extracted from the zip and staying as files instead of being converted to links." is wrong and should be reworded to "There is definitely something funky about how the symlinks are being extracted from the zip and being converted to files instead of staying as links.".
Thanks,
Steve

Rob Gale

Hi Steve. Thanks for responding. My dev environment is an RPi2 running osmc. I fetched the zip directly from the RPi using wget and unzipped using "unzip". I am going to investigate further but right now my focus is getting my RPi installed and streaming to my TVs. The good news is that the 4.0-atsc-epg branch worked very well for me as far as setting up and populating EPG info after discovering the channels (I am US based). What I really want to do though is hook up minidlna to serve the channels to my uPnP capable Blu-Ray players. I will start looking at that plumbing now.

Rob

Ted Correll

Hey everyone!

Its been a while, but I am back and have great news: I have it working!

I think I ran into the same trouble Rob did with extracting from the zip file. I bypassed this by using git clone and specifying the branch I wanted.

Steve, I will post what I did step by step soon.

Ted Correll

I'm sorry, this took longer to post than I planned.

1st I updated everything through Xbian configuration from within Kodi (Kodi settings/Xbian/Update). then ran the following commands:
sudo apt-get update # I don't remember if this updated anything or if using the update in Xbian Config caught evertyhing
sudo -s apt-get install git build-essential pkg-config libssl-dev dvb-tools libdvbv5-0 liburiparser-dev liburiparser1 libavahi-client-dev zlib1g-dev libavcodec-dev libavutil-dev libavformat-dev libswscale-dev git # I don't know if all of this is necessairy (I got the list from Lee C and omitted OSMC specifics), but ./configure returned many more OK messages than without getting all of those (previous attempts)
git clone https://github.com/laurimyllari/tvheadend.git branch 4.0-atsc-epg
cd tvheadend
./configure
make

sudo make install

from here I followed Steve's guide for setting up.

Thank you for all of the help!

I would also like to add that once everything is set up, while hitting the 'Trigger OTA EPG Grabber' button caused activity in the log, but it didn't produce EPG data. But aobut 20 hours later after both the 2:04 and 14:04 scheduled scans had ran, I had epg data in Tvheadend. It took rebooting Kodi a few times to get the EPG data to show up; each restart would add a channel or two to the guide in Kodi. After that I have had EPG continuously.

Steve Smith

Thanks Ted. I have updated my tutorial to reflect your steps and have added other things as well especially related to the RPi, usage of git, and downloading the zip file directly. Check it out and let me know if you see anything wrong.
As far as Kodi goes, I have seen the exact same problem. Don't be surprised if it keeps on doing it though. I have seen that behavior a lot. I record all of my programs so I don't use Kodi much at all.
If I want to view tv, I use Xine. To add channels from tvheadend. In a browser run "http://localhost:9981/playlist" which will give you a file called "channels" to save to your file system. Import the playlist into xine. This is lean and mean whereas Kodi is fat and passive. There is also a plugin for VLC at https://github.com/BtbN/vlc-htsp-plugin. Good luck,
Steve

Steve Smith

Hey people, I just noticed that atsc epg support has been added to mainstream tvheadend version 4.2 nine days ago. Thanks to all of those involved! This link http://tvheadend.org/versions/59 explains it. It is alpha and requires testers. It's time to crack some knuckles.
Steve

Steve Smith

Hello everybody, I just thought I would let you know that the version (v4.1-822-g18d993f) of MAINSTREAM tvheadend found at "https://github.com/tvheadend/tvheadend" does parse the psip data and populate the epg data so you can now use it to record your favorite programs automatically. An earlier version may not work so just download the latest. Keep in mind that this is still alpha and when ready will become v4.2 release. It still doesn't map all of the channels that pre-4.0 versions did so I don't know whats up with that. It does find some new channels even though they are unusable. You will have to manually add them. I had five frequencies that wouldn't map and it took me an hour to manually map them. Make sure you backup your old configuration in ~/.hts and let tvheadend make a new one for you. I not sure but I don't believe it's even compatible with the 4.0 version as per what I remember reading. Another thing that threw me off was you have to enter a new users username then switch to a different tab and enter the password.
This is just sweet,
Steve

Steve Smith

Just an update on the MAINSTREAM tvheadend atsc-epg progress. Quite a few fixes were introduced so if you haven't given it a test drive then now is the time to do so. While it is still in alpha, it seems that it is working well and ready for production. You might find it to be an improvement already. Download and install to find out.
Steve

Jim DiCarlo

any idea when v. 4.2 will get released?

Steve Smith

I don't rightly know. Alls I know is that the community was asked to test the latest version and I helped with that. A few bugs were fixed and then I gave it a thumbs up. It seems to already be working better than the versions here. The url http://tvheadend.org/versions/59 says its development is at 100% so maybe soon. Nothing wrong with downloading the latest version, installing it with a new configuration, and using that. Just make sure you backup your old configuration if you don't like it. When version 4.2 is released you can install that and shouldn't have to use a new configuration again. Besides, it wouldn't hurt to have another tester. I just use it for auto-recording programs using the psip data. It is nice to have another tester for that and other things, such as timeshift. At any rate, your contribution is welcome.
Steve

Jim DiCarlo

I installed the latest version but really want to use the ATSC EPG data to see if 4.2 is working as designed to give my thumbs up, but seems like there are no links to download and test it. I kept my original system fully functioning, so no biggie if I cannot get it.

Jim

Steve Smith

The version at https://github.com/tvheadend/tvheadend is the latest version. If you download the zip file you will get the latest version. You can also consult my earlier tutorial.
Steve

mpmc

Quick & Easy guide to building Tvheadend on a RPi2 (This also works on any other deb system!).

sudo apt-get install git build-essential debhelper pkg-config fakeroot git clone https://github.com/tvheadend/tvheadend.git build/tvheadend/master cd build/tvheadend/master ./Autobuild.sh

What each lines does.
* 1 Installs a few dependencies (you'll need to install some more later on).
* 2 Clones the Tvheadend master branch from github & places it in build/tvheadend/master.
* 3 Changes directory to the above path.
* 4 Runs the Autobuild script that will build a debian package so that you can install it in a nice and neat way.

AUTOBUILD_CONFIGURE_EXTRA=--enable-libffmpeg_static ./Autobuild.sh if you want transcoding

Other info.
The Autobuild.sh scriptwill complain about other missing dependencies you need to install those (using sudo apt-get install) and then run the script again.

Once the build has completed you'll find the built debian package (E.g tvheadend_4.1-368~geeda7d7_armhf.deb) in build/tvheadend.

You can then install it (and the debug package) using.


cd build/tvheadend
sudo dpkg -i tvheadend*.deb

Jim DiCarlo

Well, I installed version 4.2 on my RP2 with OSMC as the os and I have some feedback. First of all, I would not have tried this if I had installed the hdhomerun driver on my original install but since I am getting one on Tuesday, I figured that I would rebuild with the latest version. What I noticed right away was that they created a wizard to configure it when you launch it with the firstrun option. But the wizard did not actually do anything, do not know if I was doing something wrong, but none of those options went into effect. Next problem I had was (by mistake) I edited the default user name (which was different on the version I installed 7 months ago) when username and password was on the same line now password was located on a different line, so now I was locked out of my new install. I proceeded to make uninstall an make clean but FYI that does not work correctly either and you need to manually remove the .hts folder and then reinstall it or the corrupt database is still there and you cannot login to the server. Well, it is working fine now and looking forward to adding an hdhomerun device on Tuesday to see how that works (that will be new to me since I never had one before) and do not know how that will get along with my other 2 USB tuners.

Jim

mpmc

Jim DiCarlo wrote:
>Well, I installed version 4.2 on my RP2 with OSMC as the os and I have some feedback. First of all, I would not have tried this if I had installed the hdhomerun driver on my original install but since I am getting one on Tuesday, I figured that I would rebuild with the latest version. What I noticed right away was that they created a wizard to configure it when you launch it with the firstrun option.But the wizard did not actually do anything, do not know if I was doing something wrong, but none of those options went into effect. Next problem I had was (by mistake) I edited the default user name (which was different on the version I installed 7 months ago) when username and password was on the same line now password was located on a different line, so now I was locked out of my new install. I proceeded to make uninstall an make clean but FYI that does not work correctly either and you need to manually remove the .hts folder and then reinstall it or the corrupt database is still there and you cannot login to the server. Well, it is working fine now and looking forward to adding an hdhomerun device on Tuesday to see how that works (that will be new to me since I never had one before) and do not know how that will get along with my other 2 USB tuners.
>

> Jim

There is no version 4.2yet only 4.1.x development code. The wizard is a WIP and does not do much.

You can bypass any failed logins by using a superuser file (use dpkg-reconfigure to create this) or if that fails run tvheadend with the --noacl option.

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