[mythtv] OSD displays utf8 fonts incorrectly - bug?

[Dave M G]

MythTV Developers List,

I am turning here because I have pursued this issue for quite a while on 
the MythTV Users list, but it seems to be the case that no one there has 
the ability to help. I was going to submit a bug report, but the 
submission page indicated I should try here first. I'm hoping the higher 
level of expertise on this list can handle this issue.

My apologies if this is not the appropriate next step in pursuing this 
issue. Please direct me to the correct place if I have posted here in error.

This is the issue:

I'm using MythTV version 2.0 and MySQL 5.0. I'm in Japan, and wanted to 
be able to view program guide information downloaded from ontvjapan.org 
(via XMLTV), which is in utf8 encoded Japanese.

I discovered that in order to get the characters to display in the On 
Screen Display, I had to move a utf8 based Japanese font into the 
.mythtv directory, and also to change the encoding collation in the 
mythconverg database to utf8.
http://www.gossamer-threads.com/lists/mythtv/users/246701?search_string=Dave%20M%20G;#246701

This mostly solved the problem. When looking at the program guide, the 
Japanese displays correctly.

When changing channels, using browse mode, before changing channels, 
information about shows on other channels displays correctly.

However, when I hit "enter" or "ok" (on my remote) to actually go to a 
channel, the Japanese becomes an unreadable set of boxes.

 From this point on, I'll refer to the OSD text that appears before I 
change channels as the "pre-channel OSD", and the OSD that appears after 
changing to a channel as the "post-channel OSD".

Significantly, When not in "Browse Mode", which is my preferred method 
of changing channels, the OSD only uses the post-channel display, so the 
correct Japanese is never seen.

So I've posted on the User's list to try and discover why the OSD is 
different before and after changing a channel, where this other OSD text 
is coming from, and what font setting it's using:

http://www.gossamer-threads.com/lists/mythtv/users/252490?search_string=Dave%20M%20G;#252490
http://www.gossamer-threads.com/lists/mythtv/users/252993?search_string=Dave%20M%20G;#252993
http://www.gossamer-threads.com/lists/mythtv/users/253315?search_string=where%20do%20these%20expiry;#253315

However, I have been completely unsuccessful in getting a lead which 
really explains the situation. It is completely unclear where the data 
for the post-channel OSD display is coming from - it's not the same 
source as the pre-channel OSD display. It's also completely unclear what 
font settings it's using.

I considered marking this as a bug because, so far as I can tell, there 
is no way to alter the font or the text used by the post-channel OSD 
display. If the font and text settings for the post-channel display are 
separate from the pre-channel display for some reason, then the settings 
should be equally accessible. If they aren't separate, then something is 
not connecting.

At the very least, if there is a setting to control this post-channel 
OSD, it's completely obscure.

As it stands now, somewhere in the system, the post-channel OSD display 
is either getting incorrectly encoded text data, or it is not using the 
utf-8 fonts specified in any of the MythTV setup screens.

If this is something I can change with settings, then please let me 
know. I hope I have explained the situation clearly.

Otherwise, it seems to me that this is a bug, and should be reported as 
such.

Thank you for considering this issue, and I look forward to your response.

-- 
Dave M G
Ubuntu 6.10 Edgy Eft
Kernel 2.6.17.7
Pentium D Dual Core Processor
PHP 5, MySQL 5, Apache 2