[mythtv] A perl QAM scanner - call for volunteers

[Robert Kulagowski]

[Putting on my Schedules Direct hat]

I've created a perl scanner which leverages the information we can get
from a HDHR-cable card system to create an accurate call sign to QAM
mapping.  It will help end the issue of not knowing which QAM
frequencies have which content on them (without watching each channel
to figure it out).

Tribune's systems (the source of the data for Schedules Direct) are
not programmed to support QAM because the cable companies don't want
to distribute QAM data, so Tribune isn't going to do the R&D to
support QAM if there's no "market" for it. Since the cable companies
are the ones that would need to request the requirement, (and they're
not), Tribune isn’t going to implement something which won’t be used,
and which the cable companies won’t supply data for in the first
place.  We've asked Tribune, and for whatever reason, the cable
companies seem to consider QAM tuning information as proprietary.

When the scan is complete the result will be a {headend}.qam.conf file
containing that information and .mpg files which you can watch with
mplayer or vlc if you'd like to confirm what the scanner found.

When the scan is done, please send it to qam-info at schedulesdirect.org

Schedules Direct will manage the collection of QAM files and make them
available to other users in the same headend, allowing users that
don't have a cable card HDHR to still have accurate maps.

So, if you're reasonably proficient, and have a HDHR-cc and a
HDHR-atsc on your system, please go to

https://github.com/rkulagowski/qamscanner

and download the qamscanner.pl

The source code should be pretty self-documenting.  Please let me know
if you have any questions.