[mythtv-users] Mysql complains at me

[Kevin Kuphal]

Ryan Rawson wrote:
> So I had to powercycle the computer that runs mythtv.  Luckly my  
> filesystem is journaled (ext3 and xfs) so I didn't have to wait long,  
> but wait, surprise for me in my mailbox:
>
> Subject: WARNING: mysqlcheck has found corrupt tables
>
> The debian packaging of mysql runs check tools on system boot.
>
> So apparently my mythtv tables may or may not be corrupt.  The rest  
> of the message just indicates that some tables weren't closed  
> correctly, and now people are accessing them.
>
> Now I don't really want advice how to fix this, since I don't have  
> the time or interest to fix it (and I'm getting rid of cable  
> anyways).  But I'd like to say that as a power-user who just wants to  
> be an end user, this is a very bad experience.  The one instruction  
> for fixing it involves like 10 steps.  I'm not really interested in  
> this, I'm really interested in watching my TV, not databases.
>
> My engineering hat comes on, and says - this is intolerable.  Mysql  
> isn't really helping here, and maybe mythtv should at LEAST offer the  
> option of using a database that doesn't need care and feeding after  
> system crashes/hard reboots.  My prime vote would be for postgresql.
>
> At this point I cannot really recommend mythtv to anything less than  
> a power developer.  Fixing corrupt mysql tables is NOT cool and not  
> at all interesting.
>   
Do you think this would be any different than a corrupt file or a 
registry error on Windows Media Center Edition?  Neither Linux or 
Windows are black boxes to be compared with Tivo and ReplayTV.  They 
have underlying operating system components that need care.  If you 
can't learn how to care for it, then maybe it isn't the right choice for 
you.

A simple google for "mysql database repair" yields many results 
including the first from the MySQL documentation which explains exactly 
how to check and repair your database tables.  It involves basically one 
step, running mysqlcheck with a repair command-line option

Searching the MythTV archives reveals even more information including an 
oft-posted script that you can run in cron to check and repair your 
tables automatically.

And finally, if you are running the SVN release of Myth, and to be 
included in 0.19 in the contrib folder is this very script ready to use.

Kevin