[mythtv-users] Switch to enable "TiVO" like experience? WAS Re:mythtv keeping recordings of everything i watch?

[Tony Chiaffredo]

        Michael T. Dean wrote:    On 07/26/06 19:12, Chad wrote:
 On 7/26/06, Tony Chiaffredo  wrote:                    I come
from the Tivo world, and I find the Mythtv LiveTV behavior to be
very useless. Meaning, if I simply turn off the TV and fail to
exit to the Menu or turn off the Mythtv frontend, I end up with
somewhere around 30G of LiveTV recordings (including the Paid
Advertising spots that repeated at 3,4,and 5am) before I ever make it back
to the boob tube. This is a lot of disk to some people!
Could be upwards of 1/4th of their storage.                        How? 
Assuming 2GB/hr, that would mean that you just recorded a
15-hour  program.  However, you just said you got "the Paid
Advertising spots  that repeated at 3,4,and 5am."  That implies
the recordings were 1-hour  long, meaning it's impossible to lose
30 hours of recordings.  So, how would this /actually/ work in a
disk-full situation?  You have  LiveTV on.  In spite of your
unfounded fear of losing 30GB of  recordings, you leave LiveTV on
and turn off the TV.  As soon as the  program you were watching
finishes (we'll say it was the one preceeding  the 3am paid
programming, because no one watches those), the 3am program
starts.  Myth breaks the recording at the boundary.  Then, Myth
realizes  that it needs more space.  It checks for recordings to
expire and  realizes that there's a LiveTV recording (the one you
just watched), so  it deletes it.  Then the 4am program begins.
Myth breaks the recording  and deletes the 3am program.  At 5am,
Myth breaks the recording and  deletes the 4am program.  And so
on...            A cap was recently commited by Isaac that auto
"ends" a LiveTV recording after 8 hours of recording (and starts
another).  This could be added to the "LiveTV options" screen an
changeable (to accomodate those that want a 30 min "buffer", and
those that will die without the 8 hour "buffer" currently in
place).             But this cap /only/ applies for programs that
show up as longer than 8  hours in the guide data.  On my system
and one I set up for a friend:  mysql> SELECT COUNT(*) FROM
program WHERE UNIX_TIMESTAMP(endtime) -  UNIX_TIMESTAMP(starttime)
> 60*60*8; +----------+ | COUNT(*) | +----------+ |        0 |
+----------+ 1 row in set (0.06 sec)  meaning the cap does
absolutely nothing on these systems.  Mike
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above text has been clipped. My original posting contains more
detail.

 I never said that I have a FEAR of losing anything.

 Your assumption is just that. I actually run closer to 2.5+ Gig/hr. And
assuming that I stopped watching at 10pm, and did not return to watch the
TV until after work the following day, let's say 7pm. That's 20+ hours,
and in fact could eat 42 Gigs at your run rate. But I digress. The point
is that it's wasted space, and can be absolute crap, and stuff that
clutters up program listings in recorded programs or Mythweb.

 Don't get me wrong. It would simply be useful, and create an experience
that is closer to that of Tivo to allow for LiveTV recordings to expire in
hours, not days. Tivo probably expires LiveTV after 30 minutes because
they sell units that have much smaller storage capacities. I personally
have added two 120G drives to my Tivo. There is a happy medium for each of
us. This area just needs a tweek, that's all.

 You are correct, I believe that the 8 hour LiveTV cap is a
misunderstanding. Meaning that, the issue is not a single program, it is
the issue of leaving the frontend running, and ending up with hours
recordings.

 Cheers!