[mythtv-users] Auto transcode after commercial flagging

Matt Rude mythtv at mattrude.com
Fri Jan 12 22:23:37 UTC 2007


>> So if I set MythTV to mark commercials while it’s recording, then to 
>> automatically transcode after recording is complete, should it 
>> transcode and cut commercials (I can’t see any reason why not), or can 
>> this only happen with manual action as implied in the manual?
>>
> Notice you used two separate terms. "mark commercials" and "cut 
> commercials" which indeed are two very different things.
> 
> mythcommflag does not add cutlists by default. It adds commercial flags. 
> The difference is that when transcoding, it ignores commercial flagging 
> but removes video between points in the cutlist. commflags are detected 
> by the player and handled when playing back according to the setting (do 
> nothing, notify there is a commercial flag, auto skip to the end of the 
> commflag). This is because commercial flagging is not 100% accurate and 
> many people would be upset to lose parts of their recordings if they 
> don't view the video and manually decide to actually cut video based on 
> what mythcommflag thought were commercials.
> 
> You can over-ride the mythcommflag command to add --gencutlist which 
> would then create a cutlist instead of commercial flags - but don't 
> complain when you lose parts of your program or if it missed the first 
> commercial break, cuts our your program and leaves all the commercials 
> (I haven't seen this, but I suppose it's possible in theory despite 
> safeguards that it will never make a commercial flag more than x minutes 
> or whatever). :)
> 
> People who want to automatically cut commercials usually set up a 
> separate user job for programs where they feel confident they can trust 
> mythcommflag and remove the video automatically. They would set this 
> particular program to not run commflag after recording, then execute a 
> user job set up exactly like commflag except with --gencutlist in the 
> command, then run transcode.
>>
>>  One other question is how I can tell whether a particular show has 
>> been transcoded already or not. There doesn’t seem to be an icon to 
>> indicate this on the screen that lists the recorded shows.  So if a 
>> commercials aren’t gone on a given show I can’t tell if it’s because 
>> transcoding isn’t happening (or hasn’t happened yet) or because it 
>> transcoded but didn’t cut the commercials.
>>
> There is an icon to tell if the program has been flagged for commercials 
> which should help in your determination. I usually look at the file size 
> to determine if it's been transcoded or not. Some of the newer themes 
> coming out as displaying the filesize right in the Watch Recordings 
> screen which is convenient for this.
> 
> -Brad

Just an add-on to Brad's great response.

Steve-
when your watching a recording you can change the "commercials flags" to 
"Cut Points" by:

1 Start watching the recording like you always do.
2 once the recording has started playing press the Menu button (the M 
button on your keyboard)
3 go to "Edit Recording" now the recording will pause and show you a 
progress bar at the bottom. (by pressing "OK" (or "Enter" on your 
keyboard) you can create a cut flag.)
4 press the "right" arrow key and you will see all the commercial breaks 
that mythcommflag found.
5 Exit the "Edit Recording" screen by pressing "exit" (or "Esc" on your 
Keyboard)
6 now just watch your recording as you were before you will no longer 
see the commercial skipping OSD message when it skips commercials but it 
will just move past them. if you see a place where mythcommflag missed 
some of your recording then you can move that flag.
7 now transcode the recording and the cut points you just set will be 
removed and your show will no longer have any commercials.

-Matt


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