[mythtv-users] Recording conflict between two consecutive programs on the same channel (1 tuner)

Nick Morrott knowledgejunkie at gmail.com
Wed Jan 17 09:11:53 UTC 2007


On 16/01/07, Matthias Thyroff <lists at thyroff.net> wrote:
> Hello,
>
> tonight I have programmed "Desperate Housewives" with a 5min extra afterwards,
> and "Grey's Anatomy" which is the next program on the same channel.
>
> Myth tells me it will not record "Grey's Anatomy" because of a conflict with
> another recording which has a higher Priority (both have prio 0).
>
> If I reduce the recording extra of the housewives to 0, it only mentions a
> possible conflict. I am aware that this is a momentary fix but I always add an
> extra to all recordings, so I would like to be sure that "Grey's Anatomy" is
> recorded even with the extra.
>
> By what I read in the list I was under the impression that should be like that
> because recording extra time is not respected if conflicts exist, I am just
> worried by the definite statement of myth that it will not be recorded at all
> because of the conflict. Is recording extra time not taken into account when
> searching conflicts?

Matthias,

This goes back to the oft-discussed 'global' pre/post-roll settings (a
soft setting), and per-rule settings (a hard setting).

You can configure MythTV globally to try and record a specified
pre/post-roll duration on all recordings, but importantly, the
scheduler DOES NOT take this into account when scheduling upcoming
recordings, so there is no guarantee whatsoever that this extra
recording time will be recorded on any recordings. If you have no
other scheduled recordings that will impede the recording of this
extra pre/post-roll time, then it will get recorded.

However, if you have two consecutive recordings (or the time gap
between the recordings is less than the global pre/post-roll) on an
input, and you have not specified extra recording time in the
individual rules, pre-roll on the first recording and post-roll on the
second recording can be recorded. For two consecutive recordings with
no time gap between them (i.e. 9pm-10pm and then 10pm-11pm) the first
recording will finish at its scheduled time (10pm) and the second
recording will start immediately at its scheduled start time (10pm).

However, if you specify start early/finish late timings in a recording
rule, the scheduler DOES take into account this extra recording time
when scheduling upcoming recordings. This has the effect of
potentially stopping consecutive recordings from recording as intended
- this is what you are seeing. The scheduler notes from the recording
rule of Desperate Housewives that you want to record a further 5
minutes on recordings of that program. Whenever it gets a recording
match, the scheduler will add an extra 5 minutes to that scheduled
recording. In my simple example above, this means that first program
will actually be recorded from 9pm-10.05pm. The scheduler then notes
that the recording of Grey's Anatomy CAN NOT now be made (10pm-11pm)
as the recording can not start at its specified time (10pm).

The only 2 ways I can think of to get around this situation is to
offer the scheduler more flexibility by either getting another capture
card if can schedule the second recording on, or simply configure the
rule for Grey's Anatomy to start 5 minutes late (and possibly end 5
minutes late also). On a single tuner system (or one having multiple
cards which are also recording at conflicting times) it can take a
little while to work out whether program need to be configured to
always start recording early (configured in the rule). I have the
situation on a few channels (UK cable) where 30-minute shows start at
59 minutes past the hour, which means unless I set the recording rules
to start and finish 1 minute early, I miss the beginning of the show.

I hope this has not confused you too much ;) Any more questions,
please post and I'm sure someone more experienced can help us out.

Nick
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