[mythtv-users] Full screen time display, with screen on

[Brian Kirkman]

On 3/2/2011 10:23 PM, Brian Kirkman wrote:
> On 3/2/2011 9:23 PM, Dave M G wrote:
>> MythTV users,
>>
>> What I'd like to be able to hit a button on my remote, and have a full
>> screen display of the time and date.
>>
>> Ideally, I could do this when in any MythTV menu screen, but also if the
>> screen is off, to have it come on.
>>
>> The display would either stay up until I hit a button, or time out after
>> a short while. Or both.
>>
>> Is this possible? I did look on the net, but most clock/MythTV
>> discussions seemed to be about where time should be displayed within the
>> interface, not as a separate screen.
>>
>> Any advice would be much appreciated.
>>
> Dave,
>
> I think something could be scripted using XOSD / osd_cat.  I don't have
> such a script, but I'll bet someone will come up with one :)  Challenge
> on!!  Do you want the time display to be overlaid on the current
> background, or do you want the background to turn black (or whatever
> color you prefer)?  I think XOSD will only overlay the text.  Let's see
> what we can come up with.
>
> -Brian
Here's a bash line to get started.

date +"%H:%M %m.%d.%Y" | tr " " "\n" | osd_cat --pos=middle 
--align=centre -f "-*-*-*-i-*-*-128-*-*-*-*-*-*-*"

The 'tr' command piped in there will put the date and time on separate 
lines.  I'm sure there are other creative ways to lay it out on screen 
however you'd like.  Make sure you have XOSD installed.  Then check out 
the various options for osd_cat as well as familiarizing yourself with 
the font configuration string. Good luck!