[mythtv-users] Repeating previously recorded...

[Michael T. Dean]

On 02/11/2013 11:24 AM, Jason Bilbrey wrote:
> Ok, I thought that only marked a show as watched if you watched most 
> of the show but didn't go all the way to the end.  I didn't think it 
> had any effect if you didn't watch it at all.
> According to this page from the MythTV wiki: 
> http://www.mythtv.org/wiki/User_Manual:Detailed_configuration_Frontend
>
>     If set, when you exit near the end of a recording it will be
>     marked as watched. The automatic detection is not foolproof, so do
>     not enable this setting if you don't want an unwatched recording
>     to be marked for expiration.
>
> So will setting that really fix my issue?  I am certainly willing to 
> try it, but it doesn't seem like it will.
> If MythTV can't handle the scenario (someone recording something but 
> not watching via the front end), I'm perfectly willing to write 
> process that updates the mythconverg database when I copy that show 
> off my MythTV box to mark the show as watched so that it doesn't 
> re-record.  I just want to make sure the functionality doesn't exist 
> already in MythTV.

Why not write a script using the Python bindings to tell MythTV to 
delete the recording when you copy it off the MythTV box?  Why are you 
using auto-expire to delete recordings when you don't seem to want them 
in MythTV?

The point is, there are 2 ways to tell MythTV that you don't want it to 
re-record an episode:

1) Delete the recording (using MythTV's Delete functionality--not by 
just deleting with file system tools) and do not say, "Delete and allow 
re-record"
2) Mark the recording as Watched (either using the setting that 
automatically does it when you watch the recording in the frontend or 
"manually" in Watch Recordings or using a script, such as one created 
with the Python bindings) and let MythTV delete the recording for you 
via auto-expiration

technically, there's a 3rd way (which is what you've used so far), but 
it's not really usable long term:

3) Keep the recording around--as long as it's in "current recordings" 
(i.e. still in Watch Recordings screen), MythTV will check there, in 
addition to your recording history, for duplicates (assuming you've set 
it to check "current recordings and previously recorded"--which is the 
default)

If you're trying to use some other non-MythTV frontend to watch your 
recordings, you'll have to do the work that mythfrontend normally does 
since your client doesn't do it for you.  In this case, it sounds like 
the best/most-straightforward approach to achieve what you want is to 
delete the recording when you copy it (i.e. using the Python bindings to 
tell mythbackend to delete it for you- 
http://www.mythtv.org/wiki/0.25_Python_Bindings/Data_Handlers#Program 
and see http://www.mythtv.org/wiki/Delete_recordings.py for an example), 
but you could--if you really want to use auto-expire for some 
reason--use the Python bindings to tell MythTV to mark the show as 
Watched.  ( 
http://www.mythtv.org/wiki/0.25_Python_Bindings/Data_Handlers#Recorded ).

Mike