[mythtv-users] (almost) completely fresh install

[Marius Schrecker]

On Tuesday, November 21, 2017 12:57 CET, "Michael T. Dean" <mtdean at thirdcontact.com> wrote:
 On 11/20/2017 04:18 AM, Marius Schrecker wrote:
> Hi,
> My combined backend-frontend server has been retired and I am
> starting work to replace it with a distributed system.
>
> I haven't taken the time to maintain the old (updated to 0.28) system
> for quite a while now so despite the database being in a consistent
> state, quite a few settings are either outdated cruft or no longer
> working (my hd-pvr for example no longer works with mythtv and my
> channel list is hopelessly out of date).
>
> Because of this, I have decided to go for a completely fresh install
> and configure, only saving my recordings from the old database. I was
> intending to use mythexport to save my recording metadata, but can't
> make the cgi scripts work, so rather than spending time trying to
> figure that out, am thinking of going for a "partial"restore to a new,
> empty database, using mythconverg_backup.pl and mythconverg_restore.pl
> following the instructions
> at https://www.mythtv.org/wiki/Database_Backup_and_Restore.
>
> Both the old and the new systems are running version 0.28
>
> Can anyone think of any reasons for NOT using this approach?

The primary reason to not use a partial restore is because there's no
benefit to doing so, and doing so is much more difficult than using your
existing database (through a full restore) and much more prone to
failure (there are many things you can do incorrectly that will either
cause the partial restore to fail or will cause corruption in your
database). The partial restore is meant as a final resort for someone
who, generally, has corrupted their database due to poking around inside
it directly rather than using MythTV tools to modify MythTV data.

If you want to clear out your tuners and channel lists, just go to
mythtv-setup and in Capture Cards, select "Delete All Capture Cards"
(not "Delete All Capture Cards from <hostname>") and to clear out your
channel lists, go to Video Sources and select "Delete All Video
Sources." At that point, your capture card/input/video sources
configuration is completely clear--as pristine as a new database.

The only other thing that a new database would clear is your settings,
but--on the bright side--we don't have any "Make my MythTV system
inoperative and unrecoverable" setting. So, by pulling over your
settings from the old system, you get the benefit of having settings
that were once known to meet your preferences. If you don't like how
the settings are configured when using your new system, you can change
those few that you no longer want set how you had them. If you have
fewer systems than you used to have--meaning some of those host
configurations are no longer required--there's no problem. The settings
data for that host will take up about a kB of on-disk storage and never
be read into the running systems, so won't have any real impact on the
system.

Basically, unless you've got a database with corruption only in
non-recording-related tables, the partial restore only does 2 things for
you: 1) it makes a ton of work and b) it acts as a placebo to make you
feel like things are better. But, IMHO, hours of work for a placebo
effect is never worthwhile.

Mike
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Thanks Mike for putting that sop clearly,

I'm beginning to see now that a partial restore is not the way to go.

  One thing I know I have is a bunch of no-longer-used hostnames and channels and the mystery of my hd-pvr1212 not working any more in mythtv, although I can cat from the direct stream it produces.  Probably because I did a half-baked restore of the old tuners last time I upgraded my system and replaced my first hd-pvr1212, which had died.

Will probably forget the whole question now and do a full restore, followed by a ruthless delete of old settings.

BR.

--Marius--


 
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