[mythtv-users] Mythfilldatabase taking FOREVER

[Gary Buhrmaster]

On Sun, Jun 5, 2022 at 3:06 AM Gary Buhrmaster
<gary.buhrmaster at gmail.com> wrote:

> There are numerous checks to determine if the
> existing program is *really* the same (with all the
> details).  Sometimes it is, sometimes it is not
> ("generic" programs such as news often get
> updates as the time gets closer to the "now"
> value).

And, as I recall, the generic (daily) news programs
can sometimes be marked as repeats, and
sometimes not, due to the logic that mythfilldatabase
and the upstream scheduling source use.

> And mythfilldatabase does some additional
> adjustments of the data that can (next run) result
> in detections of changes.  Some of which was
> improved with recent (supported) releases of
> MythTV.

At the end of the run, there is a line of the form:
      Updated programs: nnnnn Unchanged programs: nnnnnn
which indicates how many programs were updated.

If you run the same mythfilldatabase load immediately
again (which implies the same source guide data) you
will likely see a small (but persistent) number of updates
due to how MythTV manages the program data and
detection of changes (which require updates).  For
a daily run, ~10% changes for Schedules Direct is
not atypical as generic placeholder show data get
replaced with actual episode data for the particular
showings and new data for an additional day.

Running a recent mythfilldatabase and a recent
version of the grabber, which together support
(mostly) accurate new (previouslyshown) marking,
I tended to use --no-mark-repeats to prevent
mythfilldatabase from "improving" the program
data (you can also modify the database setting
NewEpisodeWindow to accomplish something
equivalent, both mostly only matter because
Schedules Direct actually often has more than
14 days of program data, and using/changing
either may cause different issues depending
on the details (and --no-mark-repeats had
a specific bug when used in older versions)).

Lastly, sometimes database tuning may be
appropriate.  From time to time there are
discussions on the MythTV email lists, or
forum, regarding database tuning,  Running
mysqltuner.pl can point out specific cases
which may be causing issues (just be aware
that not everything mentioned by that script
is actually going to be an issue for MythTV).