[mythtv-users] Schedules Direct JSON service changes 2022-05-20

[Gary Buhrmaster]

TL;DR summary:  Don't worry, be happy.

The following was posted on the Schedules Direct forum at:
https://forums.schedulesdirect.org/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=3201

For MythTV users using the XMLTV grabbers that access
the Schedules Direct JSON data, this change may be seen
most visibly as the one-time bulk reloading of the revised
data after the cut-over.

I, along with some actual MythTV developers, have been
testing the revised end-point, and while there are always
specific program edge cases (some data is richer, some
a bit more vanilla) the result is essentially comparable.

-----

Notice: JSON service migration from PHP to Python

Schedules Direct will be migrating our backend service from PHP to
Python starting on 2022-05-20.

What should you expect?

The Python provided API has been created to be protocol compatible, so
it's likely that you won't need to do anything if your grabber has
implemented the published API.
The new service is provided by AWS API Gateway, so the issues you may
have experienced if you were updating your schedule at your local
midnight time should now be addressed.
The methods used to generate data on our backend servers have been
updated, and there are a number of fields in the new JSON which will
cause the MD5 values to change, so your application will refresh its
local data. This is known as a cache invalidation - expect that there
will be a large amount of data downloaded.

What changes will you see?

The schedules on the backend will be refreshed more often; we have
migrated to a new data delivery mechanism from our upstream provider.
You should see 14 to 18 days of schedule data.
Images will be updated more often.
Lineup updates will be updated more often.
Schedules Direct will send lineup deletion notifications to your
registered email address 30 days before a lineup is deleted, in order
to give you time to migrate. Lineups are deleted by upstream providers
if they're consolidating headends, or ending an offering - this
typically occurs if a provider is migrating from analog (usually, the
-DEFAULT lineup) to digital-only (-X)

What should you do if you have issues after the migration?

Check to see if you're running the latest version of your application
/ grabber. Developers were provided early access to the new API, and a
number of issues were resolved.
Check the support forum for your application and engage the developer;
they'll be the ones that can help you troubleshoot the application and
the migration.
If you're still stuck, your developer will tell you to open a ticket
with Schedules Direct. Please open a lineup support ticket on the
SchedulesDirect webpage https://www.schedulesdirect.org/lineupsupport
and indicate that you're having an issue, and that the developer of
your application has directed you to open a ticket.