[mythtv] Record now?

Risto Treksler risto at elkhornbanff.ca
Fri Jan 17 17:58:51 EST 2003


> If you choose to record the current show, you are
> given the choice of continuing to record at "Best" quality
> saving the previous portion or to change quality starting
> from the current time.

That is a a good choice and mythTV should also offer that choice.
Bothering the user with the details about quality is a little unnecessary 
though

just
if <time of last channel change> is b4 <the start of the show>
  give the choice of 
    - record starting from <the start of show>
    - record starting from the current time.
else
  give the choice of 
    - record starting form <time of last channel change>
    - record starting from the current time.

>
> To continue at "Best", it appears it is simply renaming the
> ringbuffer to the filename for the show. This works because
> the open filehandle is unaffected by the fact that the inode
> number is associated with a different directory entry. In
> Unix, you can open any file for writing, rename it, and
> continue to write (but you cannot move it to another
> partition and continue writing to it unless you reopen ;-).
>
> So, if you change channel at 7:05 then decide at 7:10 to
> record this half hour show, the result is 7:05-7:30. However,
> this gives unexpected results if you were on the channel
> before the show started. If you changed channel at 6:55 then
> choose to record at 7:10, the result is 6:55-7:30 (try it ;-).
>
> MythTV could do the same rename trick if there is nothing
> special about the ringbuffer file format. However, cropping
> a ringbuffer that started before the show's start time is
> trickier.

why not automatically crop the resulting file down to 30 minutes AFTER 
the program has finished recording. 
As I understand it video editing capabilities are at least in the works.

so the result is still 6:55-7:30
but THEN it gets cropped, no need to crop the ringbuffer on the fly

>
> >>If you change channels, does the ringbuffer start over from the begining
> >>of the file?  If not, does it indicate that a channel change occured or
> >>does it just basically have a capture of what I've been watching (and,
> >>gosh, what are the privacy implications of that!:-)

having one long ringbuffer might be useful as an option, 
but only if it marked when channel changes occurred

> >
> > Again, TiVo kills the ring buffer and starts over when you change
> > channels. In fact it kills the ring buffer a little too easily if you ask
> > me. I've lost more than a few programs I was intending to record.
>
> My first experience with a digital recorder was the ATI AIW
> windoze software. You set the ringbuffer size (say, two or
> three hours) and you could move back and forth to previous
> shows on previous channels. This made perfect sense to me.
> When I got a TiVo, I was shocked that it restarted the
> buffer when you change channel (doh! =). I believe they only
> do this for the sake of the record in progress feature starting
> from the channel change without having to crop the buffer.
>
> --  bjm
>
>
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