[mythtv] mythRadio Idea

[Glen Tregoning]

Hello all,

Firstly i'd like to apologise if any of this idea has been raised
before, but i did do a search and didn't come up with much.

Also although I have programming experience I haven't (yet) been able
to look at the source, so my idea are likely to be harder to
implemented than I make them sound.

I have noticed there are a few different modules floating around
called mythradio that do quite different things.

In fact I am interested in all variations, from the on line streaming
radio modules (mythstream / mythradio (
http://www.tommywatson.com/alog )),   tv/fm tuner card radio (bttv and
the like) modules (mythFM and the recent mythv4lradio), as well as DVB
radio (which i haven't played around with yet.

One of the issues that people seem to be having with the tv/fm tuner
card radio modules is that they run independently of mythtv.  For
example that if mythtv wants to record a program using  the tv/fm card
while someone is listening to the radio it won't be handled nicely.

I was thinking a possible solution would be to integrate radio
stations in to mythtv and treat it just like any other tv channel. but
just playback / record audio with no video, displaying an optional
logo or something.
This would mean that if there was another program to be recorded on
the device myth would handle it in the normal way (with on screen
message).

Although FM radio is simply another frequency on the spectrum, from my
brief intro to analog tv/fm on linux it appears that tv uses
/dev/video with radio on /dev/radio. This I imaging could cause some
problems in simply adding radio as another channel as myth would need
to know that both devices were in fact from the one resource?

If anyone is able to fill in the gaps please let me know.

I would be interested in contributing to an projects currently in
development if anyone is working already on a similar thing?

Keep up the great work guys!! 

Glen T