[mythtv] Re: New idea for storing recordings to disks

[Keith C]

On Jun 30, 2005, at 3:55 AM, David Whyte wrote:

>> Simple solution:  If the recorder runs out of space, the recorder  
>> exits.
>>  Scheduler sees the recorder exited, attempts to restart it.  The
>> recorder code checks the mount points for space, sees none free on
>> option one, tries option two.  Just like when you restart the  
>> backend in
>> the midst of a recording, you end up with two partial recordings  
>> of the
>> same show, both viewable.
>>
>
> Ewwww!!!  I don't have a better solution, but that doesn't look  
> cool at all.
>
> I think the better version of your idea however would be
> round-robbin'.  First recording, the disk with most space, second
> recording, the disk now with most space, and so on.
>
> Dave - the linux virgin who has been dreading buying a new disk
> because of having to configure LVM and likes the sound of some of
> these proposal.

I think the discussion moved from a simple idea to a far too  
complicated discussion of native file systems, breaking up  
recordings, etc.

Having an ordered list of locations to use for storage isn't too  
complicated as long as it still takes the exact same single input  
that it always did (for the 95% of the newbies), while allowing those  
who want to go further to do so.

I'm not worried about breaking recordings into pieces or stopping and  
restarting a recording due to lack of space.  It will never happen on  
my backend due to my settings, and I would hope thats the way most  
people have it setup.  If not, thats where they should focus their  
attention, not on how to respond once its already happened.

I did setup an LVM, and expanded it twice when adding new drives.  I  
think its cool, but as far as I know, there are no good GUI tools on  
Fedora for it yet and its a bit of a pain to figure out (even with  
the fairly good standard how-to).  And I'm pretty worried about  
loosing a drive and loosing all my recordings.  I'm not going to  
mirror it because I have no IDE ports left and no PCI slots to add  
more.  If I want more storage now, my only option is to upsize drives  
in the LVM (very complicated), or NFS mount a server and use the  
multiple recording locations discussed in this thread.

I'm still waiting for a developer to respond with the normal : "well  
then, go ahead and code it".

Keith C