[mythtv] trying to understand mythfilldatabase

Michael T. Dean mtdean at thirdcontact.com
Wed Feb 6 17:52:48 UTC 2008


On 02/06/2008 09:07 AM, Simon Kenyon wrote:
> why does the status say:
>
> Last mythfilldatabase run started on 2008-02-06 03:14 and ended on 
> 2008-02-06 03:16. mythfilldatabase ran, but did not insert any new data 
> into the Guide for 4 of   sources. This can indicate a potential grabber 
> failure.
> There's guide data until 2008-02-12 06:00 (6 days).
>   
...
> before and after the run and compares the two. this say if new data was 
> added at the end, but says nothing about modified data.
> this can give the wrong impression.
>   

Which is why it says, "This *can* indicate a *potential* grabber 
failure," (emphasis added).

> in libs/libmythtv/programdata.cpp, ProgramData::handlePrograms() 
> calculates the updated and unchanged values. could they be passed back 
> to mythfilldatabase?

The theory is that if you're updating your data only one time per day 
and your source (i.e. Schedules Direct or whomever) updates their data 
once per day, you will always see data going farther into the future 
than you did before the mythfilldatabase run.  It's a very quick sanity 
check.

That being said, I would have absolutely no problems with removing the, 
"This can indicate a potential grabber failure," warning as it tends to 
confuse more people than it helps--especially since the warning should 
only really apply when the user is first configuring 
mythfilldatabase/XMLTV (or, for those rare cases when an XMLTV grabber 
script is obsoleted/broken).  In theory, the "did not insert any new 
data" part of the message should be equally telling for an experienced 
XMLTV user to notice updating XMLTV may be necessary.

I'd like to come up with a better wording for the "did not insert any 
new data" part, but I can't really think of one...  "Changed data but 
did not insert new data..."  "Did not insert data beyond the end of the 
existing data..."  I don't really know how to say it in a user-friendly way.

Oh, and Simon, if you're using EIT, I'd bet you've been bitten by the 
EIT-inserted-program-information-for-2037 issue (or some other 
ludicrously-far-in-the-future date) that's caused by bad data.  That 
(specific date) would cause every run of mythfilldatabase to give you 
the indicated warning for another almost 30 years...  And, if you're 
using a combination of EIT and XMLTV, it's quite possible you may always 
see the warning depending on how far into the future each goes.

Mike



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