[mythtv] IPTV

[Robert Johnston]

On 11/01/2010 12:47 PM, Daniel Kristjansson wrote:
> On Mon, 2010-01-11 at 09:40 +0000, Zacarias Benta wrote:
>> Hello you guys,
>>
>> I have used the freebox recorder together with VLC to create a proof
>> of concept in wich I state that mythtv can be used for IPTV.
>> Are there any plans for the continuation of freebox in mythtv and the
>> creation of some kind feature for encrypted IPTV streams?
>
> No, the IPTV in MythTV was contributed by some guys in France using
> FreeBox, which uses unencrypted streams. This code could use some
> love, it really only works reliably if you have a single IPTV stream.
> I don't see the point in encrypting the streams if you plan to use
> them with MythTV, which will store the files unencrypted. Maybe you
> can fill us in a little on what your use case is?

I do recall (Though I can't recall how) some people using IPTV with 
CAMs, and (potentially) under Myth.

> We use Live555 to read the streams, so it can actually handle a wide
> variety of streams. The complication with Live555 is that it is a single
> threaded event driven library and we create a thread for each recorder.
> If you want to work on the IPTV support, it might be a good idea to
> first resync our Live555 library with upstream and fix any regressions
> and then create a single event loop thread shared by all IPTV recorders
> in MythTV which handles the interaction with the Live555 library. That
> should fix all the backend problems with IPTV in MythTV.

Other things the Live555 library needs are the capability to restrict a 
multicast "Subscription" to a specific interface. In thoery, you'd use 
SETSOCKOPT on the socket to restrict it to a single interface.

> For the frontend we really need a better way to browse through
> external IPTV video libraries. What we have right now works well
> with IPTV services that emulate the old fashioned cable TV 'channel'
> model, but it doesn't work well with video on demand style IPTV
> services. I don't think anyone has really cracked that nut so it
> would be an interesting project. There are plenty of services, but
> there you basically have the preselected videos, videos related to
> what you just watched, browse through an unmanageably large library,
> and search; but what you need is something that uses MythTV style
> 'recording rules' to find programming you might be interested in
> and allow you to browse those in something like the 'Watch Recordings'
> UI. Ideally this would all be done within the existing screens, so
> dealing with IPTV is just like dealing with recordings as far as
> the end user is concerned.

This would be awesome to have. Myth needs some way to state "This 
recording exists at this (http/udp/rtp/rtsp) URL".
-- 
Robert "Anaerin" Johnston
--
The subject of wizards and sex is a complicated one, but as has already 
been indicated it does, in essence, boil down to this: when it comes to 
wine, women and song, wizards are allowed to get drunk and croon as much 
as they like.
         -- (Terry Pratchett, Sourcery)