[mythtv] Favorite or Priority Channel Recording Rule Filter

[David Engel]

On Thu, Oct 17, 2019 at 08:54:37AM -0400, Michael T. Dean wrote:
> On 10/16/2019 03:48 PM, David Engel wrote:
> > Would you all rather have a "Favorite channel" or a "Priority channel"
> > recording rule filter?  The former would only match channels in
> > channel group 1 (aka Favorites).  The latter would only match channels
> > with a recording priority greater than or equal to 0.
> > 
> > I used my own version of a priority channel filter for a long time but
> > deleted it a while ago.  I now have a need to use something similar
> > again and thought I'd make it an officially supported feature this
> > time around.
> 
> I'm guessing most users would be less annoyed by having to increase the
> priority of some channel(s) than by having to make the
> much-more-user-visible change of adding some channel(s) to Favorites
> group--especially if the channel is not really a favorite.
> 
> That said, it does seem that either way users could easily make the filter
> basically moot by overuse/abuse--having to add too many channels to the
> prioritized/favorites list to cover all the rules where they think they need
> the filter.  Do you think the added visibility/accessibility of the filter
> is better than just using custom rules with the "Only channels from the
> Favorites group" example clause and/or adding another "Only prioritized
> channels" example clause--both of which would allow changing the specifics
> (group name/priority value)?
> 
> (I don't have a strong position either way, so I'm just playing devil's
> advocate.)

Purely using priority is indeed conceptually much simpler.  The
downside is changing channel priorities can have unexpected,
scheduling consequences for users that don't understand the
implications.

Creating and curating channel groups can definitely be tedious(*).
The upside, though, is it would fit more nicely with another feature
I'm contemplating(#)

(*)I would likely create/update them in SQL using priority! :)

(#)Currently, only the EPG honors channel groups (AFAIK).  I'm
considering adding support for them on all screens that show guide
data.  One thing that makes me hesitant to do this is the desire to
then make it conspicuous when some information is being hidden because
it's not in the current channel group.

Basically, the problem I'm trying to solve is there are channels that
I don't want to see or use unless I explicily choose to.  That last
bit makes marking the channels invisible less desirable.  In reality,
though, I don't expect to choose to see/use those channels very often
so perhaps marking them invisible wouldn't really be so untenable.

On Thu, Oct 17, 2019 at 01:02:16PM -0400, Peter Bennett wrote:
> I have a recording priority set on every channel - higher for local HD
> channels, lower for cable HD channels, lower for SD channels, etc. This way
> I ensure I get the best possible recording. On some shows I have used a
> custom recording rule with a setting that restricts to recording priority
> greater than a certain value.

That's extremely similar to what I do.

> My suggestion for this would be to add a "minimum channel recording
> priority" option to the recording rule. This way if you are recording reruns
> of a show,  it does not record some episodes in SD or from unreliable
> channels when those episodes are not available in the next 2-3 weeks on your
> preferred channels.

IIRC, one of the prominent reasons that recording filters were added
was to stop the feature creep that was aflicting recording rules.  The
idea was it would be much simpler to add little, snippets of SQL as
needed that could be toggled on and off rather than continueing to add
custom code for increasingly specialized cases.

Note that when filter were added, it was also expected that users
would be allowed to create and edit their own filters to suit their
needs.  That part was never done because the need for it never
materialized.

If we go with a priority based filter, I'd be very, strongly inclined
to add one, standard filter for channel priority > 0 (or >= 0) and add
the user-editable, filter part for anyone that needs more options.

David
-- 
David Engel
david at istwok.net