[mythtv-users] Good system design documentation?

[Steve Tate]

Is there a document available that goes through the various components
of a mythtv system and talks about various system design tradeoffs?

I've been frustrated looking at the official documentation, which is
in FAQ format, and seems to assume people understand the basic mythtv
architecture going in.  The docs talk about frontends and backends as
if everyone naturally knows that they are, but never actually explains
this.

What I've gleaned is what defines a frontend is the ability to play
things and what defines a backend is the ability to record.  But it
sure would be nice if there were a document the clearly layed out the
tasks performed by various systems so I can decide how to design my
system.

For instance, if I have a EPIA-based box hooked up to the TV with a
tuner card in it, it can both play and record -- that makes it a
frontend and a backend, right?  Can it be diskless?  In other words,
could I have a "tunerless" backend, consisting of my main home network
server, and a "diskless" frontend/backend at the TV?  I could put the
PVR-250 in the file server, of course, but does that mean that I'm
consuming network bandwidth with a video stream just to watch live TV
(which is why I'd want the tuner in the frontend box in the first
place)?  And then I'd have problems using the remote control from the
PVR-250 as well...   I'd really like a RAM-based ringbuffer for live
TV, so that doesn't hit the network at all, and then the ability to
stream pre-recorded video from the file server to the frontend.  Is
that something that can be done?

Anyway, maybe some of those questions are confused, but it's mainly
because I have a very poor mental image of the mythtv architecture,
and can't find any documentation that explains this.  Does anyone know
of something decent that's out there for me to read?

-- 

Steve Tate
srt at cs.unt.edu