[mythtv-users] Recovering when zap2it screws the pooch---a warning & some questions

[f-myth-users at media.mit.edu]

    > Date: Wed, 19 Jul 2006 18:53:52 -0400
    > From: "R. G. Newbury" <newbury at mandamus.org>

    > Sounds like you misunderstood things.

    > You need a separate zap2it lineup for each type of feed.
    > So it appears you want:
    > 1)	An analog OTA (off the air) lineup;
    > 2)	An analog channel cable lineup.
    > 3)	An analog channel STB lineup.

    > These will likely have the same actual channels appearing at different 
    > numbers. So you saw your 2,4,5,7 moved to the 30's.

No, no, no.  I never should have said "OTA" in the first place,
because it only muddied the water.  Wherever I said "OTA", read:
"channels that my local cable provider carries on its cable, which
happen to be the same as channels that -would- be available if I
used an antenna (which I don't), and which also by not-so-remarkable
coincidence were allocated by the cable provider to be the same cable
channel numbers as they would be if they were broadcast channels,
presumably so as not to confuse people who were used to broadcast."
(I wish there was a compact term for this. :)

Thus, true RF broadcast local PBS is channel 2, and my cable provider
puts that on -its- channel 2 as well (which I know might not actually
be exactly the same frequency, because cable and broadcast frequencies
are different).

I -do- want your #2 & #3, however, and that's what I have, except
that DD's version of your #2 is totally broken at the moment.

What's going on in -my- case is that the analog cable lineup and the
analog STB lineup from my provider are virtually identical---the
-only- difference (in reality, not in Zap2It's idea of the world) is
that some of the channels on the cable feed are encrypted and need an
STB to decode.  So Zap2It's listings -should- be identical for these
two, except that half a dozen channels should be missing from the
analog cable lineup.  This used to be the case, except for a long
period when they got a pair of the analog cable channels in the wrong
place because the provider moved 'em---DD got it right in their #3
listing (to use your terminology) but took 7 months of nagging to get
it right in their #2 listing.

Unfortunately, sometime around the time when they fixed -that-, they
stirred the rest of the channel assignments with a spoon.  Their view
of the world is just wrong.  It doesn't match what's on the cable, it
doesn't even match their #3 listing, and it doesn't match the listing
my TiVo has for the very same provider.  It's just broken.  Their #3
listing seems to track reality quite well, but since that's the one
that's got the encrypted channels, it's the one that I've turned -off-
most of the channels on because I don't want to have my cable box
tuning plaintext channels.

(For example, what my TiVo and DD's #3 claim is my local PBS affiliate
is on channel 2, but their #2 listing randomly moved it to channel 27!
That's actually where ESPN or one of its ilk is current living.  Etc.)

I fixed it for the moment by going into the channel editor in mythtv-setup
and manually changing both the channel number (for my use) and the freqid
(for myth's use) for my PBS station to "2", not "27", for the #2 listing.
I did the same for 20-odd other channels, which is about 1/3 of all channels.

What I'd -like-, though, is the ability to use the #3 lineup as -two-
lineups, e.g., use half a dozen channels (the encrypted ones) as a
"lineup" that's assigned -only- to the composite-in of one particular
tuner (the one that's connected to the STB), and use all the rest of
the channels as a "lineup" that's assigned to the RF input on every
tuner card.  As far as I know, I can't do that, so I have to download
two lineups from DD instead of one (which are identical, except that
one has only half a dozen channels selected and the other has
everything -but- those half a dozen channels selected---at least when
DD has their head screwed on straight, that is), which was annoying
and error-prone to set up, might be a waste of their servers (because
I'm downloading two sets of listings, which requires two sets of
computations---though the bandwidth is probably the same), and is
currently problematic because one of those two listings is
unaccountably screwed up.

(And since DD tries to keep you from having "too many" lineups at once
[I don't recall the rules], I remember people complaining about having
to sign up for multiple listings in adjacent zipcodes & other such
weird dodges to get things properly mapped to Myth inputs.  Some
easier way of picking & choosing that depended less on what DD put in
each lineup, and just allowed arbitrary assignment of -some- XMLTV ID
to -some- input (via a custom lineup that maybe only your Myth and not
DD knew about) would be great.  Perhaps that's already possible by
poking around in the channel editor as I mentioned near the end of my
last mail; I haven't actually tried that yet, since I've currently got
things working again and don't really want to tear it all apart to
experiment.)