[mythtv-users] is mythtv smart enough to do this (overlap/back-to-back) with recordings?

[Brad Templeton]

On Wed, Jul 26, 2006 at 10:59:03AM -0700, Brad Templeton wrote:
> On Wed, Jul 26, 2006 at 05:50:56PM +0100, Paul Wheeler wrote:
> > I have for a long time wanted something like this. However i think the
> > difficulty comes in 'splicing' the overlapping time. From my
> > understanding of the various formats this would be difficult on all
> > non mpg2 recordings and even on mpg2 recordings (where i believe you
> > can join together by literally 'cat'ing the files together) you then
> > have issues about how much of the file do you 'paste' on to the end of
> > the first recording as this will be a variable size (iirc mpg2 uses
> > variable bitrates).
> > 
> > It is these problems that unfortunately make a very simple idea
> > extremely non trivial as such i have never looked into it at all or
> > asked others about it as it is extremely unlikely anyone will have the
> > time/effort to code it up for what is a minor 'defect'.
> 
> Here's a way you could code it.   Add two columns to the recorded
> table for the unique ID of any 'predecessor' and 'successor' program
> which were recorded from the same channel immediately before or after.
> 
> Then, when a program reaches the end, and has a successor program,
> have the option to have play continue in the successor.
> 
> Plus, when rewinding, if you hit the beginning of a show that
> has a predecessor program, offer the option to continue rewinding
> into the successor (from its end.)

And let me add some other notes to this:
    a) You could also make an automatic playgroup from adjacent
       recordings and work to get these behaviours.   I think this
       is how live tv is done now?

    b) In a more generalized solution, recordings would be a series
       of cuts from files on disk.  The cutlist could be extended
       to include sets of frames from other files, so a program
       consists of frames m-n of file 1, o-p of file 2 etc.

    c) While you're at it, one thing I've always wanted is for play
       to start at the actual start time of a show when I add buffering
       to the start of a program.  Ie. if I have recording start 30
       seconds early (which I do on all shows) I want playback to begin
       30 seconds into the file, at the real start time, and I can
       rewind if I want to see the earlier stuff.  Of course, today,
       I just hit 30 second skip every time.