[mythtv-users] New install and my problmes.

Nick Morrott knowledgejunkie at gmail.com
Sat Feb 3 02:14:24 UTC 2007


On 02/02/07, Damian Surr <damian at gingermagic.com> wrote:
>
> > As a very inexperienced Linux user, one of the most important aspects
> > of your system you should come to rely on is the logging output
> > provided from programs (such as the mythbackend log output you've
> > provided below) and your system log (syslog). Problems which can have
> > you scratching your head can sometimes (and hopefully in this case) be
> > resolved quickly just by checking your logfiles.
> >
> > I would also strongly recommend you consider picking up a Ubuntu book
> > (or take the tune to read the Ubunu site) that will methodically take
> > you through how Linux (and any Ubuntu special features) works and how
> > all the pieces fit together on your system.
> >
> Thanks Nick. Can you recommend a good book? I agree I could certainly do
> with one to bring me up to speed. I feel like I did the first time I
> made a boot disk in DOS :-)

Not now really - I picked up books from the library when I started out
initially with Red Hat 5.0. I'd suggest a) looking on Amazon for well
recommended Ubuntu/Linux guides and then b) going into a decent
bookshop and browsing these titles to see if they suit your reading
style. You might decide instead you just want to use online materials,
in which case, make as much use of your distro's online manuals, and
also the man pages that reside on your system.

Be careful when reading MythTV guides to determine whether they are
aimed at installing MythTV from precompiled binaries that you install
via a package manager, or installing from source. The former will
typically carry out much or all of the system administrative issues
such a creating a mythtv user, creating the initial MythTV database
etc as part of the installation process, whereas the latter will not.

> >> /var/lib/mythtv//nfslockfile.lock: Permission denied
> >> Unable to open lockfile!
> >> Be sure that '/var/lib/mythtv/' exists and that both
> >> the directory and that file are writeable by this user.
> >>
> >
> > Does the directory exist? This is where MythTV is going to try and
> > store your TV recordings.
> >
> Yes, it's there. I tried running
> sudo mythbackend
> and that error didn't show its self. Must be a permissions thing, but I
> don't know much about that.

Could be a stale lockfile that has since been cleared up. What are the
contents of the folder when mythbackend is successfully running?

> I'm wondering if the Ubuntu Frontend/backend/desktop guide that I
> followed was set up with the intention of logging into the session as
> mythtv whenever you want to use mythtv? I'm trying to do things from
> logging into ubuntu as my user.

What's the URL of the particular guide you refer to above? Guides I
have seen for RH/Fedora, and also precompiled binaries, create a
mythtv user and use that login for running mythfrontend *for
convenience purposes only*. You can run the frontend and backend as
any user you want, taking into account any account restrictions and
appropriate permissions. Also remember from a previous message in the
thread that MySQL users and system users are not the same thing.

> >> damian at MythBox:~$ mythfrontend
> >>
> > <snip>
> >
> >> 2007-02-02 19:00:54.583 Connecting to backend server: 127.0.0.1:6543
> >> (try 1 of 5)
> >> 2007-02-02 19:00:54.584 Connection timed out.
> >>                        You probably should modify the Master Server
> >>                        settings in the setup program and set the
> >>                        proper IP address.
> >>
> >
> > Have you restarted mythbackend before running mythfrontend? The proper
> > IP address the error message refers to is the 'real' IP address of the
> > system the backend is running on (such as 192.168.1.10), not the local
> > loopback address of 127.0.0.1 which is what you currently have
> > specified in mythtv-setup.
> >
> Right. Thanks for that. Everything I've seen so far made me feel like I
> should leave the 127.0.0.1 as it is whenever I saw it. Which one should
> I change?

In the case of a single backend, the master backend's IP address is
the same as the local IP address, as they're one and the same. If in
the future you add a second backend machine to your network as a
slave, when configuring the slave machine you will need to again
specify the master backend's IP and slave's local IP address -
however, this time they will differ as the local (slave) machine is
NOT the master backend.

> Should I be forwarding any ports on my Netgear router?

If this router is between your internal network and 'outside' then no.
You should only need general web access for listings updates if using
an XMLTV grabber, weather and news. You shouldn't need specific
port-forwarding unless you are using SSH to connect to machines on
your internal network from the Internet, or similar.

Nick
-- 
MythTV Official wiki:
http://mythtv.org/wiki/
MythTV users list archive:
http://www.gossamer-threads.com/lists/mythtv/users

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