[mythtv-users] Enabling multirec borks usability a bit.

[Brian Wood]

On Monday 19 April 2010 06:25:02 pm Bill Bogstad wrote:
> On Mon, Apr 19, 2010 at 8:02 PM, Michael T. Dean
> 
> <mtdean at thirdcontact.com> wrote:
> >>> Of course you never know what's going to pop up on live TV. I still
> >>> have some
> >>> VHS tape from mid-September 2001 that I could not have anticipated.
> >>>
> >>> I think  many Myth users almost never use the live TV function (I use
> >>> it rarely), but it seems to be the first thing complained about by new
> >>> users when
> >>> their systems are not set up properly. It takes new users a while to
> >>> figure out
> >>> that eliminating live viewing is a feature, not a problem.
> >>>
> >>> One large advantage to Myth, IMHO, is that I do not have to watch live
> >>> TV,
> >>> along with its commercials, and I can watch what I want when I want
> >>
> >> Live-TV is an essential tool for determining if the tuners are set up
> >> properly and for identifying channels to determine if the channels are
> >> mapped properly.
> >> Yes newbes will complain about it not working, but imagine trying to
> >> debug their systems without it.
> >
> > Actually, Live TV as a test is not testing MythTV configuration.  It's
> > only testing the tuner card/drivers itself--the same as could be done
> > with dd/cat/azap/...  It's extremely easy to misconfigure mythbackend
> > such that LiveTV works perfectly but recordings don't work at all.
> 
> It lets you verify your channel info is correct (call sign, etc.)
> You can also match the scheduling information against what you are
> seeing on your screen in real time.  No, it doesn't test everything
> about recording, but it tests a lot more then dd or cat will.  Sure I
> could go into the the scheduler and schedule something on the  60+
> clear-QAM channels I'm currently getting in order to verify that my
> mappings are correct.   Depending on the length of the shows,
> multirec, and the number of physical tuners I have;  I'll be able to
> review those recordings for errors in a day or two.  Or I can flip
> channels in LiveTV and know it is all correct 10 or 15 minutes.

That's why I said it's complained about by users with systems "not set up 
properly", once set up and working many Myth systems never use live TV. it is 
a valuable and almost necessary tool for setting up systems, as you say.

It does test a fair amount, live TV is actually making a recording and playing 
it back, not just displaying the capture device's output, so it's a lot more 
than xawtv or tvtime. This will catch most problems, except perhaps with 
record scheduling and storage locations.