[mythtv-users] Do you build mythtv from source, and why?

[Mario Limonciello]

Hey Mark,

On Tue, Mar 29, 2011 at 11:01 AM, Mark Lord <mythtv at rtr.ca> wrote:

> On 11-03-29 10:53 AM, Mario Limonciello wrote:
> > On Tue, Mar 29, 2011 at 7:05 AM, Ryan Patterson <ryan.goat at gmail.com
> > <mailto:ryan.goat at gmail.com>> wrote:
> >
> >     On Mon, Mar 28, 2011 at 1:31 PM, Mark Lord <mythtv at rtr.ca
> >     <mailto:mythtv at rtr.ca>> wrote:
> >     > Q: Do you (re)build mythtv from source code? If so, why?
> >
> >     I build from source because I hate the "enhancements" the ubuntu
> >     package maintainers implement.
> >
> > Do you have some specifics?  We're quite open to making changes if there
> are
> > things people don't like.
>
> I won't speak for Ryan, but all of those "*.real" wrapper scripts
> simply drive me bananas.
>
>
Is there a specific problem you're hitting with them?  It could easily be a
bug that just needs to be fixed with them.

I know why they are there, for the theoretical "non-technical users",
> and I don't expect them to disappear, but I don't want them here!  :)
>
>
Ideally at some point I would like to see them go, but for now they do
manage a few permissions related problems that came up in the past as well
as some nicities such as respawning the frontend if it exits non-zero (eg
crashes).


> Speaking of Mythbuntu -- it would be Really Nice if somebody there could
> take a look at the Upstart startup/shutdown sequence.  It mostly works
> by accidents of timing, and doesn't work at all in the system I have here,
> with the rootfs on a very very fast SSD.  That throws the timing way off.
>
> Examples:
>
> (1) The box here boots/runs from SSD, but has a 2TB mechanical drive
> for recordings and videos.  Quite frequently, about every third to fifth
> boot,
> something buggy in the startup doesn't "see" the mechanical drive, and
> starts
> up the system without mounting it ("auto" in /etc/fstab).  I've now removed
> the "auto" from /etc/fstab, and added my own script to mount it later on.
> I also had to add some delays in the initramfs so that udev wouldn't miss
> seeing that device.  Ugh.
>

Have you filed a bug on upstart yet about this?  It sounds like a core
problem that some of the upstart developers would need to provide some input
on.


>
> (2) mythbackend frequently start before networking is up, so it doesn't
> find
> the hdhomerun network-based tuners.  Again, I've bypassed this by writing
> my
> own scripts to start mythbackend now, and changed the sequence to require
> networking.
>

This actually can be fixed now for natty finally because there is a Network
Manager upstart job.  We just need to make sure not to break maverick and
lucid in the process.  The same package gets built on all three of them.


> (3) At shutdown, mysql exits before mythbackend is shut down.  Duh..
>

This is an unfortunate side effect that upstart doesn't support optional
requirements for starting jobs.  What we need is something that is "if this
job exists, it should block startup of the next job until it starts, but if
it doesn't, then don't".  I requested this from the main upstart developer a
while back, but it *still* hasn't landed.  Creative things like just having
a pre-start script that pings mysqld until it's running might end up have to
be the solution that's used.  Was your workaround for this any more
creative?

>
> Stuff like that.  There were another half dozen or so things there that
> I had to tweak to guarantee correct startup/shutdown after installing
> Maverick,
> but I don't remember the others off hand.
>
> Cheers
> -ml
>
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