[mythtv-users] VU+ HDTV Receiver as IPTV Tuner

[Stephen Worthington]

On Sun, 18 Aug 2019 01:36:42 +0200 (GMT+02:00), you wrote:

>Hi list,
>
>Did anyone succeed in setting up an VU+-box as IPTV-Tuner?
>How would a valid m3u-file for the channel-list look like?
>Any hints are welcome.
>
>Regards
>Daniel

This page has some information about the .m3u format that MythTV uses:

https://www.mythtv.org/wiki/IPTV_Encoders_as_a_Capture_Device

I have my backend recording from SAT>IP tuners created by running
minisatip on some DVB-S2 tuners.  Here is what some what my initial
playlist.m3u file looks like:

#EXTM3U

#EXTINF:0,4015 - MTV
#EXTMYTHTV:xmltvid=mtv.sky.co.nz
#EXTVLCOPT:program=1039
rtsp://satip.jsw.gen.nz:554/?src=1&freq=12707&msys=dvbs&plts=off&fec=34&pol=h&ro=0.35&sr=22500&mtype=qpsk&pids=0,1039,1003,1103,1903

#EXTINF:0,4011 - Comedy Central
#EXTMYTHTV:xmltvid=comedy-central.sky.co.nz
#EXTVLCOPT:program=1042
rtsp://satip.jsw.gen.nz:554/?src=1&freq=12707&msys=dvbs&plts=off&fec=34&pol=h&ro=0.35&sr=22500&mtype=qpsk&pids=0,304,1004,1104

#EXTINF:0,4087 - CNN
#EXTMYTHTV:xmltvid=cnn.sky.co.nz
#EXTVLCOPT:program=1015
rtsp://satip.jsw.gen.nz:554/?src=1&freq=12707&msys=dvbs&plts=off&fec=34&pol=h&ro=0.35&sr=22500&mtype=qpsk&pids=0,1059,1005,1105

The MythTV format has some extensions from the base .m3u format.  The
data on the #EXTINF line is 0 for the first field (I do not know what
it is for), then the second field after the comma is the
channel.chanid value, also used for iptv_channel.chanid.  These values
must be unique in your database.  I just made mine start at 4000 and
match the channel numbers (4000 + the channel number).  Then after the
" - " is the channel name.  If I remember correctly, that gets put
into both the channel.callsign and channel.name fields.  The
#EXTMYTHTV line tells MythTV what xmltvid to use to get the EPG data
and is put in channel.xmltvid.  I am not sure if the #EXTVLCOPT line
is a MythTV specific one or used on other systems.  Its "program="
option gives the serviceid value that is put into the channel table,
but I am not sure it is necessary as IPTV tuning does not use the
serviceid.  The URL line gets copied to the iptv_channel.url field.
The iptv_channel.type gets set to "data" and iptv_channel.bitrate to
0.

I had to write a Python program to create the playlist.m3u file from
the channel data that I could extract from my SAT>IP scan done using
my copy of DVBViewer (pay Windows software).  DVBViewer gave me the
PID numbers I needed.  Since then, the dvbv5-scan program has been
updated and you can now use that to scan a tuner and get the necessary
data.  You may be able to run dvbv5-scan on your VU+ box to do that if
you need to.  What software is the VU+ box using to create its IPTV
tuners?  Is it TVHeadend?  What IPTV protocol is it using?  If it is
TVHeadend, that may have an option to create a playlist.m3u file, but
it would probably not quite be the right format for MythTV.