STV: malore's STV for SageTV (Oct 15 update)

[malore]

malore's STV for SageTV (http://homepages.isunet.net/smichael/sagetv/)
This is a modified version of the SageTV 2 STV file that defines the user interface for SageTV. It includes all the features of the original and some additional menus and features have been added.

Additional Features:
* Viewing History
* Disk Space/Recording Status
* Sage Recordings (modified)
* Upcoming Movies
* Upcoming Favorites

I expect a popular feature will be the Viewing History which provides a way to view and modify the data for all the shows every recorded, marked watched or don't like.

http://homepages.isunet.net/smichael/sagetv/Options.gif

In the top left corner can be seen the disk status, the left most number is the free video disk space available. In parentheses is the number of shows scheduled to be recorded in the next 36 hours. If these scheduled recordings will leave less than 2GB of free space, then a number in red is shown displaying the estimated amount of space the recordings will take based on the recording quality and length.

enjoy,
malore

[justme]

The ability to set all "don't like" is worth it's wait in gold.:thumb:

[gplasky]

OK-this I gotta see.

Gerry

[Opus4]

Originally posted by gplasky
this I gotta see.I had to see too. I like some of those added features! Set/clear all watched, Set/clear all dislike, recording indicator, etc. When I've got the time, I'll be checking out some of these mods. :)

- Andy

[mlbdude]

Yeah that watched menu is great.

[Opus4]

I was about to ask if it were possible to pick & choose things in the mods w/o having Studio yet, but I see that it looks like everything is in one STV file.

- Andy

[AndyS]

This is really nice.

FYI - The viewing history also includes all my music tracks as shows - it would be nice to exclude those.

I'm impressed - can't wait to get my hands on Studio! ;)

Andy.

[JasonJoel]

I don't see any option to change STV files at the end of the Advanced settings. What am I doing wrong?

Would be nice to have an easier way to chance STV files than renaming the original...

Jason

Originally posted by malore
May 13 Update (http://homepages.isunet.net/smichael/sagetv/)
* Added Narflex's new function to change to a different STV file._ This can be found at the end of the Advanced settings in the Detailed Setup menu.
* Viewing History now filters out imported library files.
* Adjusted the size and position of the disk status numbers.

[JasonJoel]

MlbDude said in a post in his thread:
EXPERIMENTAL: Added Advanced Setup\Multimedia\SageTV (.STV File) setting from Narflex that will let the user change STV's on the fly. Will only show up on Server though and not a Client.

I was trying the skin on my client, not on my server. So maybe it is 'by design' that the option did not show up?

Jason

[plawlor]

Malore,

This is excellent! I prefer your version of the Sage Recordings screen and the Upcoming Movies screen is a great idea. Any chance the channels included in Upcoming Movies can be modified? Here in Canada, it would be nice to add The Movie Network 1, 2, 3, and 4 plus MoviePix and a few others... A config file with the channel call number perhaps?

Great Work!

[malore]

I'm glad you guys like it.

plawlor, adding a way to add channels to the list Upcoming Movies uses is something I want to do.

[malore]

May 13 Update (http://homepages.isunet.net/smichael/sagetv/)
* Added Narflex's new function to change to a different STV file. This can be found at the end of the Advanced settings in the Detailed Setup menu.
* Viewing History now filters out imported library files.
* Adjusted the size and position of the disk status numbers.

The update should be correct now. This update will need to be installed the same as the original. After this, updating should be possible without exiting SageTV by using the new setup option. MlbDude's latest STV has added switching as well (Detailed Setup/Multimedia). You can also download SageTV's OriginalV2.stv (http://download.sage.tv/STVUpdates/OriginalV2.stv) with this feature. However, I've read that the SageTVClient can't change STVs in this way.

[AndyS]

The update does now seem to contain the latest STV. I checked out the STV switching but for some reason I'm not seeing all the STVs - my OriginalV2 folder contains malore.stv, malore2.stv, malore3.stv, MLBDude.stv and OriginalV2.stv but I only see OriginalV2.stv in the list. I tried leaving the directory and coming back into it but that didn't have any effect. The list of folders seems to be incomplete.

This all got me thinking - is it looking on the server for its file-open dialog? That would explain it (I'm running SageClient).....

Andy.

[malore]

May 14 Update (http://homepages.isunet.net/smichael/sagetv/)
*Added the ability to configure the channels Upcoming Movies uses. It uses the channels names as they appear in the LiveTV Guide.
*Updated the STV switching function to Narflex's latest that is supposed to also work with the SageTVClient.

SageTV's OriginalV2.stv (http://download.sage.tv/STVUpdates/OriginalV2.stv) was also updated by Frey Tech with their STV switching option.

[JasonJoel]

Looks good! And the 'on the fly' STV switching works great on clients.

Interestingly though, when I use the Malore's view for Sage Recordings all of the texty blurs over each other, like it isn't blanking the windows when I change from one show to another. So all of the text becomes a big blurry mess. If you get my meaning.

Tried it with VMR9, VMR7, and overlay. I did NOT try disabling 3d accel though.

Jason

Originally posted by malore
May 14 Update (http://homepages.isunet.net/smichael/sagetv/)
*Added the ability to configure the channels Upcoming Movies uses. It uses the channels names as they appear in the LiveTV Guide.
*Updated the STV switching function to Narflex's latest that is supposed to also work with the SageTVClient.

SageTV's OriginalV2.stv (http://download.sage.tv/STVUpdates/OriginalV2.stv) was also updated by Frey Tech with their STV switching option.

[mbrown3]

Here's two feature requests that I think are better suited here than in the regular feature request for Sage2.

The first is that I'd love to see the automatic pop-up (on mouse move) of the menu bar while watching a show. That is, in 1.4 if you are watching a show and move the mouse, the little status/play/pause/ff/rw bar pops up automatically, which I find very helpful for brief status checks, etc. Is there a way to get that back instead of having to double click on the screen in V2?

The second one is, in malore's STV, in the recordings list, if I finish watching a show and want to delete it, it gives me a menu saying "delete all," but I don't want to delete all, just that episode. Is there a way to get that right click menu to say "delete all" OR "delete this episode"?

Thanks!

[Deadbolt]

I really like Malore's skin. The upcoming movie and favorite lists are superb. Couple things:
- It would be great if the program would remember where it was in the recording list and the upcoming movie list
- It would be great if you could sort the upcoming movie list by date/time instead of alphabetical
- It would be great if you could delete an entry from the the Historical Listings altogether (I don't want everyone to know I watch the Carebears ;) )

[xlr8shun]

Originally posted by Deadbolt
... (I don't want everyone to know I watch the Carebears ;) )
snorks are where its at..

[malore]

Originally posted by mbrown3
I'd love to see the automatic pop-up (on mouse move) of the menu bar while watching a show.Looking at the SageAdjustableProperties.txt (http://www.freytechnologies.com/2_papers/SageAdjustableProperties.txt) there doesn't appear to be an option to turn this on anymore. When I have some time, I'll take a look at this.

Originally posted by mbrown3
Is there a way to get that right click menu to say "delete all" OR "delete this episode"?
Currently you can delete a single episode by using the delete command (delete key) or by going to the Detailed Info screen by right arrowing over.

Originally posted by Deadbolt
- It would be great if the program would remember where it was in the recording list and the upcoming movie list Yes it would.
Originally posted by Deadbolt
- It would be great if you could sort the upcoming movie list by date/time instead of alphabetical
When I have some time, I'll take a look at this.
Originally posted by Deadbolt
- It would be great if you could delete an entry from the the Historical Listings altogether. I'd like that as well, to clean up all the junk shows from when I accidently go to livetv.

[mbrown3]

I'd love to have the buttons back in the mini menu bar too. When I pause now, I have to use a keystroke command to start playing again when I go back to Sage to watch. There are no other buttons on the menu box, just status bar and pause. I have to ff/rw using the status bar. Does anyone know of a way to get the buttons back on the bar?

[malore]

mbrown3, make sure you don't have show_mouse_icons=false in your sage.properties file, you'll want show_mouse_icons=true. You should see RWD, Play and FF buttons above the show length on the right side of the time status bar.

[mbrown3]

OK, I'll try that, thanks! Any idea how it would have been changed (if this is, indeed, the problem)?

[plawlor]

Malore,

Your latest changes are sweet! When I started using Sage, it changed the way I watch TV. Your "Upcoming Movies" screen has changed the way I watch and rent (I mean, no longer rent) movies. With the configurable movie channels option, I now have hundreds of movies to choose from each week. Great work!

I now see how the release of Studio to the general user base will take Sage to a whole new level. It would be nice to be able to mix and match skins, i.e. use Malore's Sage Recordings screen and Upcoming Movies screen together with someone else's Jukebox, etc.

[mbrown3]

Another question...I'm not sure if this applies to this skin or Sage2 in general (not home now to test), but when I right click on a show and "toggle full screen mode," once it switches on/off the full screen, the menu is still up, and I always have to go to "cancel" to then get out of it. Is there a way to have this automatically disappear after I select an item?

[jbuszkie]

This might be a dumb question.. but do these STV files work for the client as well??? Or do we need a different version for the client?

Jim

[malore]

jbuszkie, I responded to your question here (http://forums.sage.tv/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=5379), so that others with the same question can find it and others with more firsthand knowledge of the SageTV client will see it.

[malore]

plawlor, glad to here you're happy with the change.

mbrown3, I'd agree that the options menu probably isn't going to be used further after selecting full screen. This is part of the OriginalV2.stv, so you can try to get it changed by submitting a bug report to Frey Tech. I just use the Full button on my Hauppauge remote to switch back and forth from full screen (ctrl-shift-f also works).

[mbrown3]

Thanks, will submit bug report.

[ben_gb]

Hi Malore,

Your menu system is a real improvement!

One suggestion (isn't there always? :-)

Would it be possible to make it so that if you left the Set 'Movie Channels' section blank, it would automatically pick up movies on ALL enabled channels?

At the moment my movie channel list is about 3 lines long and has to be edited manually by fiddling around in sage.properties on all my clients.

I also second the request for being able to switch the movie list between time order or alphabetic order.

Thanks very much for all your work on this!

Regards,
Ben

[malore]

May 20 Update (http://homepages.isunet.net/smichael/sagetv/)
*Added blue indicator bar to the episode list to show how much of a program has been watched.
*Number of rows used to display items can be set on the options menu.
*If the Movie Channels list is blank, then it will show movies for all channels.
*Added Guide menu (shows guide data with "Paid Programming" and "No Data" airings filtered out)
*Added grouping, sorting, and filtering options to my custom menus (SageTV Recordings, Guide, Upcoming Movies, Viewing History)
*Added single delete command to the options menu.
*Moved Viewing History to Schedule Recordings menu.
*Changed it so that when a show is finished it returns to the previous menu, which helps my SageTV Recordings to remember its place.
*Some other stuff.

Screenshots (http://homepages.isunet.net/smichael/sagetv/new.html)

Enjoy,
malore

[Snuffy2]

With your new menus, how can I go about just setting one episode (if I have multiple episodes of a show) to watched or unwatched?

[malore]

Snuffy2, the same way you do with the regular menus. Use the watched command (ctrl-w or blue button on hauppauge remote). Or you can go to the Recording Detail page by right arrowing on the episode.

[Snuffy2]

Originally posted by malore
Snuffy2, the same way you do with the regular menus. Use the watched command (ctrl-w or blue button on hauppauge remote). Or you can go to the Recording Detail page by right arrowing on the episode.

Right arrow does just what I wanted. I've always used the info button, which now brings up your menu. BUT the combo of your menu & the right arrow is perfect.

Thanx

[mbrown3]

GREAT stuff, malore! One question though. On the recording screen, when I'm done watching a show and delete/set watched for it, the list of shows on the left bumps down to only one or two shows and their episodes. The rest are missing. I have to menu out and back into Sage Recordings to get the full list. Any idea why this is happening? Thanks, and keep up the great work!

[malore]

The show list scrolls, because it reloads the menu after deleting a show to refesh the episode list and then scrolls back to where you were (part of the tricks I've had to do to get a 2-pane display working). You should be able to just scroll the show list back up.

[mbrown3]

Well, for example, last night I had about 8 shows in the list, with their corresponding episodes on the right. When I deleted one of the episodes of one show, however, the list on the left went down to only 3 shows. Couldn't scroll up or down, because there were only 3 shows there and I had to go out to the menu and back in to the recordings in order to see the full list again.

[bgorrell]

Really like your customizations, malore...

Suggestions:

1. Grouping the guide by channel -- I would much rather see it listed by channel number than call-sign. Some call-signs are very hard to remember or interpret and grouping by number tends to group networks, sports, news, and pay channels nicely.

2. When sorting the guide by date, include the date in addition to the time (or put Mon, Tue, Wed, etc in front of the time)

3. Add right click menu options to all listings to include everything you normally have to press the right-arrow for. I don't like going to a seperate screen to select "Record, Move to Library, Add Favorite, Delete, etc". Sage v1.4 had context sensitive menus and I really miss them since I prefer to use the mouse to the remote.

Overall, your changes make SageTV much better. I think the default interface is SageTV's weakest link, but SageStudio is going to be it's strongest. It's a bit like the game mods community. Can't wait to get my hands on SageStudio. I'd like to redo all the menus entirely. I find the menu structure confusing (especially the grouping of menus under Schedule Recordings).

One final feature I am really missing is export/import of the wiz.bin info. I would hate to lose all the usefull information about my recordings that wiz.bin saves just because I have a system crash or have to add a hard drive and move files around. Will SageStudio allow this level of control? I would like to export info based on filename alone and be able to re-populate info on an import. It seems like a simple database, but what format? If we could figure that out, it would also be possible to write a third party app to manipulate it any way we want. I'd love to be able to browse it in table format, search/replace, delete, rebuild, etc.

[justme]

It seems like a simple database, but what format?It's not so simple now. If you remember a while back, someone ;) reverse engineered the wiz.bin. If you check that thread you'll see there were changes to the wiz's structure including encryption. So any access to EPG data will have to be thru Studio and that is likely to be whatever Jeff can contractually allow. Hopefully this should be enough. I'm sure he understands how important it is to users to get as much access as possible, and still be fair to Frey and it's contracts.

Personally I'm a big fan of openning up the EPG data to the absolute limit of the contract, but that's only my personal opinion/wish. :)

[mbrown3]

Originally posted by bgorrell
3. Add right click menu options to all listings to include everything you normally have to press the right-arrow for. I don't like going to a seperate screen to select "Record, Move to Library, Add Favorite, Delete, etc". Sage v1.4 had context sensitive menus and I really miss them since I prefer to use the mouse to the remote.


YES. This would be excellent. Having these options in a right click menu (especially record and watch now) would be excellent, just excellent.

[ben_gb]

Hi,

Another excellent update to this inferface! Well done and thank you.

Would it be possible to add an extra 'grouping' on the Upcoming Movies list, which would list them in order of showing (in otherwords, the movie with the nearest show time coming up gets displayed first. The 'other airings' could still be listed in the right-hand panel...but the actual list would be ordered based on which movies have the soonest showings.

The reason that this would be useful is if you want to find a movie to watch/record now, soon, or later tonight (eg in case there is nothing you want to watch that has already been recorded).

It would also be useful if the time of showing was displayed as well as the date in the right-hand panel (in fact this might be useful in all the different groupings and listing displays, such as under "Guide") - you could possibly drop the year part of the date if you are getting short of space there.

A different way of doing this could be to have the time/date in the left hand panel, and then clicking on this will show you what movies begin at 8:00, 8:15 etc.

Lastly, it could be useful to be able to select other program types in this 'Upcoming' section, in addition to movies (such as news, sports etc), though personally I'm less bothered by this one!

Thanks again.

Ben

[ben_gb]

PS:

Would it be possible to wrap around the lists in the left-hand panel, so it's quicker to get to something that is at the end of the list? EG when the movies list is displayed, you can page-up to get to the Xs, Ys or Zs end?

Regards,
Ben

[xlr8shun]

ive noticed lately when the blue bar thing (to show how much of a show was watched) im getting visual errors in the gui now.

http://webpages.charter.net/rt001/messed.jpg

also a side note, it seems i only get the visual errors in the screenshot above, with video backgrounds enabled

one more, my recording conflict icon wont go away, i load up your latest stv (may 20) and i see a recording conflict icon in sage, so i go to check and no conflicts, if i load up the default or mlbdudes stv, then i have no conflict.

[Opus4]

Originally posted by ben_gb
Would it be possible to wrap around the lists in the left-hand panel, so it's quicker to get to something that is at the end of the list?That sounds like a good idea to me too. :)

Now for something that I think is new: I seem to find nitpicking stuff... I noticed that when on the SageTV Recordings screen, for example, the commands to go directly to certain other menus do not work. In particular, I can not go directly to the LiveTV Guide and the Upcoming Recording Schedule.

- Andy

[xlr8shun]

sry, that was the 'recording' icon not the conflict icon.. my fault.

however video backgrounds/trans menus are still causing havok.

[zz5]

The thing I was most excited about when I saw this thread was the display of recording space that would be left after scheduled recordings occur. I am so happy that you can do this with Studio. Having to manually estimate whether or not recordings will complete has to be my biggest complaint about Sage. I don't use any favorites or intelligent recording, which would make it even harder. I do have three hard drives, and you just never know whether you will have enough space. You could have 11GB left as reported by Sage system information, but a 4GB recording might not complete if that space was evenly distributed among the 3 hard drives. When space is tight, you just have to look at the how much each partition has with My Computer. This gets really complicated if you have lots of things recording and will be gone a day or two. Having Sage tell me whether recordings will be able to complete will save me a lot of time. I also love the list of upcoming movies.

[malore]

ben_gb, I don't like wrapping menus, which is why I didn't use them. I'm experimenting with a few alternatives.

Opus, maybe I don't want you to leave my menus ;).

xlr8shun, a while back I saw a screenshot of someone's menus looking similarly that used the originalv2.stv. I couldn't find the post so I don't know how it was resolved. I might just add an option to disable the blue watched bars.

zz5, I'm glad you like the upcoming movies feature. My disk status probably doesn't solve your problem, but, studio should allow you to track your disk space more easily.

[Opus4]

ben_gb: If malore doesn't like wrapping & doesn't add an option to allow wrapping, I'll bet that since some STV files have wrapping lists & some don't, it will be possible to turn wrapping on once Studio is available.

- Andy

[zz5]

malore: I haven't tried out your stv, but I assumed it probably wouldn't really solve my problem. I figured that part was probably just a simple example to demonstrate what Studio could do and probably wouldn't take into account multiple drives. How exactly do you determine the space each recording will take? Is there a function call in Studio that returns Studio's estimate for how much space a given recording should take, or are you just reading the schedule and doing some calculations? Let's say you have an all ready recorded favorite or intelligent recording that was taking space that would be needed by an upcoming manual recording. Sage will delete that recording to make room for the manual recording. Would it be possible to design an stv that could correctly report that the manual recording would take place?

[malore]

zz5, I just estimate the space needed from the recording quality bit rate and the scheduled recording duration. The space available is the total of all sources.

[malore]

May 26 Update (http://homepages.isunet.net/smichael/sagetv/)
· Added ability to use the 1-9 keys to scroll both the left hand grouping list and the right hand episode list. 1 scrolls to the beginning of list, 5 scrolls to the middle, 9 scrolls to the end, etc.
· Added grouping option to group by channel number.
· Episode listings now begin with the day of the week when sorted by date.
· Can turn off the blue watched bars in Setup -> Added Features.
· Setting "No Grouping" in Upcoming Movies now shows only a single group consisting of all the movies.
· The menu short cut commands (Guide, Recording Schedule, SageTV Recordings, etc.) should now work.
· Back button will now exit the full screen display of the episode details.
· A few other minor things.

[Opus4]

Originally posted by malore
Added ability to use the 1-9 keys to scroll both the left hand grouping list and the right hand episode list. 1 scrolls to the beginning of list, 5 scrolls to the middle, 9 scrolls to the end, etc.That was a great idea! :)

- Andy

[mbrown3]

Is this at all a possibility as an upcoming option?

Add right click menu options to all listings to include everything you normally have to press the right-arrow for. I don't like going to a seperate screen to select "Record, Move to Library, Add Favorite, Delete, etc". Sage v1.4 had context sensitive menus and I really miss them since I prefer to use the mouse to the remote.

Thanks!

[malore]

Originally posted by mbrown3
Is this at all a possibility as an upcoming option?

Add right click menu options to all listings to include everything you normally have to press the right-arrow for. I don't like going to a seperate screen to select "Record, Move to Library, Add Favorite, Delete, etc". Sage v1.4 had context sensitive menus and I really miss them since I prefer to use the mouse to the remote.

Thanks!

Sorry, but all these options either already have keyboard shortcuts and remote buttons(watched,delete,don't, favorite) or cause problems because they remove a file (move to libarary, incorrectly recorded) and the list doesn't update correctly. Plus adding another 6 items to the options menu make it far to large and confusing.

[mbrown3]

How about just "record" and "watch now" then? I don't really care about the others (that was taken from someone else's post), nor do I really care about the regular buttons in the options menu. All I really want are to be able to get to "record" and "watch now" when I right click on a show in the guide. Even just the option would be great. Of course, once studio comes out, I (hopefully) will be able to do this myself, but can someone help a brother out? ;)

[malore]

In both my "Guide" and "Upcoming Movies" if you left click on a future airing it is marked to record. If you left click on a show that is currently airing in "Guide", SageTV will start watching it. In "Viewing History" left clicking toggles watched. In "SageTV Recordings" left clicks play the show.

[mbrown3]

Is this part of the newest release? Because I just tried it in the guide for a future show, and left click brought up the options screen "record," "add'tl airings," "favorite options," etc. I have to select "record" to get it to record (as far as I know)...

[malore]

I was referring to my "Guide" and not the standard "LiveTV Guide".

[mbrown3]

You mean the recordings guide? Anyway, is it possible to alter the standard tv guide view to enable "record" and "watch now" on right click?

Incidentally, I know many of us make a lot of requests, etc., but that doesn't mean we don't appreciate what you've already done. You've taken a great program and made it exceptional. Keep up the great work!

[Opus4]

The only immediate feedback I have is that the original Recording Schedule is nice because everything is shown in the order it is to be recorded. Yours makes it easy to categorize and get rid of all the titles you don't want at all... great for when General Hospital shows up again, as I'm sure it will. However, with the idea in mind of being able to stay on one screen & simply change the layout, it might be nice to be able to group the left pane by date/day, in order to see all the shows set to record for each day.

One other thing... would anyone else find it useful to be able to use the 'watched' command on the playback screen? Currently, if you end a show early (at the credits, but the recording isn't at the end yet), you either have to remember to FF to the end or mark the show as 'watched' manually before exiting or watching something else. If you could use the 'watched' command, you could simply hit the 'watched' button on the remote, then exit immediately or go directly back to the the list of recordings to find something else to watch.

- Andy

[kny3twalker]

Yeah i found this strange as well that we could not use the watched button while video is playing

[malore]

May 28 (http://homepages.isunet.net/smichael/sagetv/)
· When using the favorite command on an airing that is already a favorite it now goes to the settings for that favorite.
· The record command on a airing already set as a manual recording brings up the recording settings dialog.
· Added "Recording Schedule" and two additional Guide menus.
· Added "Set Menu Name" item to the option menu for the 3 Guide menus. So you can set up the grouping, filtering, and sorting any way you like and then name it accordingly (Ex. Guide by Channel, Guide by Category, Upcoming Favorites)
· Grouped the custom menus under new "Custom Menus" menu.

My changes primarily refer only to my 2-pane custom menus, since that is where my efforts are focused.

I had fun playing "Whack-a-mole" with Intelligent Recordings using my new Recording Schedule menu.

Let me know which of my features you like, or it might get removed it I decide I don't like it or need room for something else.

enjoy,
malore

[Opus4]

ok... well, now my "immediate feedback" post looks way out of place. :) Did you change something since posting that other version earlier this afternoon?

- Andy

[malore]

You're just Psychic. The posts wrapped to a new page and I didn't want anyone, who cares, to miss that there was an update. It would be nice if I could just edit the thread title to indicate when the file was last updated.

[justme]

It would be nice if I could just edit the thread title to indicate when the file was last updated. It's not as convient as you being able to change the thread's name, but...
Just PM one of us Mods with the new title you want changed/appended to your thread. I'd be glad to do it for you. I can't ganrauntee I'll always do it within x hours but I'd be glad to help. :)

I took the liberty of updating the name to show that you have a new May 28 version available. If you wish I had not done so, please just let me know and I'll change it right back.

/justme

[malore]

Thanks, that works.

[Deadbolt]

Is there a way to change the font size in the list or description portion of Sage Recordings or any of the custom menus?

[malore]

Not currently. It's something I've thought about adding.

[glbrown]

I'd like an unwatched filter in the recordings screen.

[follower]

malore

Excellent work! I love the movie list and the customizable guides. :jump:
I was testing this on my test box and then moved it into my production box. My production box has the PARENTAL CONTROLS set on. When using your Recorded Lists it will not ask for the PARENTAL CONTROL password, it just fails. I needed to turn off the parental controls to watch a movie and now my kids may be tainted by accidentally clicking on an inappropriate movie. Are there plans to support the PARENTAL CONTOL password for all of your UIs?

Keep up the good work...

Follower :goodjob:

[follower]

malore,
It would be nice to have the ability to have categories checked off. For instance, I want to have the guide show only COMEDY SITCOMS or HORROR MOVIES RATED R, or ...

follower... and thanks!

[malore]

follower, I'm not sure why you are having problems with Parental Controls. I just tried it and it seemed to work fine. My suggestions would be to exit SageTV and restart it and see if that fixes it. If that doesn't fix it, try right arrowing to the "Recording Detail" screen and then use the Watch Now button.

I would like to know if Parental Controls is/isn't working for anyone else with my menus.

[follower]

malore, thanks for the quick reply... I will test that when I get home and update you here tonight.

Follower

[follower]

malore,

Restarting Sage fixed the problem... thanks!

Follower

[follower]

malore,

Is there anything new you are working on?

-Follower-

[malore]

June 3
· Added the ability to set the base font size for my 2-pane style menus under Custom Menus -> Settings. All the fonts are scaled from this base size.
· My SageTV Recordings now remembers its position after going to other menus, etc.
· Redid a bunch of the inner workings of my menus, so that they now update better.

I set it up to reduce the width of the panel displays when using a font smaller than 10. If anyone actually uses a font smaller than ten, let me know if you like this or not.

[Deadbolt]

Great additions! The font adjustment and position memory is sweet!

Thanks!

[Opus4]

Originally posted by malore
· Added the ability to set the base font size for my 2-pane style menus under Custom Menus -> Settings. All the fonts are scaled from this base size.I really like being able to change the font size... though now I don't remember what it was originally.

I set it up to reduce the width of the panel displays when using a font smaller than 10. If anyone actually uses a font smaller than ten, let me know if you like this or not. I don't think my server could use anything smaller than size 10 unless I had a HUGE screen, but I _might_ use a small font on my client, since that monitor is right next to me. Is there a problem keeping the panels the original size for those small fonts? I think the benefit of such a small font is to be able to see so much more info for each listing (especially long titles), but reducing the panel size negates some of the benefit of that small font. If it was more work to reduce the panel size for small fonts, I don't think that extra effort would be worth it.

I don't know which takes more Studio effort: keeping the panels the same size for each font, or reducing them for the small fonts.

- Andy

Edit: Oh yeah: the menu position memory is great. Between that & the immediate list movement with the number keys, the long menu lists are much easier to navigate.

[malore]

16 was my original base font size.

I added the width adjustment for fonts smaller than 10 because you end up with a lot of white space in both columns and I found it easier to read, but I don't really plan on using fonts this small, so I'll let people who do decide which is best.

[malore]

Jun 5 update (http://homepages.isunet.net/smichael/sagetv/)

· Redid the filtering option to allow multiple filters to be applied at the same time.
· Added an option to filter by category.
· Added the year and number of stars to the episode listing for movies.
· Other minor tweaks.

http://homepages.isunet.net/smichael/sagetv/filtering.gif

Example of making a guide listing for Science Fiction shows that aren't favorites, watched, or marked don't like.

enjoy,
malore

[kny3twalker]

hey post this at htpcnews.com
mlbdude has his there
I was waiting for you too
but nothing
so I just thought I would ask

thanks
I know I like to use mlbdude's now
but some of your features are priceless
and I install every update

[Deadbolt]

I had a problem with your June 3 version...I use a 350 TV and GUI out only...if I had video running and went to Sage Recordings (with video set to play in the background) nothing showed up except for the SageTV in the upper left and teh time in the upper right. All the other menus displayed properly while overlayed against running video.

Does the June 5 version fix this?

[malore]

Background video on my menus is fixed as of this post.

[follower]

malore,
What about the ability to sort it by stars (rating)? It would be great to tape or choose to tape only the 4 star / 3 star movies.


What about be able to chose more than 2 categories... HORROR / MOVIES / 3 STARS?


Follower

[malore]

Sorting by star rating can't be easily done well.

I might expand on filtering later, but there doesn't seem to much interest in the changes I already made.

[follower]

I looked at your changes last night. It was a great idea to add the stars to the list on the right pane. When looking for things to "tape" in the guides is where it makes sense. I have a hundred movies to look through and if they were sorted by stars you could easily record the good movies. Maybe this should be an option in favorites but still needs to have mulitiple criteria (category = movies and stars > 3 and category = "Horror" and year > 1989 and ...

I appreciate all the work you have done thus far and makes Sage so much more enjoyable! :jump:


Follower:thumb: :thumbup:

[follower]

As far as the interest in your latest changes, the customization is perfect... :nod:

[malore]

Jun 9 Update (http://homepages.isunet.net/smichael/sagetv/)

Added "Series Premieres & Specials" menu.

http://homepages.isunet.net/smichael/sagetv/premiere.gif

enjoy,
malore

[follower]

Great! I will install it when I get home... Looks Great!


Follower

[Opus4]

I haven't had time to download & check out the last couple updates the way I normally would... :(

- Andy

[Opus4]

Just so you know... the link to the zip file in step 1 of the Installation instructions points to a local C: file; the link at the top of teh page works, though.

- Andy

[malore]

No, it doesn't ;)

That's what I get for using a HTML editor instead of just a text editor like I normally do.

[kny3twalker]

what about can you add pay per view and sports package listings to the guide?

[Opus4]

Oh... you're right. I just checked it again and I see the link is correct after all. ;) Don't know what came over me... :p

- Andy

[Opus4]

I've got it all set up now... that "Series Premieres & Specials" menu is interesting. Since this is rerun season, there isn't a whole lot there, of course. I'm curious -- is it only going to show the very first episode of a series? At first, I thought it would find the start of a new season, but it looks like it checks for a ShowID ending in 0001. If it only sees the first episode of a new series, I'm not sure how much I would use it.

Also, what is the criteria for a show to be a 'special'? It might be useful to have it be able to show just the specials -- currently it looks like it shows either "premieres" or "premieres & specials".

Finally, I don't know what the limits are in Studio, but is it possible to have the left pane of your recording schedule group by date? (I don't think there was a response to that question before.) As I mentioned previously, that would allow sorting the upcoming schedule by each day.

- Andy

[malore]

Originally posted by kny3twalker
what about can you add pay per view and sports package listings to the guide?

The guide should show listings for all the data that it has, if you're not seeing listings for pay per view and sports packages then my guess is Zap2it doesn't have/provide that data. I can't change that. This thread (http://forums.sage.tv/forums/showthread.php?postid=10059) talks about not getting Pay per view titles in EPG.

[malore]

Opus4, your observations are spot on. My goal was to list the pilot episode for new series. To do this I first implemented the method used by the "Premieres Only" setting which searches for "Series Premiere" in the guide data. I then tried the method used by "Premieres & Specials" which just searches for showID's ending in 0001. This method catches some shows that the first method misses, but adds a lot of E!/VH1 style 101 best something or other listings. So I implement both methods. I tried a third method of Specials only, but it turned out that half the pilot episodes for new series were shown more than once and only the first airing was marked "Series Premiere", so it only half worked so I got rid of it.

I need to look into grouping by date before I know if it can be done or how difficult it would be, but I'm pretty sure it would require more work than the other methods of grouping.

[mdmint]

Just installed your STV on my Client and way cool. And I'm another one jealous of not having access to Studio!

Interesting "glitch" or quirk. Under custom menus, viewing history, it lists not only viewed programs but recorded not viewed programs (maybe it's supposed to?) More interesting it lists some programs I never even recorded or watched - some from BEFORE I even downloaded and installed Sage!:confused:

[malore]

mdmint,

Glad you like it. Yes, it sometimes shows recent old guide data. I could just only list watched shows, but not all recorded shows are watched before being deleted and if you marked it unwatched than it would disappear from the history list, also shows just marked don't like would not be listed. So, instead I list all the guide data older than 2 days. SageTV seems to usually delete guide older 2 days unless it has been recorded or marked watched, don't like, etc. But occassionally it doesn't and you see old guide data.
If look again after a guide update this might clear up. You can also use the filtering options to only show watched shows.

Originally posted by mdmint
More interesting it lists some programs I never even recorded or watched - some from BEFORE I even downloaded and installed Sage!:confused:
I'm not sure how that would happen. Is it a recent date or something off the wall like 1969?

[mdmint]

Recent date, May 13th 04. I may be mistaken and that may have been the first date I brought the Server up. I'd have to check for sure.

I'll play with filtering and try for only watched. Makes sense to me for "viewing history" to display what we've viewed!

BTW, you have three custom "Guides", what are they for, they seem to display the same thing. (or should I read some directons...)

[kny3twalker]

ok I did not realize this but could you add the xmltv for just directv and dish payperview I am sure this would really make alot of us happy
the thread you sent me to just died off
with no solution as I could see
maybe with studio you or mlbdude could get this going maybe with some help from members that use xmltv
If I am out of line by asking this just say so
but yeah TitanTV does have per pay per view listing and mostly correct
I suppose I may watch it and check for the next few days that they are cool
I still want to use the epg from zap but xmltv for TitantV pay per view would be sweet

this seems more like you than mlbdude anyways if someone is going to do it
thanks

[malore]

Originally posted by mdmint
BTW, you have three custom "Guides", what are they for, they seem to display the same thing. (or should I read some directons...)

The guides all start with the same guide data, but then you can set up the grouping, sorting, and filtering the way you like and rename the menu to match your settings. It lets you have three different ways of viewing the guide data without having to change the settings back and forth. For example, you could set up a Guide by Category, Upcoming Favorites, and Sci Fi listings.

[Opus4]

malore: In case you hadn't thought of this already, there's something you could use those custom commands for -- let people go directly to some of those custom guides. :)

- Andy

[malore]

Originally posted by kny3twalker
could you add the xmltv for just directv and dish payperview I am sure this would really make alot of us happy
the thread you sent me to just died off
with no solution as I could see

I think adding listings for just ppv shows from xmltv is beyond what I can do. The thread I gave you is just what I found when trying to figure out what you were asking for about PPV. The main thing I got out of was:
Originally posted by dkardatzke
We are limited by the data provided to us by Zap2it and the Cable and Satellite companies. I apologize for any inconveniences this causes, but you will experience the same problems with other PVR apps that use the Zap2it data. Your best bet is to contact your Satellite provider and tell them to provide the data to Zap2it so you can get better use their service.

[malore]

Originally posted by Opus4
malore: In case you hadn't thought of this already, there's something you could use those custom commands for -- let people go directly to some of those custom guides. :)

- Andy

I've thought about it and wondered how configurable to make it and then never gotten around to doing anything.

[cmaffia]

Is there any way I can set one of my guides as a programed
key on my Streamzap remote? Say I want to replace the live guide button on my remote for custom menu/guide 3 rather than the default grid style. What is the event code for the guides?

Thanks

[Opus4]

Originally posted by cmaffia
Is there any way I can set one of my guides as a programed
key on my Streamzap remote? Say I want to replace the live guide button on my remote for custom menu/guide 3 rather than the default grid style. What is the event code for the guides?That's what we were just discussing not having available currently. How are you using your Streamzap? (ie: what software is running to control it & can you chnage the message command for the button you want to use?) Depending on your answer, you may be able to send a sequence of codes to get anywhere you want to go. See the last link in my sig lines, below, for an example & you should be able to do something similar in Girder, if you use that.

- Andy

[cmaffia]

I got the SageTV bundle pack which included the Rosyln PVR-250, the SageTV license and the Streamzap remote. Included with the remote was a printed manual which gave the installation instructions and the url to install the software for the remote.
The instructions included a screen shot of the Streamzap configuration utility which allows you to program the 4 colored buttons on the remote. The screenshot was specifically how to program certain functions in Sage and had the event ID's of these functions. So, I figure if there is an event function for the custom guides, I could replace that instead of using the default guide.

[Opus4]

Originally posted by cmaffia
The instructions included a screen shot of the Streamzap configuration utility which allows you to program the 4 colored buttons on the remote. The screenshot was specifically how to program certain functions in Sage and had the event ID's of these functions. So, I figure if there is an event function for the custom guides, I could replace that instead of using the default guide.And did it show how to run "SageTV.exe -event #" to use those codes? The above discussion/request reflects the fact that there are not any events to go directly to the screen you want at the moment. If you can change the program that the Streamzap software runs in order to send those event codes, you can then use my SendMessage utility to send a batch of event commands to get anywhere you want to go. See: SendMessage V2 upgrade (http://forums.freytechnologies.com/forums/showthread.php?postid=43117#post43117) for the download & more info.

So that we don't get this thread too far off track here, if you have any further questions/comments about that utility, please post to the thread I just linked to.

- Andy

[cmaffia]

Originally posted by Opus4
And did it show how to run "SageTV.exe -event #" to use those codes? The above discussion/request reflects the fact that there are not any events to go directly to the screen you want at the moment. If you can change the program that the Streamzap software runs in order to send those event codes, you can then use my SendMessage utility to send a batch of event commands to get anywhere you want to go. See: SendMessage V2 upgrade (http://forums.freytechnologies.com/forums/showthread.php?postid=43117#post43117) for the download & more info.

So that we don't get this thread too far off track here, if you have any further questions/comments about that utility, please post to the thread I just linked to.

- Andy

Yes I can program the 4 buttons to do a variety of Operating System functions as well initiate any command or exectutable.
I will check out your URL. Thanks!

[walts81]

Malore, is there any way we could get the preview window to stay displayed on the main menu screen?

Thanks,
Josh

[malore]

walts81, I'm not sure what you are asking for. If you are asking about the the small video window, then you can change the settings for that using the options menu (esc, right mouse, or yellow button) on the main menu. It sounds like you want to change show video on menus to always.

My custom 2-pane menus don't show the small video window, but it will show full screen background video.

[walts81]

I forgot about the "show always" setting. But I don't think that's what I'm after. If I remember correctly, "show always" would display the video window all the time, even if I just brought sage up out of sleep mode. I only want it to show the video window if I went to the main menu straight from either the program guide or liveTV. I believe mlbdude's stv does this. Well, at least it's supposed to but sometimes the video doesn't display.

[mdmint]

Originally posted by malore
malore's STV for SageTV (http://homepages.isunet.net/smichael/sagetv/)
In the top left corner can be seen the disk status, the left most number is the free video disk space available. In parentheses is the number of shows scheduled to be recorded in the next 36 hours. If these scheduled recordings will leave less than 2GB of free space, then a number in red is shown displaying the estimated amount of space the recordings will take based on the recording quality and length.

enjoy,
malore
Can this be user modified? (say for next 48hrs or whatever)

[malore]

At the moment there is not a way to set the time frame the disk status uses. I'll keep that in mind as something to possibly add. I choose 36 hours, because I wanted a days notice and to protect against checking it a 7pm one day and 12pm the next.

[malore]

Jun 14 Update (http://homepages.isunet.net/smichael/sagetv/)

· Show information can now be exported in XML format using the options menu of any of my 2-pane menus. Show information is exported for either a single show if an episode has focus, or for the entire group otherwise. The information is written to shows.xml in the SageTV folder and is overwritten each time. Information for shows in my SageTV Recordings can also be exported to individual .xml files named after the .mpg file names and will be created in the same folder as the .mpg files.
· Added .smi (sami) closed captioning support to video playback. Closed Captioning can be enable from the options menu during playback if a .smi file with the same name as the first segment is found for the current program. CC setup information (http://forums.sage.tv/forums/showthread.php?postid=44757#post44757)
· The "Set Movie Channels" dialog now accepts channel numbers in addition to channel names.
· Added the display of video in a window to my 2-pane menus and most of the main menus.
· The Custom1 command goes to "Custom Menus" and the Custom2 command goes straight to the first custom guide menu.

enjoy malore

[justme]

Yeh, metadata portability for show data and smi support. You rule. :goodjob:

Thanks,
/justme

[Deadbolt]

What kinds of things can you do with this xml data???

[turak]

http://banshee.ancients.net/malore-tearing.jpg


I'm getting some rendering problems when video is playing in the background. I'm using VMR9, NVDVD, 3d accel.

[justme]

Malore,

Padding correction for shows seems to be working perfectly except for one small thing. I tested it it out on a padded show I'd used to test your first private beta and the CC was out of sync, just like the padding wasn't being noticed. At first I thought it might be the fact that this show was moved to the library(I did this to save it for future tests). But then I recorded a new padded show(call it show2) as a test, this morning. It played back fine from the SageTV recordings menu and properly adjusted for the padding.

I then moved it to the Library, expecting this to cause loss of CC sync. However, when I played show2 from the "Archived Shows Recorded with SageTV" menu the CC was still in sync. So I put Sage to Sleep and woke it and tried the new file again. It still played the CC in sync. I even tried playing another show with CC to make sure Sage wasn't holding onto the old CC timing, somehow. When I went back to the play show2 again it was still in sync. I then noticed the watched indicator for the show and saw it wasn't fully watched. This appears to be the only difference between show2 and the old test show. So I the fast forwarded til the show was fully watched. When I played it again CC was finally out of sync. Going into options and marking the show unwatchd doesn't seem to get the CC sync back.EDIT:One other piece of info. Both of these test shows had padding at the beginning and end

I'm not exactly sure what all this means, but it seems it has something to do with the way Sage is keeping track of the last position of the time marker when you return to a show. I'm not sure if the library function has anything to do with this, it may be this is just where I first noticed it. It may be that I'm looking at the wrong possible cause, since once CC sync is lost I can't get it back for that show. So maybe something else I did caused the loss of CC sync and I didn't notice. I'm sorry I can't tell you the exact cause. Hopefully something I told you will allow you to figure out what is happening. I'm going to be gone most of the day. If you'd like me to run any tests or provide certian info, please let me know and I'll do it ASAP.

The good news is that CC seem to be perfect on shows without padding.

Thanks for this feature,
justme

[cmaffia]

Turak

I got this too.. on the settings menu for the custom menus,
I chose disable blue bar and that fixed it.

[turak]

Originally posted by cmaffia
Turak

I got this too.. on the settings menu for the custom menus,
I chose disable blue bar and that fixed it.

That works. Thanks.

[malore]

Jun 15 Update (http://homepages.isunet.net/smichael/sagetv/)

· Added grouping options to group by date or to group everything into a single group.

· Dates and times exported to .xml files are now in the standard format for xml.

· Fixed CC diplay to correctly play archived shows that had their start times padded.

enjoy
malore

[Opus4]

Originally posted by malore
· Added grouping options to group by date or to group everything into a single group.Hey... I think I like that date-group view for the Recording Schedule! :goodjob:

- Andy

[malore]

Yeah, grouping by date does make it easy to see how many shows are going to record each day.

[justme]

Thanks for the fix for archived CC shows. I can't seem to screw up the sync no matter what I do. :)

I love the XML export function. Do you plan to make use of this data format to eventually allow imported videos to have desciptions, etc in the media library? I'm not expecting the data to get imported into the Wiz.bin, but showing it in the UI(for media library) could still be usefull. IMHO

Thanks again

[malore]

If anyone has any questions, comments, complaints, or praise, make them tonight because I'll be away from my computer for about a week starting tomorrow.


justme, you're welcome.

[Opus4]

OK... one quick question/suggestion: would it be possible to leave the selected item highlighted in the left pane when you move focus to the right pane? For example: I just noticed today that when I'm using the mouse in your Recording Schedule, it can get difficult to remember which day I'm looking at.

Yes, I know the info is there on the screen, but leaving the day highlighted would make it that much more obvious. :)

- Andy

[malore]

Opus4, I was going to tell you that it couldn't be done easily, but it turned out it can. I've upload this minor update to my web site, but this is the only notice that I'll make that a change has been made.

[Opus4]

You're pretty quick on this stuff... guess I was lucky it was an easy change. :)

Thanks!

- Andy

[Opus4]

While malore's away... is anyone else using the Custom Menu's Recording Schedule? I am getting lockups on that screen.

I usually go through the schedule on my client, so I have been sorting that menu's panes by Date & checking each day's upcoming recordings to see which I don't want. I then use the "Don't Like" command directly on that screen rather than on the Program Information screen (which you get to by using the right arrow on a show title). The problem is that SageTVClient locks after marking a few shows -- it _seems_ to happen once the server notices those marks & begins rethinking the schedule. I have never had this problem on Frey's regular Recording Schedule.

- Andy

[Deadbolt]

I use it heavily...no problems

[DoughBoy]

Malore or anyone, Just installed this stv. Very nice. I have a quick question.
When I go into the custom menu/Recording Schedule I see everything that will be recorded in the future. I clicked on a few of the scheduled programs and now a red bar serounds each of them. What does this mean? Clicking on it again brings up another window for further customizing.
Doug

[Opus4]

The red outline indicates it is a manual recording (check the FAQ, below, for more info on color outlines). He obvioulsy changed the behavior such that clicking on a recording changes it to a manual recording.

- Andy

[Opus4]

Originally posted by Deadbolt
I use it heavily...no problems Exactly how are you marking shows as Don't Like?

- Andy

[DoughBoy]

Originally posted by Opus4
The red outline indicates it is a manual recording (check the FAQ, below, for more info on color outlines). He obvioulsy changed the behavior such that clicking on a recording changes it to a manual recording.

- Andy

Well Andy, these files are set up as favorites, what would be the advantage of changing this so now it would be manual recording? And how do you change it back?

Does this mean that the other showes that are in my favorites that are not set to manual recording now will not be recorded?:confused: I assume they will still record.

Thanks for the help Andy

Doug

[Opus4]

Originally posted by DoughBoy
Well Andy, these files are set up as favorites, what would be the advantage of changing this so now it would be manual recording? And how do you change it back?Sometimes it might be desirable to change the recording settings for one particular airing rather than the entire favorite category... ? My preference would be to have the Program Information screen be shown when I click on a show in the scedule... but since this is malore's STV, we get his preferences. ;)

Anyway, if you cancel the recording, that will remove the Manual setting & restore it to its regular favorite status. It might get temporarily removed from the schedule when you remove the manual setting, but it will get added again once SageTV goes through the process of rethinking the schedule... unless another favorite actually has higher priority or it might be scheduled to record a different airing of that episode.

Does this mean that the other showes that are in my favorites that are not set to manual recording now will not be recorded?:confused: I assume they will still record.Everything shown in the recording schedule is scheduled to be recorded. The outline colors simply show the status/type of recordings they will be.

- Andy

[DFranch]

I just wanted to say that I have been using your STV since it came out, and loving it. I really love the scheduled recordings menu in your custom menu. I am grouping by date, this way I can see everything scheduled to record 1 day at a time. Is their any way to put the day next to the date in the left column? Like this:

6/20/04 - Sun
6/21/04 - Mon
6/22/04 - Tue
6/23/04 - Wed

When you get a few days down in the list it can be confusing trying to tell which day of the week you are actually looking at. This way I can easily see that I am looking at next Saturday.

[Opus4]

That sounds useful, especially when you have scheduling going out more than the default 3 days. :) For now, note that if the right pane is also sorted by date, it shows the day of the week as the first item on the line.

- Andy

[DFranch]

Oh, yeah I have scheduling going out 14 days.

[follower]

Say malore,
Hope you had a good trip :thumb:

I was asking earlier about sorting on the right hand pane by rating (number of stars) as opposed to filtering which is on the left hand pane. This would allow, if I am looking for Movies sorted by stars I would see the best movies at the top of the list in the right hand pane (sorted by). From there I can set to record the the top rated movies.

Of course if you move this sorting to all views, the recorded view would be able to sort by stars and I could watch the best rated movies first... Since you already pull the rating (stars) onto the description on the right hand pane, I thought it might not be too difficult.

Just a suggestion... I was not too clear on my previous post.

Follower---

[malore]

I'll look at this again, but the difficulty with sorting by rating is that it gets sorted alphabetically so it lists movies with whole star ratings first then movies with half star ratings. If the movie listing includes the studio that also effects the sort order.

[DFranch]

It would also be great if you could sort by time in the right side of the upcoming recordings menu. That way when I group by date, I could sort the right hand side by time.

[Opus4]

Originally posted by DFranch
It would also be great if you could sort by time in the right side of the upcoming recordings menu. That way when I group by date, I could sort the right hand side by time. It does that now, doesn't it? Sort both panes by Date -- the left will be sorted by day & the right will be sorted by time within that date. (When sorting the right pane by date, it sorts first by day, then by time.) That's what I use all the time. :)

- Andy

[DFranch]

Oh, I did not realize that if I sorted the right pane by date it would also sort by time. I should have thought to try it.

[follower]

malore,

Thanks for taking a look at the sort by rating (stars). I really don't know how I used SAGE without your customization!


Kudos... Double Kudos... :goodjob: :jump: :clap: :p :D :dance:

[Opus4]

Here's another strange one... is anyone else seeing a difference on the client vs. the server in the total size of the upcoming recordings shown in red at the top of the screeen when that number exceeds the space available? My client seems to be consistently showing nearly 20GB less than the server does.

Edit: I restarted them both & made sure they both had the exact same versions of the latest STV, just in case I forgot to update one. The server lists 101.2GB needed for the next 22 recordings, while the client shows 84.4GB needed for the same 22 shows.

Edit2: My mistake! I am using custom recording rates & somehow the one I am currently using got defined differently in the server's properties file compared to the client's file. Note to others: if you ever start using custom recording rates, verify that they are defined the same way in your clients' properties files too.

- Andy

[malore]

Jun 26 Update (http://homepages.isunet.net/smichael/sagetv/)

· Added code to the Video Library to make it try to look up the show information using the file name.

· Added sorting by Star Rating option to the Upcoming Movies menu.

· Added the day of the week to grouping by date.

enjoy
malore

[follower]

Malore,

I am so excited...


Thank you so much. I wish I can repay you for the best customization!

Follower!:coffee: :jump: :goodjob: :goodjob: :clap: :smokin: :dance:

[DFranch]

Cool, thanks for adding the Day of the week to the group by date in recording schedule. It works great.

[kny3twalker]

Hey I checked out your STV again to day and was surprised to find in the custom menus recording schedule I show I never set up to be recorded
is the recording schedule in the custom menus different from the normal recording schedule?

Also what is the blue bar?
I could not see any difference when disabling it and enabling it

otherwise nice skin

soooooo much information

[malore]

The blue bars indicate how much of a program has been watched. So if you've watched half the program, half the episode listing in the right column will be blue.

The only difference between the two recording schedules should be how they are displayed.

Edit: The default action, for my menus that show guide info and other upcoming airings, is to mark the show to be recorded, so if you accidently clicked on something,pressed the OK button, etc. you might have marked something to be recorded and not noticed.

[malore]

DFranch and follower, I'm glad you like the changes I made for you. :)

[Fluffdaddy]

:thumb:

[kny3twalker]

Oh I figured out what it was
It is the second times the Discovery Channel did this to me
I had set up a manual recording of the seven wonders of ..... motorcycles
for monday at 1:00 AM
the show though gets swictched now with two days until the shows airs to some shows about Hugh Hefner and Playboy
whats worse is that there are no future airings of the show I want to record
like I said this is second time the Discovery Channel has done this
Hey I like everyman like Hugh Hefner but SOFB


It would be really nice if Sage could notify use when a show does this so we have another chance to record it before it never airs again

SECOND TIME DISCOVERY RRRRRRRRRR!!!!

Thanks malore for the explanations

[tangfj]

This may have been asked before, but I didn't want to search through this very large post. Is it possible to combine the features that malore provides with mlbdude's interface? Thanks.

[follower]

Malore rocks!-

[justme]

This may have been asked before, but I didn't want to search through this very large post. Is it possible to combine the features that malore provides with mlbdude's interface? Thanks. Yep, it's been ask before. See this post by Dan (http://forums.sage.tv/forums/showthread.php?postid=45731#post45731) for Frey's official stance. You might also want to read the whole thread and some of ther other threads here in the Custominazation forum. If you were asking Malore to add certian features himself, that's also be covered in customization section(in a few threads). In the end, it's all up to each STV author. They made these STVs for themselves and then made them public to allow users to use their additions. Having said that, a specific feature request is always valid, IMHO. But what is added is solely their decision. :)

PS: Yes, Malore and his STV do rock. It's my STV of choice, because of his support for CC(smi files) and it's XML metadata export feature. All the rest is just really tasty icing on the cake. :)

[follower]

I love the custom lists. You can see all the movies that are coming on, sort by PG or R, Date, Rating(stars), year, etc. It makes it so easy to ensure you will have something to watch! :jump:

The volume of data you can see on one screen is awesome!

Follower :goodjob:

[Deadbolt]

Malore...can you include these 350 bug workarounds???
http://forums.freytechnologies.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&goto=lastpost&threadid=5947
Since you have Studio...wondering if you could incorporate these fixes in your STV? I love your STV, and won't go away from it...but these 350 fixes might be able to keep me from my standard 1 week use between 350 soft lockups.

[follower]

malore,

Are you planning anything new for your STV? Maybe some work on the music player? Random Playlist? I love your stv! :coffee: :nod:

[DFranch]

Random playlists would be cool. Then I wouldn't have to worry if my Wife's Ricky Martin or Marc Anthony MP3's starts playing when in random mode.

[mbrown3]

Yeah, your wife's...;)

[DFranch]

Doh!

[malore]

I'm currently not working on anything new. I use SageTV solely for watching favorites and other recorded shows, so organizing those recorded shows and picking new shows to be recorded is my main focus. At the moment my disc space status indicator is telling me that I have spent too much time working on my .stv and not enough time watching my shows.

Deadbolt, I’ll take a look at the 350 fixes.

[follower]

Malore-
How about filtering out all the duplicate when looking for something to record? For example if I have one of your Custom views open, I should be able to open up the FILTER dialog and chose a "Don't Show Dupes" in the filter. This way if there is a movie being shown 70 times in 2 weeks, you only see one of them in the list. Going "right" from there you can chose which one you want to recored.

This functionality falls in line with what your focus is for your STV. Great work..

Follower :jump:

[Deadbolt]

Thanks Malore!

[Opus4]

Originally posted by tangfj
Is it possible to combine the features that malore provides with mlbdude's interface?Yes. This is certainly possible. See:

MalDude v1.0: A Combo Malore + MlbDude STV (http://forums.freytechnologies.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=6174)

:)

- Andy

[jbuszkie]

First of all a big Thanks for all the work you are doing! It's really great what you and Mlbdude have started... :goodjob:

That being said...

I'd like to voice my suggustion for an automated way to add the CC (closed caption). Right now it's pretty clugey(sp?) Don't get me wrong.. It's better than nothing and I'm thankful for what you've done so far! And I'm really close to getting it wokring. But what I'd like to see is an automatic way to do the parsing of the mpeg to extract the files... And the deletion of the files after one deletes the MPEG file. In the best of situations, one wouldn't even know whats going on and when you ask for CC while playing the show it will just start playing.
Whow knows, maybe you can get together with Merrypig and make it so it does the extraction on the fly.. While one is watching the show... I can wish!! If you ask me.. you guys have pioneered the way to get CC info. Now maybe Narflex can work to make it part of the base sage and imbed merrypig's prog into sage!

Thanks again for all the work you've been doing,

Jim

[UniKyrn]

I've found a bit of a bug in the latest stv. The Recordings display, if I use your version of it, comes up with "no movies". If I go into custom menus and select the default display for recordings, all 115 of the currently recorded movies I've got on my drive show up. For some reason your display can't find anything.

This is on SageTV Client running your latest STV. The server running the default STV displays all my recordings correctly as well so I'm sure what ever database is being queried has them all listed.

[Opus4]

If you use the Options command (or right click) on the SageTV Recordings screen, is there any filtering being used that might be filtering out all those movies?

- Andy

[UniKyrn]

Nope, I even did an explicit clear filters to make sure. All I get is "No Shows". I also tried the mlbdude(old) style display, it gives me a blank display also.

The only one that seems to work is the default now. This was working fine for a couple of weeks, I seem to have crossed some threshold somewhere.

[malore]

Since mlbdude(old) also doesn't work, my guess is that something is causing the grouping to fail. If you haven't already, try changing the grouping on my sagetv recordings to something else (date, category, etc.)

[UniKyrn]

I just tried that, no change, the display is still empty.

[UniKyrn]

Ok, I've discovered what triggers the empty list, I'm hoping you can look at the code and figure out why it happens.

A week ago I had a problem with the EPG data being useless and ended up making a few timed recordings during the week, but not watching anything. When Zap2It pulled itself together and got the EPG going again, some of my favorites got recorded and I noticed then that the recordings display was broke.

After watching the last timed recording and deleting it, the malore style display now works again as it should. Somehow the filenames for timed recordings, numbers with a leading minus sign, cause your display to come up empty.

[ekiwi]

Hi, I love the concept of the movies list, but i am amongst the unfortunates that dont live in the USA and have to use xmltv importing.

When I go to your upcoming movies list I see nothing no movies at all even with the channel list blank or with it set to the correct channels

I am happy to preparse the xmltv file before i send it into sagetv and i have tried a couple of things like setting category to movie and adding a star rating etc but i cant figure out what is required to make something appear in the upcoming movies list

can you please tell me exactly what conditions cause a movie to appear in the list including things like case sensativity.

thanks in advance.

On a side issue it appears that not everything gets imported out of a xmltv file into sage. two examples are star ratings and episode numbers.

I realise this is a little of topic (and i will probably open another thread for this) but it is important here if forinstance a star rating is required to make it a movie

[malore]

UniKyrn, I tried to duplicate your problem by making a couple time based recordings, but they showed up listed as "Timed Record" and didn't cause any problems. Unless this happens again, I'm not going to worry about it.

[malore]

ekiwi, the requirement to be listed in "Upcoming Movies" is that the category is "Movie", it's on one of the channels set if any, it's not rated "NR". So I would think the only thing you would have to do is make sure the category is "Movie". You can check that the category is being set correctly by grouping one of my custom guides by category.

If you can't get "Upcoming Movies" to work, you might be able to make something similar using one of the custom guides. Using the pop up options menu, select display filter and then set the category to Movie. You just wouldn't be able to set specific channels they way you can with "Upcoming Movies".

[malore]

Originally posted by follower
Malore-
How about filtering out all the duplicate when looking for something to record? For example if I have one of your Custom views open, I should be able to open up the FILTER dialog and chose a "Don't Show Dupes" in the filter. This way if there is a movie being shown 70 times in 2 weeks, you only see one of them in the list. Going "right" from there you can chose which one you want to recored.

This functionality falls in line with what your focus is for your STV. Great work..

Follower :jump:

I've added this and it will be included in the next release.

[follower]

Malore,

Thanks so much... it was an annoying thing to keep seeing the movie over and over (I like sorting by date so the movies closest to airing will be taped). I love your customization!

Follower :nod:

[malore]

Jul 19 Update (http://homepages.isunet.net/smichael/sagetv/)

· Added a filtering option, "No Duplicates", which will only list one episode for each show. This can speed finding new programs to record when, for example, looking at the guide grouped by category or upcoming movies sorted by star rating.

· Removed the show title from the episode list description when grouped by title.

· Removed the episode number from the episode list when sorted by title and now does an additional secondary sorting by the episode title.

· Updated the calculations for the disk status indicator, so it now only loads the property file quality settings once, which reduces the number of calculations done and eliminates extra network traffic from a client to the server.

· The timing for Closed Captioning can now be adjusted by selecting "CC Adjustment" from the options menu after CC has been turned on. Enter an adjustment in milliseconds. Positive numbers will display the CC sooner and negative number will display it later.

· Decreased the CPU usage of CC in places, by checking that the text actually changed, where there were times codes with duplicate text in the .smi file.

· Added custom5 command to the main menu that toggles pvr350 output off and on, similar to laurenglenn's custom1.

enjoy
malore

[follower]

Excellent! Can't wait to get home to try it out! Thanks for the DUPE Removal!!! :thumb:


Follower :clap:

[roco]

this features would be so nice. huge functionality at "little cost?"

roco

[Opus4]

Here's a fairly simple feature suggestion: Add a link to the recording.png icon such that when it is shown & you click on it, it goes directly to your custom Recording Schedule.

- Andy

[malore]

When I first added the recording icon, I had it go the recording schedule, but it was a hassle to add it back each time I updated for the new version of SageTV. I hadn't thought about adding it back since I mostly use the remote, but I'll do it now that things have settled down.

[Opus4]

That's why I was suggesting that it go to your custom version of the recording schedule -- that link would always be there. And, besides, I like your version of that list better. ;)

BTW - I use the remote almost exclusively on my server, but I mostly use the mouse + some keyboard for my client, since I'm at the keyboard & mouse already.

- Andy

[follower]

malore,
I know you have been busy with the commercial advance but I have a suggestion for your original stv. It would great if one can delete all of the mostly watched shows that are contained on the right hand pane. Currently you can delete all or delete one, it would wonderful to "delete all watched".


Follower;)

[malore]

follower, I'll consider it. I delete everything with the delete command assigned to one of my remote's buttons.

[bender]

I haven't said it yet, so I'm saying it now: Thanks malore for the great STV. I use your STV for the client/server and like all of the functionality you have incorporated. I anticipate your next release.

I have two suggestions for your STV. I have not read all the posts in this thread so if these suggestions have been posted before, then consider my post another positive vote.

First, could you add a feature to sort sage recordings by origianl air date? I think this would be a useful feature because the episode numbers occasionally do not correspond to the sequence that shows follow in a series.

Second, for the EPG on the LiveTV guide, could the color of the highligted show be changed to a more noticeable color than light blue. With the dark blue background and lightblue highlighted, I sometimes lose track of what show I am selecting on the EPG. Maybe some shade of orange would work?

Thanks again for the work and effort.

Cheers :goodjob:

[JasonJoel]

Yeah, I find the light blue hard to see also.

Jason

Originally posted by bender
Second, for the EPG on the LiveTV guide, could the color of the highligted show be changed to a more noticeable color than light blue. With the dark blue background and lightblue highlighted, I sometimes lose track of what show I am selecting on the EPG. Maybe some shade of orange would work?

[McTurok]

Originally posted by cmaffia
Turak

I got this too.. on the settings menu for the custom menus,
I chose disable blue bar and that fixed it.


That works. Thanks.

How do you do this? I'm having the same problem.

[Opus4]

How do you do this? I'm having the same problem.Do you mean: How do you change that setting? If so: on the Custom Menus, there is a Settings option. Select it & you can enable/disable the blue-watched bars in the pop-up dialog.

If that is not what you meant, please clarify.

- Andy

[McTurok]

Do you mean: How do you change that setting? If so: on the Custom Menus, there is a Settings option. Select it & you can enable/disable the blue-watched bars in the pop-up dialog.

If that is not what you meant, please clarify.

- Andy

Yes, that was the change I was looking for. I just got this setup a week ago and I'm still stumbling around all the new features and settings.

Thanks for the help! :)
:thumb:

[malore]

Oct 15 Update (http://homepages.isunet.net/smichael/sagetv/)

· Rebuilt the STV file using the STV file that comes with SageTV V2.1.7 RC4 to insure all the new features are supported.
· Added option to sort shows by original air date.
· The delete all shows option will now let you choose to delete only the shows that are marked as watched.
· Added the option to mark shows as a recording error to the delete command's popup dialog.
· Changed the method the disk status feature uses to estimate the space required for upcoming recordings.
· Moved my custom setup options to Detailed Setup.
· Added setting to change the delay that auto commercial skip waits before skipping a commercial break.
· Added setting to change the offset from the estimated start of the show after a commercial break.
· Added setting to let the commercial skipping code know the broadcast is using the PAL standard.
· Added setup options for the background commercial skipping settings that previous had to be set manually by editing the sage.properties file.

enjoy
malore

If you have any problems, please make sure you don't also have the same problem using the OriginalV2 STV file.

[malore]

First, could you add a feature to sort sage recordings by origianl air date? I think this would be a useful feature because the episode numbers occasionally do not correspond to the sequence that shows follow in a series.malore,
I know you have been busy with the commercial advance but I have a suggestion for your original stv. It would great if one can delete all of the mostly watched shows that are contained on the right hand pane. Currently you can delete all or delete one, it would wonderful to "delete all watched".

Follower;)Both these features were added in my last release for use with SageTV 2.1.

[btvbuddy]

Malore, cool stuff. On your Jun 14 Update - You wrote:

Show information is exported for either a single show if an episode has focus, or for the entire group otherwise. The information is written to shows.xml in the SageTV folder and is overwritten each time. Information for shows in my SageTV Recordings can also be exported to individual .xml files named after the .mpg file names and will be created in the same folder as the .mpg files.

I would like to integrate a new program I am working on with your Sage TV mod and this seems like a good place to start.

Are the XML formats still changing or are they now standard?
Maybe you have a 1.0 format version?
Could you include a version attribute so that I can tell current & later XML's apart?
Could you post a sample XML for me?

Thanks in advance I hope to test my integration points with your mod/STV soon.

[malore]

btvbuddy,

Attached is a sample .xml file renamed to .txt so I could upload it. The format hasn't changed at all since the inital release. I tried to make it a complete as possible the first time, so I wouldn't have to keep changing it.

[btvbuddy]

malore,
Simply excellent! Tip of the Hat to you. So, with your OK I will just add an option that says 'Sage TV - Malore STV' in my configuration options screen.

Lastly, is it possible for these XML's to be auto generated somehow so that the user does not have to request a XML gen? This way maybe I can just scan a directory, see if any XML's have been piped out and they just load them all in. This would make the user experience better.

Have you gotten any feedback from users on what they are doing with these XML's?

Just as an example (there is a program called DVDProfiler that grabs metadata from DVD's) this kinda thing can be done to supplement the metadata you already have in your XML's... Just food for thought.

Again, many many thanks!

[malore]

malore,
So, with your OK I will just add an option that says 'Sage TV - Malore STV' in my configuration options screen. Feel free.

I haven't heard much about the XML feature since it was first release. nielm made a program (http://forums.freytechnologies.com/forums/showthread.php?p=49291) to convert the xml file to info.my format.

With some work it would be possible to auto generate the xml files.

[silkshadow]

I have a quick question, I am playing with Cayar's stv and it includes a bunch of your excellent mods (thanks!). The upcomming movie one, however is not working right. I think this is because I am using the XMLTV plugin? What exact piece of data is this mod looking for when I set the movie channels? For example, Star Movies (a movie channel ;)) is defined as:


<channel id="starmovies.home.ph">
<display-name lang="en">Star Movies</display-name>

I tried putting in STAR MOVIES, Star Movies, star movies, starmovies.home.ph and 32 (the physical channel its located on). None of those gave me anything. Is there something I am missing? Thanks!

[malore]

I think someone else had problems with Upcoming Movies, who was using XMLTV. The channels need to be either the channel name shown in the livetv guide (ex. DISN) or channel numbers. If you leave the channel list blank, then all channels are selected. The criteria it uses is that the category for the show is "Movie" and it's on a channel in the list and it doesn't have a rating of NR. Change the grouping of one of the custom guides to "category" and see if the movies are grouped into a "movie" group.

[silkshadow]

The criteria it uses is that the category for the show is "Movie" and it's on a channel in the list and it doesn't have a rating of NR. Change the grouping of one of the custom guides to "category" and see if the movies are grouped into a "movie" group.

Ah-ha, that's the problem, there aren't any categories set for any shows in my guide data. Is there anyway to remove the filtering so it just shows everything on my movie channels? My grabber dosen't support setting default categories for channels. Thanks!

[malore]

I sure wish Studio would be released, because I could help you to easily change this yourself. I could make this adjustable using a property setting, but then the setting would be added to everyone's sage.properties file and I would prefer not to add any more clutter than necessary. If you're willing to provide me a copy of your wiz.bin file, I can see if I can find an alternate solution. Send me a private message with either a web location for the file or I can give you my email address.

[rsagetv99]

I also have the STV by Cayars, however when I go to Viewing History it says "No Shows". Is there a setting I can check/change to make sure this is set up properly?

Thanks again for the great features you have added to SAGE.

[Cayars]

Check the filters you have in place in the options and make sure you aren't filtering everything out.

[rsagetv99]

I don't think I have any filters turned on but I will double-check tonight. Thanks.

[rgfaulkner]

malore,
Lastly, is it possible for these XML's to be auto generated somehow so that the user does not have to request a XML gen? This way maybe I can just scan a directory, see if any XML's have been piped out and they just load them all in. This would make the user experience better.


I have the same question. Is there anyway to automatically create these when a recording starts?

Have you gotten any feedback from users on what they are doing with these XML's?


I would like to use them as an interface into Meedio. My plan, if the XML's could be created automatically, was have Meedio to launch a script that loaded each as an entry in the Meedio Library. Specifically, I am referrring to the XML's generated for Single Shows, not groups. But, hey, I could work with any.

Is there a way to get this created automatically? Some amazing stuff is being done in these STVs, this should not be that much of a problem.

Thoughts? Comments?

-RGFaulkner