SageTV V4 questions and feature requests

[neilbradley]

I've been using V4 since it came out, and have some suggestions and questions:

1) When typing video drive path names, make the *FIRST* digit on keypad or keyboard entry *ENTER THE NUMBER IT REPRESENTS*. For example, if I press '1, I have to scroll through 15 characters to get to "1".

2) In my setup, I've moved one 400 gig drive out of one machine and put it in a machine that's on 24/7. All of the files are still there, but my shows in SageTV still point to the old location, and I get a playback error when I try to play anything that was on that drive. Is there a way that I can simply point all of the existing recorded shows to the new location? If not, how 'bout adding that as a feature?

3) I'm wondering if I'm doing something wrong with "Don't like". I wake up every other morning and have 5 "Paid Programming" shows recorded, and none of them are set to "don't like" even though I've set them all to "don't like" several times before. I also have this same problem with other shows, most notably The Fresh Prince Of Bel-Air, Full House, and a few other children's shows. I'm wondering if Sage TV is forgetting my preferences, or there's a bug somewhere that doesn't identify those shows as a series?

4) Any chance of lossless audio (.m4a) playback in Sage? Or at least have Sage recognize that .m4a is the same as .mp4 lossless?

Thanks!

-->Neil

[stanger89]

Originally Posted by neilbradley

4) Any chance of lossless audio (.m4a) playback in Sage? Or at least have Sage recognize that .m4a is the same as .mp4 lossless?

Sage supports WMA Lossless...

[Opus4]

Originally Posted by neilbradley

1) When typing video drive path names, make the *FIRST* digit on keypad or keyboard entry *ENTER THE NUMBER IT REPRESENTS*. For example, if I press '1, I have to scroll through 15 characters to get to "1".

The numbers are last because if NTE is on, it assumes you want to enter something other than numbers. If you want to enter numbers, then toggle NTE off using the Pause key -- see the PDF manual for details about using numeric input... I don't have the manual with me, but I think it is in the Detailed Setup -> Customize section, where you will also find info about how to customize the number text to be configured how you want it.

2) In my setup, I've moved one 400 gig drive out of one machine and put it in a machine that's on 24/7. All of the files are still there, but my shows in SageTV still point to the old location, and I get a playback error when I try to play anything that was on that drive. Is there a way that I can simply point all of the existing recorded shows to the new location?

See my earlier posts from today here and here. I'm guessing the old location's drive is no longer visible, so SageTV can't come to the conclusion that the recordings are no longer there. In the FAQ about this, there is also mention of a 'make_all_media_files_local' property (or whatever it is called).

3) I'm wondering if I'm doing something wrong with "Don't like". I wake up every other morning and have 5 "Paid Programming" shows recorded, and none of them are set to "don't like" even though I've set them all to "don't like" several times before. I also have this same problem with other shows, most notably The Fresh Prince Of Bel-Air, Full House, and a few other children's shows. I'm wondering if Sage TV is forgetting my preferences, or there's a bug somewhere that doesn't identify those shows as a series?

You can view the Airing History for a show to see how the past airings have been marked & whether any are marked as Don't Like or Watched. If you don't want such shows, clear the Watched marker from past shows. Some shows need to be kicked in the head, I mean marked as Don't Like, many times, so may need to mark several more airings for them.

- Andy

[jominor]

Originally Posted by neilbradley

I've been using V4 since it came out, and have some suggestions and questions:

3) I'm wondering if I'm doing something wrong with "Don't like". I wake up every other morning and have 5 "Paid Programming" shows recorded, and none of them are set to "don't like" even though I've set them all to "don't like" several times before. I also have this same problem with other shows, most notably The Fresh Prince Of Bel-Air, Full House, and a few other children's shows. I'm wondering if Sage TV is forgetting my preferences, or there's a bug somewhere that doesn't identify those shows as a series?

Thanks!

-->Neil

For don't like, I go to additional airing and mark a range at once. Someone, mldude or neim has an STV that does this with one press.

[sleonard]

Originally Posted by neilbradley

I've been using V4 since it came out, and have some suggestions and questions:

1) When typing video drive path names, make the *FIRST* digit on keypad or keyboard entry *ENTER THE NUMBER IT REPRESENTS*. For example, if I press '1, I have to scroll through 15 characters to get to "1".
Thanks!

-->Neil

Like you I think the number should be first on the list so I changed the order. You can find and modify the list in the Sage Properties file easier than you can in Detailed Setup. Compare these lines in my properties file w/ yours.

ui/numeric_text_input_en_1=1*?"\\/'`.,\:;@$&\!-_()
ui/numeric_text_input_en_2=2ABC
ui/numeric_text_input_en_3=3DEF
ui/numeric_text_input_en_4=4GHI
ui/numeric_text_input_en_5=5JKL
ui/numeric_text_input_en_6=6MNO
ui/numeric_text_input_en_7=7PQRS
ui/numeric_text_input_en_8=8TUV
ui/numeric_text_input_en_9=9WXYZ

[neilbradley]

Thanks for the replies, gents!

I did stumble across the ordering for the numbers. However, in my case I'm using a keyboard, so shouldn't it accept keystrokes as being their respective keys? I can understand this behavior with the remote, but not with a keyboard. Or is this something in which SageTV doesn't know the difference - between the keyboard and remote?

Regarding my drives, I wound up moving that drive out of one machine and putting that same drive in another machine and didn't touch the filesystem, so I guess the "old drive" (at least in its old location) isn't visible.

Also, is there a nice & easy way to reconcile the current list of shows against the files that exist? When I moved this drive to my new server, I wound up getting a whole ton of shows that I had to manually delete because the UNC pathnaming wasn't correct any longer. Would've saved me 10-15 minutes of hitting delete/yes + time to delete.

-->Neil

[Opus4]

Originally Posted by jominor

For don't like, I go to additional airing and mark a range at once. Someone, mldude or neim has an STV that does this with one press.

You can do that in the default STV -- highlight a category & use the Watched or Don't Like commands -- mentioned on p. 36 in the v4 PDF manual. (You can also use this for any group that is part of an Additional Airings, Historical Airings, or Search Results list.)

Originally Posted by neilbradley

I did stumble across the ordering for the numbers. However, in my case I'm using a keyboard, so shouldn't it accept keystrokes as being their respective keys?

It is still just a number, no matter what the input source. For some reason, all I can think of is Bob Seger's "Feel Like a Number"...

Regarding my drives, I wound up moving that drive out of one machine and putting that same drive in another machine and didn't touch the filesystem, so I guess the "old drive" (at least in its old location) isn't visible.

Also, is there a nice & easy way to reconcile the current list of shows against the files that exist?

I think this is what I was trying to point you towards earlier -- If you can, make that UNC path visible again & just point to a blank dir as that path so that SageTV can see that the files are no longer there. If that is not possible & the make_all_mediafiles_local property doesn't work, then v4 should be able to re-recognize the files after you 'delete' the non-existent recordings... when the recording dirs get scanned again, it should be able to find the recordings in their new locations... as long as the new location is a recording or import dir.

- Andy

[stanger89]

Originally Posted by neilbradley

I did stumble across the ordering for the numbers. However, in my case I'm using a keyboard, so shouldn't it accept keystrokes as being their respective keys?

You'd probably be better served to disable NTE entirely (Detailed Setup -> Customize IIRC).

[MrRed]

Well, first congratulations on an impressive product. I've been using it since 1.4.

1) I would like to have the mp3 player play by id tag information. There is nothing more annoying than listening to songs out of order, as I listen to full albums.

2) 'Don't Like' setting should be extended to 'Don't Like Series'. Your killing my remote batteries

3) If I have a show set to only keep 3 episodes, I don't need IR to keep filling up the shows. I would suggest that if a show IS in a schedule, it should NOT be recorded by IR at all.

4) Shuffle should be extended to shuffle ALBUM - playing the songs in the album in order. This is an adicting feature in iTunes. It worked so well, I just left the program in shuffle mode.

These 4 features / fixes you make your exelent product amazing.