Import recordings from BTV

[Opus4]

Are there details about the format of the metadata inside the BTV recorded files somewhere?

- Andy

[Brent]

Originally Posted by Opus4

Are there details about the format of the metadata inside the BTV recorded files somewhere?

- Andy

Not sure what types of details you're looking for. Here's a list of the fields included in the BTV metadata:

• Channel -- channel number
• Duration -- show scheduled duration
• Start -- show start time
• FullName -- recorded file name
• DisplayText --
• DVDReady --
• InProgress -- Recording in progress
• LastExistsTime -- File last verified time
• EPGID -- Zap2It EPGID
• OriginalAirDate --
• Name -- File name (no path)
• StationCallsign -- channel name
• Folder --
• Recommendation --
• ActualStart -- Actual start time of recording. Not present for existing recordings
• Description --
• Genre --- Category/Subcategory
• Actors --
• Added -- unknown
• ParentGUID --
• FileFormat --
• Title -- Show title
• Editable --
• TZBias -- Time zone offset from GMT
• AddedBias --
• Managed --
• SortableTime -- Start Time
• LastWriteTime -- recording stop time
• Length -- File duration
• EpisodeTitle -- Show Episode Title
• UniqueChannelID --

Regardless, there is now a solution for importing BTV recordings with metadata using neilm's webserver. Read about it in this thread

[Opus4]

Yes, I know about that thread... I put the link to it in the customizations list.

I got curious about how the data is stored in the recording itself... maybe there could be a more direct way to import the recordings.

- Andy

[Brent]

Ahh, understood. The metadata is embedded somehow into each mpg file itself. I could donate a sample if you're interested.

If your interested, there's a detailed wiki article on the BTV metadata here

There are three programs I know of that can extract the metadata from BTV recordings:
1. metadataextractor - this is a commandline program that extracts the metadata from a single show to an xml file.
2. BTV Negociator - this is a more complex program that does many things including extracting one or multiple recorded shows metadata to an xml file. It requires you to log into the BTV service
3. BTV Show Info - This is a plugin that allows manipulation of the BTV recorded show metadata. it also requires you to log into BTV service.

[gveres]

Ok, is there corresponding information for getting the metadata into SageTV?

I can take a crack at writing something.

Greg

[jdamore]

Originally Posted by gveres

Ok, is there corresponding information for getting the metadata into SageTV?

Um.. the info in the last few post isn't what you are looking for??


Edit:
"I can take a crack at writing something."

Actually it would be cool if you could write something to import your scheduled BTV recordings into SageTV. How possible is that?

[Opus4]

Originally Posted by Brent

The metadata is embedded somehow into each mpg file itself.

Thanks for the info posted above, but that all uses the BTV API to get the metadata, the step that could be removed in a more direct import method that I mentioned. Are there details somewhere of how the data is stored in the mpg file? Do you have any idea if there are some sort of tags or something that could be read fairly easily?

I could donate a sample if you're interested.

You might get a request for one...

- Andy

[gveres]

Originally Posted by jdamore

Um.. the info in the last few post isn't what you are looking for??


Edit:
"I can take a crack at writing something."

Actually it would be cool if you could write something to import your scheduled BTV recordings into SageTV. How possible is that?

I missed the post of the XML importer. I am about to try that out tonight.

Using the API probably wouldn't be that hard ...

Greg