(Old) MediaShrink - An HTPC focused encoder

[nyplayer]

EP,

1. Is there a way you can add an optional refresh of the SageTv media? this is required when replacing a file with a diff extension
2. If mesdiashrink fails does it return a code other than 0 .
3. Do you check the duration of the input against the output to make sure you don't replace a file with a partial encoded one ... this was a problem with the previous release.

PS also it doesn't seem to be using your comskip.ini see code below. notice Comskipcomskip.ini"

Running Comskip: start /B /D "S:\SJQSAGE\penguin64\mediaEngineBins\Comskip" comskip.exe --ini="S:\SJQSAGE\penguin64\mediaEngineBins\Comskipcomskip.ini" "U:\Medium-WhosThatGirl-4179033-0.workFolder\Medium-WhosThatGirl-4179033-0.clip_1.mpg" > "U:\Medium-WhosThatGirl-4179033-0.workFolder\Medium-WhosThatGirl-4179033-0.clip_1.comskip.log" 2>&1

[Slugger]

I'm triggering a video import rescan after each run of mediashrink via SJQ's :SCANMEDIA option, but it doesn't update wiz.bin. I then trigger a manual scan multiple times after mediashrink completes, but no matter how many times I do it, the converted video just ends up in imported videos and the original recording becomes lost in Sage (still shows up, but listed as 0MB file). Is there something else that's needed so that Sage will relink the converted video to the airing info? I've been doing it manually via studio calls right now (I've just started testing mediashrink with a few recordings and it does everything perfectly except it loses the link to the airing info).

[evilpenguin]

Originally Posted by nyplayer

Running at low priority through sjq does not work. It still runs handbrake at normal priority

You can download this updated version of mediaShrink.exe which I updated to *always* run mediaEngine and all its tools at IDLE priority.

http://upnp2podcast.googlecode.com/s...ediaShrink.exe

[evilpenguin]

Originally Posted by nyplayer

1. Is there a way you can add an optional refresh of the SageTv media? this is required when replacing a file with a diff extension

I think it'd be possible to call the webserver to trigger one, but I haven't looked into it. Honestly, I recommend just letting Sage notice the swaps at its own pace.

Originally Posted by nyplayer

2. If mediaShrink fails does it return a code other than 0 .

Nope, I don't set any return codes, but that should be an easy change.

Originally Posted by nyplayer

3. Do you check the duration of the input against the output to make sure you don't replace a file with a partial encoded one ... this was a problem with the previous release.

I used to, but I think I removed it at some point because it got in the way of my testing using very short files. I can add it back in.

Originally Posted by nyplayer

also it doesn't seem to be using your comskip.ini see code below. notice Comskipcomskip.ini"

good catch, i'll fix that. But, no worries its still using the right .ini file because I'm launching it with mediaEngineBins\comskip\ as the working directory.

[evilpenguin]

Originally Posted by Slugger

I'm triggering a video import rescan after each run of mediashrink via SJQ's :SCANMEDIA option, but it doesn't update wiz.bin. I then trigger a manual scan multiple times after mediashrink completes, but no matter how many times I do it, the converted video just ends up in imported videos and the original recording becomes lost in Sage (still shows up, but listed as 0MB file). Is there something else that's needed so that Sage will relink the converted video to the airing info? I've been doing it manually via studio calls right now (I've just started testing mediashrink with a few recordings and it does everything perfectly except it loses the link to the airing info).

Sage's logic for in place replacement is a complete mystery to me and I've been bugging them for *years* to make it more robust. Honestly, the best way to handle it is to just let Sage notice the switch at its own pace.

By doing what you're saying it sounds like Sage sees the new video before it notices the original is gone, adds it as an imported video. Then when it finally sees the original is missing, it looks for files it hasn't seen yet to replace it.

[ohpleaseno]

Originally Posted by evilpenguin

You can download this updated version of mediaShrink.exe which I updated to *always* run mediaEngine and all its tools at IDLE priority.

http://upnp2podcast.googlecode.com/s...ediaShrink.exe

Awesome. With this change, my SJQ+Mediashrink process will be perfect. Awesome job.

Let me say awesome one more time.





Awesome.

P.S. With the last update SJQ properly cycles through all of the queued items without my intervention. Now I just have a bunch of work folders to clean up and I'll be rolling.

[Slugger]

Got to admit I'm new to mediashrink and started playing with it last night. Basically, I'm planning on using it to transcode syndicated shows that I'm archiving. Some shows are recording on my HD-PVR from channels that aren't HD but since my STB is fixed on 720p output, I'm getting recordings of shows in SD that are 1.8GB. Well, my first few tests show mediaShrink is shrinking these recordings to 0.38ish GB (on the 2 or 3 I've tried it on) so I'm quite pleased with the results. As I say, the only problem is Sage is losing the link to the airing info.

My question, does mediaShrink always produce the output in a *.mkv file? If so, I can probably whip up an internal SJQ task to automate the relinking of the airing info to the new mkv.

As a side note, even on my Q6600 quad core, the transcode nearly brings my system to its knees. To help prevent overloading, I'm adding some new task options to SJQ to help support this. I've built the following new options and am testing them right now:

:NOCLIENT - A task with this option will not accept new tasks as long as a client or extender is connected to the SJQ host. Motivation: Do not run mediashrink task if there is a client or extender connected (and presumably using) SageTV.

:NORECORDING - A task with this option will not accept new tasks as long as a recording is active. Motivation: Do not run mediashrink if there is a recording in progress.

I'm running the build now and testing it. I plan to release the next v3 beta snapshot of SJQ later this evening.

[nyplayer]

Originally Posted by evilpenguin

Sage's logic for in place replacement is a complete mystery to me and I've been bugging them for *years* to make it more robust. Honestly, the best way to handle it is to just let Sage notice the switch at its own pace.

By doing what you're saying it sounds like Sage sees the new video before it notices the original is gone, adds it as an imported video. Then when it finally sees the original is missing, it looks for files it hasn't seen yet to replace it.

This has changed it is now tied to the refresh of the full media library.

See this thread
http://forums.sagetv.com/forums/showthread.php?t=42092

I added a refresh to my batch-file that uses wget (with web-server) to refresh the library after mediashrink completes. This sees the new files right away.

[ohpleaseno]

Are you talking about making an inplace replacement of an mpg with a mkv? Are you using /inplace as one of the switches. I haven't had a problem with sage recognizing the new file as long as the filename is the same.

Or are you talking about something else?

[evilpenguin]

Originally Posted by Slugger

Some shows are recording on my HD-PVR from channels that aren't HD but since my STB is fixed on 720p output.

Out of curiosity, when you record SD channels like do they show up as widescreen with black bars on the side?

Originally Posted by Slugger

My question, does mediaShrink always produce the output in a *.mkv file? If so, I can probably whip up an internal SJQ task to automate the relinking of the airing info to the new mkv.

By default mediaShrink outputs mkv files and its by far my recommended container for SageTV, but its also possible to configure mediaShrink to output mp4 files as well.

Originally Posted by Slugger

As a side note, even on my Q6600 quad core, the transcode nearly brings my system to its knees. To help prevent overloading, I'm adding some new task options to SJQ to help support this.

The .exe i posted above for lowering the priority will help with this, but the more options the better

[nyplayer]

Originally Posted by ohpleaseno

Are you talking about making an inplace replacement of an mpg with a mkv? Are you using /inplace as one of the switches. I haven't had a problem with sage recognizing the new file as long as the filename is the same.

Or are you talking about something else?

What I am saying is that I do not do a refresh of my Sage media unless I have to... I have it on manual. I only do a refresh if it s required... unless you do a refresh Sage will not recognize the new file.

I think setting up a refresh every 5 minutes is overkill so I refresh only when I add a new file or transcode a file.

[Slugger]

Originally Posted by evilpenguin

Out of curiosity, when you record SD channels like do they show up as widescreen with black bars on the side?

Yes, and mediashrink is cropping the recording to remove the black bars, which I suspect is why I'm seeing the file shrink from 1.8GB to ~385MB. I really didn't expect to see this kind of gain and once I did I got very excited about transcoding all such recordings. Especially b/c I'm chewing up the space on my new 3TB unRAID NAS way faster than I expected to.

By default mediaShrink outputs mkv files and its by far my recommended container for SageTV, but its also possible to configure mediaShrink to output mp4 files as well.

But as long as I don't touch anything, it will always output mkv?

The .exe i posted above for lowering the priority will help with this, but the more options the better

Just dropped in the new exe... probably will help enough, but I still liked the idea of the new task options I added to SJQ.

[evilpenguin]

Originally Posted by Slugger

Yes, and mediashrink is cropping the recording to remove the black bars, which I suspect is why I'm seeing the file shrink from 1.8GB to ~385MB.

Interesting, there's actually some more improvement I can do on those. Since they're usually just up-scaled SDTV, I can detect that and scale the video back to down to 480p and tone down the bitrate quite a bit (2500 -> 1500) without sacrificing much noticeable quality.

Originally Posted by Slugger

But as long as I don't touch anything, it will always output mkv?

Yep. Now, just to be clear, you're using the /inPlace flag right where it names the new videos exactly the same as the original, right?

original.mpg
original.mkv

[Slugger]

Yes, I'm using /inPlace but I end up with:

orig.ts turns into orig.mkv not orig.autoencode.mkv

[evilpenguin]

Originally Posted by Slugger

Yes, I'm using /inPlace but I end up with:

orig.ts turns into orig.mkv not orig.autoencode.mkv

Yep, that's right, just checking. (also updated my post to fix that)

[farfromuman]

As a note, SageMC will delete the associated .autocomress files once the extension changes to mkv it does not do this to avi conversions.

[evilpenguin]

Another new thing I remembered: if you have an .edl or .properties file next to your original video and are encoding to an mkv, mediaShrink will include the them in the mkv file as attachments. I don't have a real use case for this yet, just something i'm toying around with.

[evilpenguin]

Hey, there were some serious issues with that priority fixing mediaShrink I posted earlier. So serious in fact, i'm not 100% sure why it worked at all on my test system.

Regardless, here's a new download that includes a fixed version as well as a few other misc. fixes I put together tonight.

DOWNLOAD

[nyplayer]

Ep,

I have had some failures log attached.

[evilpenguin]

Yep, i'm seeing the same thing on all my encodes from last night, i'll get it sorted out.

Edit: I take that back, two failed and one succeeded... hmm