Plugin: CommercialDetector

[tmiranda]

Originally Posted by weeber

Sorry for the delayed reply tmiranda - I got married a few days after I posted my original question and it's been a whirlwind since...but I do appreciate the quick turnaround to my original question.

So my next question. What log do you want to see? A comskip or a Docker? And what do I need to enable to generate a log, and where is it written? Sorry, for the basic questions, but I'm still learning my way around Dockers and UnRaid.

Congratulations!

Logfiles are created automatically. Look in the same directory as the sagetv executable for a file called sagetv_0.txt. Zip it and attach it to a post.

[KryptoNyte]

I always used to have comskip pad my commercials, so that I would always watch of 3 seconds of the beginning of commercial and 3 seconds of the end of commercials right before the show restarts, to make sure I don't miss some of the actual show.

Can this only be controlled manually by modifying comskip.ini?

[tmiranda]

Originally Posted by KryptoNyte

I always used to have comskip pad my commercials, so that I would always watch of 3 seconds of the beginning of commercial and 3 seconds of the end of commercials right before the show restarts, to make sure I don't miss some of the actual show.

Can this only be controlled manually by modifying comskip.ini?

Yes, there are parameters in the comskip.ini file you can tweak to change the padding. The best source of info in here: http://www.kaashoek.com/files/tuning.htm

[KryptoNyte]

Thanks, Tom. I did get it configured with the padding. I would have sworn that I recall this as a setting somewhere in the SageTV UI. Must be mistaking it for something else.

[tmiranda]

Originally Posted by KryptoNyte

Thanks, Tom. I did get it configured with the padding. I would have sworn that I recall this as a setting somewhere in the SageTV UI. Must be mistaking it for something else.

I think there is a settling like that in the comskip plugin options.

[waynedunham]

Originally Posted by tmiranda

I think there is a settling like that in the comskip plugin options.

Detailed Setup/Customize. Down near the bottom in the "Extra Options" section you'l see Comskip Playback Options. That will bring up a dialogue box with all the option sections. You want "operation options" and on that menu you'll see the start and stop offsets as well as other things like minimum sections to mark (i.e. if it only sees a 15 second "commercial" it won't mark it), and lots of other stuff.
A lot of possible switches and options on all the Comskip playback options menu.

A couple from the bottom on the first menu you'll get a list of all the stuff going on. There you can set how many files to comskip at once (nice to limit the # of comskips running concurrently if you have a slower processor or limited memory).
On that running list you can also see your job queue as well as current files comskip is running on. This is also where you tell Comskip where the comskip program is and what ini file to use.
You can also limit which channels comskip runs on by entering a list of channels for comskip to ignore. i.e. I don't usually run comskip on the PBS channels and if I had them, things like HBO, etc.
You can also tell it which file extensions to clean up when you delete a recording. That can change depending on some plugins you might be using which may create other files when they process your recordings. EDL files, properties files, etc.

[BACON]

How would I go about having the Commercial Detector and Comskip Playback plugins invoke comskip.exe with different .ini files (without pointing them both at a custom .exe that decides which .ini to use)?

I have Commercial Detector UI v1.33 installed, and, in turn, Commercial Detector v1.16 and Comskip Playback v2.1.3.2. I have Commercial Detector configured to run Comskip when recordings complete, and I have the Run Comskip button configured to run a .cmd file that invokes Comskip with the same .ini file that Commercial Detector uses. For several years this setup has worked fine and continues to work fine whether Comskip is invoked automatically or manually, even though that .ini treats everything as live TV (live_tv=1).

I've been noticing Comskip missing or misjudging commercial breaks on some shows recently, and, having learned that live_tv=1 has less accurate detection than live_tv=0, I want see if there's any improvement by at least changing Commercial Detector to use live_tv=0 since those recordings are known to be complete. So here's what I did:

• Created a comskip-CommercialDetector.ini file with live_tv=0 and configured Commercial Detector to use that.
• Created a comskip-ComkipPlayback.ini file with live_tv=1, created a comskip-ComkipPlayback.cmd script that runs comskip.exe with comskip-ComkipPlayback.ini, and configured the Run Comskip button to run comskip-ComkipPlayback.cmd.

The problem is, when I use the Run Comskip button on a recording I can see that the resulting process's command line is passing comskip-CommercialDetector.ini, not comskip-ComkipPlayback.ini, to comskip.exe. So, it seems the Run Comskip button uses the configuration from the CommercialDetector settings page and ignores the Buttons Options → Manual Comskip Options → Manual Comskip Application.

Is this a bug, or do I need to install the Commercial Detector and Comskip Playback plugins directly without Commercial Detector UI? What does Commercial Detector UI even do? Integrate/override Comskip Playback's UI to use Commercial Detector's Comskip queue? I'm assuming the Run Comskip button is the same one from the Comskip Playback plugin and so should use that plugin's configuration, or is Commercial Detector UI somehow replacing it with its own button of the same name that uses its own configuration?

[tomdomm]

Did a update/rebuild to Win10 Pro V1909 64bit i7-8700CPU, SageTV v9.2.1.826. Got everything working but Comskip.
Running Java 1.8.0_191, STV =SageTV7.xml (V9.2.0.0), No Alerts.
I have the Donated version of Comskip82_010. Installed Plugins Comskip Detector V1.16 and Comskip Detector UI V1.33.
Comskip Playback has no install option. I configured it through the plugin, as I no longer see it in Setup/Detail setup/Customize. Nor do I have the Comskip buttons in the Recording Options Window.
I deleted from copied over shows all txt, edl and incommercial files from the old 32 bit setup. It seems to be re-analyzing the old shows but does not do new recordings. The shows already analyzed are not skipping commercials.
What am I doing wrong? Is there setup instructions for Comskip in SageTV V9 64bit that I missed in my research?

[tomdomm]

Originally Posted by tomdomm

Did a update/rebuild to Win10 Pro V1909 64bit i7-8700CPU, SageTV v9.2.1.826. Got everything working but Comskip.
Running Java 1.8.0_191, STV =SageTV7.xml (V9.2.0.0), No Alerts.
I have the Donated version of Comskip82_010. Installed Plugins Comskip Detector V1.16 and Comskip Detector UI V1.33.
Comskip Playback has no install option. I configured it through the plugin, as I no longer see it in Setup/Detail setup/Customize. Nor do I have the Comskip buttons in the Recording Options Window.
I deleted from copied over shows all txt, edl and incommercial files from the old 32 bit setup. It seems to be re-analyzing the old shows but does not do new recordings. The shows already analyzed are not skipping commercials.
What am I doing wrong? Is there setup instructions for Comskip in SageTV V9 64bit that I missed in my research?

Update. Uninstalled SageTV to clear any config errors. Reinstalled Sagetv V9 64bit. reinstalled Comskip and 1st test all is well!!

[Ericft]

I have been recording the modern family marathon and comskip always recogniEs the last few minutes of the recording as a commercial and hence skips it. There is always a little return to the show at the end that I miss. Is there a way to tell it not to comskip the last 30 secs or minute of the recording? I can’t find a setting in the comskip options. Thanks for any help.

[gilded07]

Originally Posted by Ericft

I have been recording the modern family marathon and comskip always recogniEs the last few minutes of the recording as a commercial and hence skips it. There is always a little return to the show at the end that I miss. Is there a way to tell it not to comskip the last 30 secs or minute of the recording? I can’t find a setting in the comskip options. Thanks for any help.

I'm following the answsers to your question bc I've been having a similar problem.

This happens on several shows I watch. I just figured that while I love comskip, its not perfect and I'm happy to live with 90% accurate (estimate) when it comes to finding and skipping the coms. What I've done in the past (I watch SageTV w an Nvidia Shield and mini client) is right before the final comm, I just toggle the comskip to off and then manually skip thru the comms until I get to the final scene.

Unfortunately, a recent update to the Shield no longer allows the button on my remote to bring up the window where I can toggle comskip off/on. So perhaps the answer to your question will help me too. I literally miss the final scene to every episode on several sitcoms I've been watching

[graywolf]

It has been quite awhile since used Comskip but if I remember correctly there is a parm setting to do this. I’ll see if I can find it later today

[graywolf]

try min_commercial_break_at_start_or_end=##
## = seconds

http://www.kaashoek.com/comskip/view...e9bbf&start=15

or always_keep_last_seconds=##
;Any commercial at the end shorter then this amount of seconds will be regarded as show
http://www.kaashoek.com/comskip/view...2&t=1035#p5728

[gilded07]

Thx Graywolf - will this accomplish the same thing? (see attached)

this is from
-Detailed Setup
--Comskip Playback Options v2.1.3
---Operation Options

PS Comskip is one of the main reasons I still use SageTV!!

[graywolf]

Originally Posted by gilded07

Thx Graywolf - will this accomplish the same thing? (see attached)

this is from
-Detailed Setup
--Comskip Playback Options v2.1.3
---Operation Options

PS Comskip is one of the main reasons I still use SageTV!!

Possibly. You can always double check the ini file to make sure

[jimcgreen]

I have been running SageTV for 11 years now and love it. I am currently running it on 64 bit Windows 7 Pro.

Last year I started to have problems with Comskip not marking the commercials and I see that in the installed plugins list Commercial Detector shows "Failed"

I have tried uninstalling and reinstalling the required plugins and Commercial Detector and am seeing this Java error in the SageTV log

Mon 4/5 9:24:16.519 [ReProcessHook@5207f3cc] Plugin commercialdetector is enabled, try to load it from class: tmiranda.cd.plugin
Mon 4/5 9:24:16.524 [ReProcessHook@5207f3cc] Plugin object was loaded, now starting it...
Mon 4/5 9:24:16.524 [ReProcessHook@5207f3cc] CD: PlugIn: Starting. Version = 1.16
Mon 4/5 9:24:16.525 [ReProcessHook@5207f3cc] ERROR starting plugin of:java.lang.NoClassDefFoundError: sagex/api/Configuration
Mon 4/5 9:24:16.526 [ReProcessHook@5207f3cc] DONE with plugin installation for commercialdetector 1.16

Any idea of what I need to tweak to get this working again?

[waynedunham]

Originally Posted by jimcgreen

I have been running SageTV for 11 years now and love it. I am currently running it on 64 bit Windows 7 Pro.

Last year I started to have problems with Comskip not marking the commercials and I see that in the installed plugins list Commercial Detector shows "Failed"

I have tried uninstalling and reinstalling the required plugins and Commercial Detector and am seeing this Java error in the SageTV log

Mon 4/5 9:24:16.519 [ReProcessHook@5207f3cc] Plugin commercialdetector is enabled, try to load it from class: tmiranda.cd.plugin
Mon 4/5 9:24:16.524 [ReProcessHook@5207f3cc] Plugin object was loaded, now starting it...
Mon 4/5 9:24:16.524 [ReProcessHook@5207f3cc] CD: PlugIn: Starting. Version = 1.16
Mon 4/5 9:24:16.525 [ReProcessHook@5207f3cc] ERROR starting plugin of:java.lang.NoClassDefFoundError: sagex/api/Configuration
Mon 4/5 9:24:16.526 [ReProcessHook@5207f3cc] DONE with plugin installation for commercialdetector 1.16

Any idea of what I need to tweak to get this working again?

I installed the latest donator version (82.010) of Comskip.exe and suddenly one of my servers still worked fine while the other one would stop comskipping immediately after it started.
So this morning I verified I had copied all the correct files over to the machine that was failing. All was correct, but comskip still wouldn't work on that machine.

I did every computer geek's last resort and decided to RTFM (read the 'f'in manual). In the readme.txt for the donator version I fould a mention that it it was failing immediately after starting that you might need the Visual C redistribuable from M$. I was pretty sure I had it, but I downloaded and installed it again. Rebooted the machine and no change, it still stopped immediately.

Back to RTFM and right near the top I see this: "
WARNING: This Comksip build will ONLY run on Windows 10. NOT on windows 7, 8 or 8.1"

Well, sure enough the machine that was failing is running Win8.1. Put in the previous version of Comskip donator version that I had (81.094) and Comskip was working again.

I noticed in your signature that you are running Win7 so if you had recently insalled Comskip 82.010 or something between 81.094 and 82.010 then that may be your problem as it was for me. Check the readme.txt file for the version of the donator version of comskip you have installed.

[CptKirk]

waynedunham, thanks for posting this comment. I updated my paid version to 82.010 a few weeks ago. But I haven't been watching much TV lately so I didn't notice. My SageTV is running on Win7.

I just looked at my show recordings and sure enough, I can see the marked commercials from recordings made before I updated. Then after the update, there are no commercials marked.

I mentioned it to my wife and she was like "that was why I was having to fast forward all the time".

Time to start back tracking versions to find where Win7 is still supported.

But it looks like his Comskip website is having problems. I can't get to the donators site. Even his Comskip forum is not working.

The last donator version I had that I was using was 82.002 so I'll go back to that one.

I sent him an email letting him know there were problems with his site and asked about the Win10 only support.

[jimcgreen]

Thanks for the info waynedunham. I have just been using the default Comskip version in the SageTV Plugins installer which is 80.042.
I don't see the file path that is mentioned in the error message.
"ERROR starting plugin of:java.lang.NoClassDefFoundError: sagex/api/Configuration"
Should I be able to find sagex/api/Configuration somewhere? I am looking in Program Files/Sagetv/Sagetv.

Thanks.

[wnjj]

Originally Posted by jimcgreen

Thanks for the info waynedunham. I have just been using the default Comskip version in the SageTV Plugins installer which is 80.042.
I don't see the file path that is mentioned in the error message.
"ERROR starting plugin of:java.lang.NoClassDefFoundError: sagex/api/Configuration"
Should I be able to find sagex/api/Configuration somewhere? I am looking in Program Files/Sagetv/Sagetv.

Thanks.

That’s a path within the Java code hierarchy. It means there’s an issue with a .jar file not loading or something not installed.