Come Back to SageTV - Open Source in "Near" Future

[MacDaddy]

Holy transcoder Batman!

I just started monkeying around with Kodi on a RPi 2 last week. Great for general media, underwhelming for TV. With a little SlingTV, some better PlayOn integration and an agnostic extender module that runs on an HDMI dongle could make life in the Sage world interesting again.

Every now an then the old blind squirrel will find an acorn. Thanks for good news.

[maceie]

Wow, Great news. I only checked the forum today as my server has become massively unstable over the last 10 days or so with about 5 or 6 different BSOD errors.
I was looking into shutting it all down and moving on.

Looks like I'll be moving to a new temp server & build while all this shakes out

SageTV is still the best OTA solution and with updated client/extender support - I'm in.

Thanks Jeff.

[pjpjpjpj]

You know what makes me the happiest about this? Seeing all the old familiar names on here that have been absent for so long.

Hey. somebody call nielm!!

Thanks for all you guys have done, Jeff.

[mechling-burgh]

I'm excited by the news. I come here several times a day always hoping to hear something. So this was great to see when I check the forums just before bed lat night. I'm hoping Jeff still has the contact info for the people that did the beta testing for 7. There were programers in that batch and I'm wondering if Jeff may of already started talking to a few before the official announcement was made to see how to make it all work.

[aedion]

That is awesome news, I was dreading losing my server and not finding the motivation to rebuild it (with SageTV being end of life and all).

[bunch92]

With Sagetv open source , will we go back to having official releases that we can download from this website (and therefore that are tested properly) ? Or will anyone be able to code changes and release their bits and bobs.

I just hope we will have a controlled management and testing of the future releases ....

[pjpjpjpj]

Originally Posted by bunch92

With Sagetv open source , will we go back to having official releases that we can download from this website (and therefore that are tested properly) ? Or will anyone be able to code changes and release their bits and bobs.

I just hope we will have a controlled management and testing of the future releases ....

I suspect there will need to be a greater subdividing of this forum, that's for sure. There might have to be separate subforums for people working on implementation for various clients or end uses (from Raspberry Pi to Chromecast to AppleTV?), and for people looking to do various other things with the software. Perhaps there should be sections for development of the DVR portion (subdivided into satellite, cable, OTA, QAM?), for people working on video library stuff, people working on the music area, people working on photos, people working on the general UI, etc.

Well, I should first say, hopefully there is enough renewed interest that we'll need that! Then hopefully we can have that implemented.

[PLUCKYHD]

It's interesting that's for sure. I'm not sureit helps cablecards users like me..... But then again I'm kicking cable to curb soon anywayscorn::

[BobPhoenix]

Great news!

Some things I would like to see changed on OS version but not necessarily in this order:

1. Fix HD200 extender so it doesn't crash when playing "XMen 1" blueray and a couple of others. I am trying a rerip on this in case it was just a bad rip but put this out if it is a real is a problem.
2. Make it 64 bit compatible and on current java version.
3. Allow recordings to overlap on same channel without using multiple tuners.
4. Allow recordings on multiple channels with single tuner. I.E. OTA main channel and sub channels can be recorded at same time as well as allowing all QAM channels on same main channel to be recorded from one tuner.
5. Remove the drive access on remote directories when browsing through recordings. I.E. don't have to spinup NAS drives on my unRAID server when browsing recordings in import directory only spins up when PLAY selected or manual/automatic scan run.
6. Allow the replacing of the SageTV splitter on M2TS files like you can with MKV. Then I could just rip movies to folders only.
7. Work on response time and indicators. I.E. I press a remote button multiple times when not needed sometimes because the spinning circle doesn't start up soon enough - this might be adjustable already just haven't researched it yet.

[tmiranda]

Yes!!!!!

I may fly out to CA just to thank Jeff for answering my prayers

Game on.

[matterofrecord]

Originally Posted by nyplayer

I wonder if this will mean the end of the EPG data being provided by Google?

Just FYI - In the UK we get an epg in 2 ways. 1st is free OTA which is supported by sagetv automatically ( - not really relevant in the USA). The 2nd is that for some channels we have to import xml epg data using lmgestions ( stephane on this board) XMLTV Importer for SageTV. There are various options for getting the epg xml data we import: website scrappers, decoding encrypted OTA epg updates and commercial epg options are all sources of epg xml data.

The importer is a bit of a hassle to setup compared to say the xml import feature on nextpvr but once properly set up it just runs in the background hassle free. Your xml source "grabber" is run automatically by the program and then it imports the xml epg data daily in the background with no user input needed. Setup and forget.

The xml import on sagetv is something I think could be improved on but the feature is there. If google do shut off the the epg data ( understandable if open source sagetv takes off) there are other ways to get your epg guide data.

-----------------

As for sagetv becoming open source, having started a thread called "Why ISN'T Sagetv open source?" and being told basically it's very unlikely, I am so pleased Open source is going to happen.

I always felt that sagetv was a few improvements away from being both perfect and awesome. The sagetv community has been really good at providing useful plugins and there was genuine feeling that people loved sagetv, wanted to make it better and were willing to put the time, effort and skill in to improving sagetv. I really hope that attitude is rekindled by this announcement and the old devs come back.

I don't know how it's going to be open sourced and who, if anyone, is going to manage the code and releases but there are a lot of plugins that I recon could be worked into the main code base.

As far as making sagetv awesome, there are loads of features I would like to see and some of them I think other people would like to see as well;

• Fast forward at greater that 1x speed ( 1.1, 1.2, 1.5, 2.0 ) with audio (as you can with cyberlink powerdvd. ). Perhaps by using cyberlink player/codecs in sagetv.
• x264/x265 ( handbrake ) encoding with more user control
• Andoird/iOS placeshifter - perhaps with media sync for selected programs
• Convert Radio recordings in .mpg/.ts format to .mp3 within sagetv
• Easier access to user defined categories
• Ability to pick your own thumbnail image for a recording if you want
• An update epg button
• Wiz.bin editor
• Faster startup
• A tuner model that allows multiple channels to be recorded from the same frequency by one tuner ( Like nvpr )
• Easy native xml epg importing ( Like nvpr )
• Native decoding of UK OTA HD epg ( There are already de-encrypters but I have to import the decrypted epg xml)
• A Videoredo plugin I can get working - just for simple trimming to save space.( I can't get bobPhoenix's plugin to work or get neilm dynamic menu prerequisite to work - the dynamic menu wiki is down )

It's a big list, some of them seem easy and some of them are obviously major re-writes. I can't code so I can't ask for too much but I can get happy about the future of sagetv again.

[KeithAbbott]

Once the software is open source, would integration with other open source software be more of a possibility, since a commercial entity is no longer involved? Maybe something like a tighter integration with VLC, for example?

[HelenWeathers]

THANK YOU JEFF!!!!!

Originally Posted by pjpjpjpj

You know what makes me the happiest about this? Seeing all the old familiar names on here that have been absent for so long.

I miss the old crowd too. I still check in here every week or 2. This could be a wonderful thing. Nothing really matches SageTV.

I would be happy to pay for upgrades and plugins. Hope some developers become re-interested in Sage.

[jt4242]

Originally Posted by HelenWeathers

I would be happy to pay for upgrades and plugins. Hope some developers become re-interested in Sage.

I, too, would be happy to pay. I've tried all the alternatives and end up coming back to SageTV all the time (I run client/server on my PC so no extenders in the picture). I'm hoping that the fact that this list is still rather active after all the years is a positive sign - though I wish it could have happened last year before so many of the heavy hitters found alternatives.

[Narflex]

Originally Posted by reggie14

Out of curiosity, Jeff, are you still using SageTV v7 at home? Or did Google set up some way for you to use Google Fiber TV?

I still use SageTV at home...version 8.something. It's basically the same as the last v7 we put out; but with an updated STV and Sage.jar file that have new features that I wanted.

Originally Posted by peternm22

Do you know which version will be open sourced? Will it be the SageTV version everyone on this forum has been using? Or will it be the current Google-SageTV version (that I assume is still being actively developed by Google)?

My current plan for this is to take all the relevant changes we've made in the past 3+ years at Google and merge them into the codebase from when we were acquired. (I've already done most of that work, I'm leaving out all the Google Fiber specific stuff since that's not relevant and just clogs up the codebase for y'all) I'll then run that version myself for awhile to ensure it's solid and then that'll be what we open source. The only code we've changed since acquisition that'll be released is basically the Java code. We didn't touch the native windows/linux code much here at all (w/ the exception that we wrote a whole new thing that did the recording/playback portion, i.e. network encoder/streamer, but that piece won't be open sourced as it wouldn't really be of use to you all)

Originally Posted by Skirge01

I'm really excited about this, but I'm truly hoping it's not too little, too late. Are any devs seriously considering coming back as a result of this announcement? I'm ok paying for EPG data, if that's what it takes, but if no skilled devs (you know who you are!) pick up the torch, this could be much ado about nothing.

So, any devs out there considering a return? Bueller? Bueller?

Well....I'll be available to help as needed. But as it was already a very solid product; it's not like much needs to be done with it to make it useable again (main thing is new installers, and recompiling it with all the licensing code removed...most of which is already disabled)

[Enormous]

Jeff, I don't have much to add right now except to say: I love you man.

[HelenWeathers]

Originally Posted by Enormous

Jeff, I don't have much to add right now except to say: I love you man.

Ditto!!

[poto]

I'm probably getting a bit ahead of myself here, but I'm wondering if, during the course of post-open-source development, compatibility will be maintained with HD200/HD300 hardware?

Either way, a big thanks to the SageTV team for staying the course!

[routerunner]

Originally Posted by Narflex

I still use SageTV at home...version 8.something. It's basically the same as the last v7 we put out; but with an updated STV and Sage.jar file that have new features that I wanted.

Jeff, for sure I am not the only one thinking

...what about a sneaky peek of that version 8.something you're currently using, now?

I cannot thank you enough for this

Eddy

[tmiranda]

Ditto the ditto!

Originally Posted by HelenWeathers

Ditto!!