Why didn't my favorite record?

[rwc]

Here's a question for you:

1 got one Haupauge 350 in my HTPC

My number one favorite is 'Survivor'
My number 5 favorite is "Tom Hanks"

Last night, there was a tom hanks movie on at 7:45
Survivor started at 8

Without checking the conflicts, it recorded Tom Hanks instead of survivor. WHY? Shouldn't the higher priority (survivor) take precedence over the lower one (Tom hanks)?

Needless to say, the wife was not happy.

How can I make sure it doesn't happen again?

thanks!

rwc

[mlbdude]

The order in which Favorites are listed mean almost nothing. Was a conflict generated prior to the airing? When a conflict happens you need to handle it. Otherwise it will guess based on a million things that may override that order.

[rwc]

The order doesn't matter? Really?? WOW! that's stinky! Maybe I just got too used to tivo...

Do I only have to worry about the ones with the ! next to them? Is there any way I can make it sort of act like a prioritized list?

Thanks for the info!

rwc

[mlbdude]

Yeah that got me too. It does matter a bit if you manually move them around but there are many other factors that I have seen override it. The big one is that I think it uses the same technology it uses for Intelligent Recording when deciding. So if you watched a lot more of shows with Tom Hanks it probably thinks you like that better.

Good news is when the conflict comes up you can address it and tell it to always get Survivor over it.

[erics]

Originally Posted by rwc

Here's a question for you:

Without checking the conflicts, it recorded Tom Hanks instead of survivor. WHY? Shouldn't the higher priority (survivor) take precedence over the lower one (Tom hanks)?

You would think that huh? So did I at first. I'm originally a Tivo user (still am actually), and with Tivo, Priorities actually mean something. With SageTV, Priorities really don't mean anything which makes it extremely confusing for the non-Sage expert.

From my experience, this is how it works. If you have 2 favorites that overlap (which you did) but 1 of the programs repeats at a later date, then Sage completely ignores your PRIORITY ORDERING and goes ahead and schedules both programs for record even if this means the lower priority favorite is getting recorded ahead of the higher priority favorite. This is what happened to you. I think Survivor repeats on Saturdays, so as long as it doesn't get rescheduled at the last minute, your showing of Survivor should be recorded tomorrow night and your wife will be happy again.

I'm sure many SageTV users on this forum love this feature but I'm definitely NOT one of them. I belong to the camp of "I know what's best, NOT the computer." If I tell the computer I want Show A recorded before Show B, then that's what I want. There are many instances where shows repeat later in the week, but I've learned that relying on those repeat showings is not a good practice. Often these repeat showings get bumped at the last second or are aired HOURS LATE because a ball game or some such ran long. I find this "feature" of Sage extremely annoying which is why I only use my Tivo to record important programs and dedicate Sage to record only a very small subset of channels/shows that don't have overlapping schedules.

[ToxMox]

I think it resolved the conflict on its own since the same episode of Survivor that was on last night is on again tomorrow night 10/9 at 8PM EST again. I bet if you check tomorrow night's schedule that it is set to record.

[erics]

RWC, since you are a Tivo use like me, let me give you a word or warning right now! DO NOT change your recording options for First Run/Repeats & First Runs/All for a Favorite if you have recordings you haven't watched sitting on your HDD and you haven't manually edit your Sage properties file with a text editor. Otherwise you wife is REALLY gonna be pissed at you when you lose ALL your recordings.

EDIT - THIS HAS BEEN FIXED
Sorry for getting your worried... http://forums.freytechnologies.com/f...ead.php?t=7631

EDIT EDIT - This WILL be fixed but it's still not in the current version. It will still bite you if you don't make the necessary manual edits to your properties file.

[hubick]

This Survivor type problem is exactly the problem I am having. I have Survivor as the first thing on my favorites list, and the news as the last thing. I don't care about the news on Thursday, Thursdays I want Survivor, not news, and not Saturday!

I would /REALLY/ like a favorites feature that says "Any show airing which we don't already have recorded/watched, matching a favorite which is higher in the priority list, will be recorded in favor of any other show airing matching a favorite lower in the list".

[Opus4]

Originally Posted by mlbdude

The order in which Favorites are listed mean almost nothing.

Jeff replied to my question to clarify this: a favorite's priority is its position in the list & new favs get added to the end of the list.

If it doesn't work this way, then I suppose it is a bug. It can often seem like a priority is being overlooked, but I think it is because the schedule gets juggled around to fit as many favs as possible, so a lower priority can get recorded before a higher priority, if that higher priority fav can be recorded during a later airing.

- Andy

[eruji]

This favorite priority thing has driven me crazy too.

I have always wanted the favorite list order to be what sage records at that moment.

Jeff, please make this an option to switch between the way it works now to a tivo-like favorites priority list.

i understand that could possibly watch fewer favorites this way, but i dont care because i dont want to have to wait to watch survivor a few days later than everyone else.

wouldnt this eliminate the conflicts all together?

[dvsing]

The reason that Tom Hanks was recorded instead of Survivor, is that Survivor re-airs on Saturdays I believe... It's still marked as "First Run" on the re-airing date though, so since when Tom Hanks starts on Thursday at 7:45, Sage sees that it can accomplish making recordings of both if it delays Survivor until Saturday to be recoreded, this is why it's recording Tom Hanks--- sage tries to resolve the schedule so that it can record the most favorites- it may not necesarily catch the first airing- especially if it sees the exact same show (ie: Survivor, Episode whatever, FIRST RUN) at a later date with no conflict. Hope this makes sense. If you really want to configure sage to record the FIRST airing of each show, based on priority in the favorites list, you need to reduce your look-ahead scheduling time... there's a variable in the properties file but I forget the exact name-- reduce it to only look ahead a few hours... this means that it will resolve to record the higher-priority favorite. I actually prefer to use it how it is set up by default--- I dont care if I watch a show right the same day it airs, as long as it gets all of my favorites. I rarely watch TV on-time anymore because of Sage. Somtimes it takes over a week for me to get around to catching up with stuff on Sage. That's what's so cool about it.... I don't have to live my life by a TV schedule anymore =)

[Opus4]

Originally Posted by eruji

I have always wanted the favorite list order to be what sage records at that moment.
...
wouldnt this eliminate the conflicts all together?

How could it eliminate conflicts? It would create more, since fewer of your favorites would get recorded when any of them air at the same time. Let's say I have 2 favs: A airs at Fri/8PM and Sat/3AM; B airs at Fri/8PM. Let's say A has higher priority. Under your system of always only recording the first airing, you would always get show A and never see show B. Currently, you get both.

Originally Posted by dvsing

If you really want to configure sage to record the FIRST airing of each show, based on priority in the favorites list, you need to reduce your look-ahead scheduling time... there's a variable in the properties file but I forget the exact name-- reduce it to only look ahead a few hours... this means that it will resolve to record the higher-priority favorite.

I don't think this will accomplish it either -- I _think_ it will look further than the scheduling look-ahead time in an attempt to resolve conflicts that occur during the look-ahead time. It has been a long time since I tried something like that, though.

- Andy

[eruji]

How could it eliminate conflicts? It would create more, since fewer of your favorites would get recorded when any of them air at the same time. Let's say I have 2 favs: A airs at Fri/8PM and Sat/3AM; B airs at Fri/8PM. Let's say A has higher priority. Under your system of always only recording the first airing, you would always get show A and never see show B. Currently, you get both.

exactly, i know it would result in fewer favorites being recorded. but like 3 others have stated in this thread, they would want that A to record on Friday instead of Sat. And because I setup the favorite and ordered A above B then I would understand that B would not get recorded at all, and would be okay with it.

I see the value in the current way it runs but i also see the value in the tivo-like system. Thats why i would suggest an option to have both.

Take the survivor example, do i really want to miss the thursday recording to have it on saturday when ive already heard the radio/tv interviews with the looser, and overheard conversations with coworkers on friday.

[Opus4]

Yes, I know what you were asking; I was just pointing out that it wouldn't get rid of conflicts.

Until the timeslot feature gets added to the standard STV, you can use one of the custom STVs to set the timeslot when a fav is allowed to be recorded. That way, the show will only record during the time specified. Of course, if an additional airing of the show happens to fall into the same timeslot a couple days later, you will still have the same results, since there isn't a limit for which day to use yet.

And, after setting the timeslot, you can return to your preferred STV if that one doesn't have the timeslot feature yet. The timeslot setting will remain.

- Andy

[Cayars]

There are a few shows that used to get me this way to. There are two workarounds that I know of:
1) schedule a manual recording to get the show for you. That is pretty much fail safe but does take more work on your part
2) purchase an extra tuner or two to make sure you don't have this problem. I've got 4 tuners always online and sometimes 2 additional depending on what system I'm playing with. Since I've pretty much solved this issue myself with hardward I've actually forgotten about this issue.

For those less fortunate. What I would like to see is an additional flag that can be set in the favorite setup menu to "Always Record First Airing". Yes, this could mean you miss out on other shows but it would guarantee that shows like Survivor get recorded the first time SageTV see it in the EPG. Of course if you have a couple of favorites setup this way and they conflict then you'd have to solve the conflict or let SageTV figure out the best recording schedule for you.

However, what SageTV should do is follow the "priority" order we manually set and adjusted. As an example, if I have one tuner and two favorites setup that conflict and neither has an additional showing, I really don't want SageTV to use fuzzy logic to determine which show to record. I WANT IT TO FOLLOW THE PRIORITY I ALREADY SET!

Another reason it should do this is that people's viewing habits change. You could have watched ER or CSI for 2 or 3 years but put a NEW FAVORITE in that is for a show you LIKE EVEN BETTER. At present chances are that ER or CSI would win out for the recording because of your past history of watching the show. It should see tha the PRIORITY is higher for the new show's favorite and use that instead. Sometimes the past isn't a good indicator of the future

Carlo

[mlbdude]

The only time I have seen it use "fuzzy logic" is when I have a bunch of new favorites and have not set a priority for them over any others (move them up or down in the list). Once they have been set it always seems to follow that order.

Handling a conflict by choosing an "Always" option does the same thing as move it up or down.

It might be a bug that priorities that have not been prioritized are being handheld this way.

It was in the early 2.0 days that I noticed this behavior. It may have been fixed already.

[eruji]

Thanks for the info Andy,

i didnt know that the modified STV's had a timeslot feature. Still seems a bit cumbersome since its extra steps and i have to use a modified STV(And as you stated, is not a guaranteed work around) . Another thing that kinda annoys me. Dont want to get OT here but, the fact that i have to modify ini files to apply STV's and when updates like 2.1 change the way an older STV works ( i think i read that ) makes me steer clear from them. Skins should be just skins, and sage should be more customizable through the interface.

enough bitching already! i really do like SageTV! have been a long time user.

[ToxMox]

On most of the newer STVs including the OriginalV2 in the 2.1 release candidate they have a setting in the GUI to switch to another STV.

[Opus4]

Originally Posted by Cayars

However, what SageTV should do is follow the "priority" order we manually set and adjusted. As an example, if I have one tuner and two favorites setup that conflict and neither has an additional showing, I really don't want SageTV to use fuzzy logic to determine which show to record. I WANT IT TO FOLLOW THE PRIORITY I ALREADY SET!

That's exactly what it should be doing -- the fav that is listed earlier in the list shown on the Favorites Manager screen (has a lower number) has priority. If shows A & B air only once at the same time and A has priority, it should always be recorded instead of B, unless an airing of A has already been recorded, has been watched, or has been marked as Don't Like. (I think those are the only cases, but I might have forgotten something.)

New favs are added to the end of the list & thus have the lowest priority. You can always move a new one to a higher priority position in the list, though.

- Andy

[Crashless]

Best way around this is to set it to manually record the showing you want. Sage believes it is doing a better job by being able to get both shows, that's the way it's designed to work.