STV: Cayars17 Ultimate STV (Release 17 - Jan 18)

[Cayars]

Originally Posted by johns55

I think that I see the same thing as pcostanza on the local weather. I have changed the zip code in setup, restarted the client, does not seem to matter, when I go to Local Weather, all have been able to see is the message "loading".

The Weather suite works fine. I am able to get local weather as well as all the other places that I care about.

Running Release 17 on Sage 2.2.4.

The local weather is a problem for a lot of people. Normally, going back to the first post and following the directions there for it will take care of the issue but sometimes people have issues with it. The site is uses is also down a lot.

I've thought a lot of just removing it or making it unsupported as the weather suite does everything it does and more anyway. BTW, when I say remove it I'm referring to removing the menu item but leaving it in the STV for those who allready have it working.

[ajuhawk]

Originally Posted by Cayars

With the newest change to the STV (D) where it can be set to PAUSE when ever the SCREEN SAVER isn't active it should be a moot point.

Are you just talking about the Sage screen saver or the system screen saver? It seems to me that it would be handy (and probably really hard to impliment...) to have the commercial manager look at overall cpu usage - that way if someone is running it on a 2nd, 3rd, 4th machine and they decide to play a game or use some other cpu intensive program they don't have to go halt the service (when that part is implemented). Or maybe we all just need to make sure we run it on computers that don't do those other things Now there is a file called ProcManager in there - is this all ready doing something like this and I just overlooked that? Wouldn't be the first time

-AJ

[Cayars]

At present it will follow the screen saver in SageTV. It's not really hard to follow the CPU usage but from what I've seen the majority of issues related to comskip aren't due to CPU usuage but to IO bandwith instead which becomes much harder to track.

Also unless comskip.exe/commercialdetect.exe is rewritten to watch these performance counters there isn't much the "Manager" can do except pause and resume it at certain thresholds.

All though the manager will presently run on machines without sagetv installed this functionality is going to change. It will get smarter and be handled by a central QManager (being developed). The QManager will handle other "Queues" besides commercial detection (ie. commercial cutting, transcoding to DivX/XViD, etc). The different QManager clients and server will communicate via TCP for a distributed architecture/grid computing type thing.

[pcostanza]

Originally Posted by Cayars

The local weather is a problem for a lot of people. Normally, going back to the first post and following the directions there for it will take care of the issue but sometimes people have issues with it. The site is uses is also down a lot.

I've thought a lot of just removing it or making it unsupported as the weather suite does everything it does and more anyway. BTW, when I say remove it I'm referring to removing the menu item but leaving it in the STV for those who allready have it working.

In response to whether it's the local weather I'm talking about....yes. I've tried changing zips, logging on and off and still no luck. It just sits as 'loading'.
I can say that it did work the very first time I installed it but never again.

Thanks

Paul

[broderp]

Originally Posted by Cayars

I've thought a lot of just removing it or making it unsupported as the weather suite does everything it does and more anyway. BTW, when I say remove it I'm referring to removing the menu item but leaving it in the STV for those who allready have it working.

Can't we just "REMOVE MENU ITEM" on this?

What I'd like to see is some help files or guidance as to how to add the LOCAL SATELLITE ond other IMAGES. Maybe this can be automated as part of the STV for us "PC challenged" users who are afraid to modify a file. I've hosed my sytem many a times by modifying files.

I always have doubt if I'm doing it right, then there's always the fact that you have to remember to do certain things EVERYTIME you make a new SAGE PC with the STV (change certain files, add zip codes, change drive locations....etc...) It takes me a good amount of time to get back were I was usually.

If the install process could create the text in the proper file for the functionality, and the STV could be used to simply have the end user inset SIMPLE info, like a zip code, and the STV/program automaticall changes and saves the appropriate files......this would be great.

[rsagetv99]

This may have gotten lost in my wordy post, but will the new external comercial detect eventually support the ignored channels list? I have already had some movies get processed that didn't need to be processed, and worse yet, CD put in comercial breaks in the middle of the movie where there were none (HBO).

[mdmint]

Originally Posted by Cayars

It's a no win situation

Either it not there and people ask for it to be there by default. It there but doesn't come out of the ZIP with the right times FOR THEM, or why is the detect running so slow?

With the newest change to the STV (D) where it can be set to PAUSE when ever the SCREEN SAVER isn't active it should be a moot point.

Are you referring to the Sage screensaver? I was referring to someone using their PC with Sage not running but with commericaldetection running bringing some PC to it's knees. But you're right, they can just pause it if they need to. Never mind.

[mdmint]

Originally Posted by rsagetv99

This may have gotten lost in my wordy post, but will the new external comercial detect eventually support the ignored channels list? I have already had some movies get processed that didn't need to be processed, and worse yet, CD put in comercial breaks in the middle of the movie where there were none (HBO).

My solution for that right now is putting movies in import Library dir and not processing that dir.

[julesjohn]

Originally Posted by Cayars

Use the info button instead of the select button.

Thanks - yes this shows the video file info. Great.

To follow up though on this same usability subject in the second half of my post it seems there is no way to play a song that is highlighted with one button click. So just an idea but I mention it again here. Thanks.

Originally Posted by julesjohn

Not to go too far on this, but I like this same idea for playing a song or album. [Play] plays the song immediately and [Enter] opens the little dialog that lets you add to playlist, cancel or "Play Song Now". Removes a click or remote button in all cases. More intuitive too. Thanks.

[rsagetv99]

Originally Posted by mdmint

My solution for that right now is putting movies in import Library dir and not processing that dir.

Sounds good except for new movies. The new CD is so fast that I have not been able to do this.

[rsagetv99]

BTW, can comskip process files that have been compressed using FFMPEG?

[Drinyth]

Originally Posted by Cayars

With the newest change to the STV (D) where it can be set to PAUSE when ever the SCREEN SAVER isn't active it should be a moot point.

This pausing while the screen saver isn't active is going to be optional, yes?

[JUC]

Is the commercial detect manager only for use in version 18? I am still on 17 and don't have a commercial detect directory in my external applications folder under cayars.
thanks
JUC

[Drinyth]

Originally Posted by JUC

Is the commercial detect manager only for use in version 18? I am still on 17 and don't have a commercial detect directory in my external applications folder under cayars.
thanks
JUC

It's working for me under version 17. Just create any folders that are missing.

[JUC]

thanks, i guess i just unzipped it into the externals folder and it didn't create the directory. So if i add the folder 'commercialdetect' then unzip into that it should work right?
juc

[White94Cobra]

Originally Posted by pcostanza

I love everything about this STV. Only problem I'm having is with Weather. It just sits at 'Loading'. I've changed zip codes and still nothing.
But, the Weather Channel is probably no better at predicting the weather than the local guys.

I've had the same problem for months. Whats strange is it works fine using the SageMCE STV. I recently did a total reinstall of Windows, Sage, etc and still have the problem. Even stranger, if I put in a zip code from a major city it works great.

[Cayars]

Originally Posted by rsagetv99

This may have gotten lost in my wordy post, but will the new external comercial detect eventually support the ignored channels list? I have already had some movies get processed that didn't need to be processed, and worse yet, CD put in comercial breaks in the middle of the movie where there were none (HBO).

Yes, and it should be in the next release which will need to be coordinated with an STV release. The new STV has a process that writes an XML file out for every TV file on your system.

The XML file contains all the EPG data for the show as well as information such as the channel it was recorded on, it's location when captured, the capture board used, etc..

This XML file will have multiple uses, but the first thing that will make use of it will be the external Commercial Detect Manager.

[Cayars]

Originally Posted by rsagetv99

BTW, can comskip process files that have been compressed using FFMPEG?

No, FFMPEG converts the files to an MPEG4 type format (i.e. XviD, DivX, etc). Commercial Detect only works on MPEG2 files.

You can however run CD on the MPEG2 file and then compress it with FFMPEG. As long as your not cutting parts of the movie the commercial cut list generated on the MPG2 file should still be valid for the MPG4 file.

[Cayars]

Originally Posted by Drinyth

This pausing while the screen saver isn't active is going to be optional, yes?

When do I ever implement something without giving you more option anxiety?

Right now, I've got the original OSD pause/resume in there as released in 18C. However, it is now set to DISABLE by default now. It was ENABLE before. I've also added a "Process when Screen Saver is Active"" setting which is set to ENABLED by default. If you have both enabled the screen saver setting will overide the OSD setting.

Curious, is your machine fast enough to do the processing without the need to pause?

[rsagetv99]

Originally Posted by Cayars

No, FFMPEG converts the files to an MPEG4 type format (i.e. XviD, DivX, etc). Commercial Detect only works on MPEG2 files.

You can however run CD on the MPEG2 file and then compress it with FFMPEG. As long as your not cutting parts of the movie the commercial cut list generated on the MPG2 file should still be valid for the MPG4 file.

OK, so if I am understanding this right, if I were to write something that will move the associated .txt files that were created by comskip after the FFMPEG process completes then I will still have the purple bars in the recording, and comercial auto-skip will work as well?