PlutoTV with OpenDCT and fHDHR

[jpwegas]

I was playing around with PlutoTV this weekend and was able to get it working in Sage using OpenDCT and fHDHR.

Background:
PlutoTV is a free IPTV service owned by ViacomCBS. It is ad supported so there is currently no subscription fee. Mostly they run old shows so if you want a 24/7 MacGyver channel or a classic 80s movie channel this is a nice service.

fHDHR is a project to make various video sources appear as an HDHR or other "devices". In most cases, this means it's pulling from an m3u IPTV stream, but it depends on the exact origin/source.

fHDHR has a "core" and plugins. Plugins can be sources (called "origins") like PlutoTV or "interfaces" like HDHR, which "look" like an HDHR device to other services like Sage or Plex or Emby.

What I did (brief summary):
I set up the fHDHR "core" (https://github.com/fHDHR/fHDHR) and the PlutoTV plugin (https://github.com/fHDHR/fHDHR_plugin_origin_plutotv). There are basic instructions on github which basically involve doing a git clone and then installing some Python dependencies. (Python3 is required.)

My final fHDHR config file is pretty basic:

[main]
uuid = RANDOMLY_ASSIGNED

[fhdhr]
address = 0.0.0.0
port = 5004

[plutotv]
username = REDACTED
password = REDACTED

The "main" section will be automatically created the first time you run it and a random value is created for the uuid. I added the other sections later. There is a web page that it presents at port 5004 and you can see how things are set up.

On the web page you might notice that by default it creates 4 tuners for PlutoTV, although you can override this in the configs. I did not test how many streams PlutoTV allows simultaneously.

Then in OpenDCT, I followed the normal instructions for creating a Generic HTTP Capture device which is basically:
1. Stop OpenDCT
2. Add the new device to the 'generic.http.device_names_csv' list in the 'opendct.properties' file. (I named mine "DCT-fHDHR PlutoTV-0").
3. Start OpenDCT so it creates a device entry.
4. Wait 20 seconds then stop OpenDCT
5. Edit 'opendct.properties' and add the device to the 'sagetv.device.global.only_devices_csv' list if you filter devices.
6. Add streaming_url for the new device: "http\://IP_ADDRESS\:5004/api/tuners?method\=stream&tuner\=0&channel\=%c%&origin\=plutotv&stream_method\=direct"
7. Start OpenDCT
8. Stop/Start SageTV (so it will pick up the new device)

You should now have a new source in SageTV. If you use Schedules Direct, there is a "Pluto TV" lineup you can use.

Issues I've noticed so far:

1. The SD "Pluto TV" lineup channel numbers don't always line up with the ones presented from fHDHR and the Pluto TV web page. I remapped (both physical and logical) the channels that I wanted so all the numbers match.
2. When OpenDCT stops using a stream, it takes 5-10 seconds for fHDHR to stop steaming. When switching from one PlutoTV channel to another, OpenDCT will try to connect again more quickly than that, and fHDHR will reject the request because the tuner is still "in use". I tried using the "stopping_executable" option to force a delay but that didn't seem to help. I have "fast_network_encoder_switch" set to false.

Some other notes:

1. There is a Locast "origin" so you should be able to use this same method for Locast. I have not tested this.
2. Because of the plugin architecture, it looks relatively easy to add new origins. This might be a way to get TV Everywhere into SageTV, but I did not have time to work on this but may in a few weeks.
3. For some origins (sources), fHDHR grabs and/or builds XMLTV data, but SageTV has no way by default to grab this from fHDHR, so in order to have EPG data you have to use a lineup that exists in Schedules Direct (PlutoTV has this), or possibly use the XMLTV plugin. I have not tried this either.
4. Originally I tried fHDHR set up with PlutoTV as a "source" and the HDHR "interface" plugin so OpenDCT would just magically see it as a new HDHR, but fHDHR's HDHR implementation isn't quite what OpenDCT and Sage expects (different APIs I believe) so they don't see these automatically like they do with real HDHR devices. fHDHR has streaming URLs that can be used even without the HDHR interface plugin, so that is what I used above. I removed the HDHR interface plugin as it wasn't needed.
5. If you want more than one PlutoTV tuner, just repeat the instructions above to add more to OpenDCT. Be sure to change the "tuner=0" to "tuner=1" or similar in the URL for each device.
6. fHDHR can have multiple origins/sources defined (like PlutoTV and Locast). If you add another origin plugin, you can add another device in OpenDCT, just change the 'origin' in the URL to match the "short" origin name.

So far it's working pretty well, although I have not done any long recordings. Hopefully ENE or someone else will have some thoughts on options for OpenDCT to wait longer between tunings of the same device.

--John

[wayner]

fHDHR seems like a project that could be useful for SageTV since HDHRs are so well supported. And I saw your post in the Locast thread as well.

We are starting to see some interesting ways in being able to integrate streaming TV channels into SageTV. Or other Media Server software like Plex, Emby, etc.

[AlphaCrew]

Nice work, Thank You!

[jpwegas]

Originally Posted by wayner

fHDHR seems like a project that could be useful for SageTV since HDHRs are so well supported. And I saw your post in the Locast thread as well.

Apparently Plex and Emby use the older protocol so they work. ENE commented on another thread that OpenDCT uses the newer/faster protocol but not the older one which fHDHR (and I think other similar projects like Telly or tvhProxy) use. To use it seamlessly with Sage either fHDHR would need to support the newer protocol or OpenDCT would need to support the older one.

I do think it's good that a lot of "video source" projects are using the HDHR API to act as a common interface to various DVR like projects.

--John

[mlcarson]

The FHDHR product has been modularized so there are plugins for origins and interfaces. Wouldn't the Interface plugin make it easy to integrate into SageTV?

[jpwegas]

Originally Posted by mlcarson

The FHDHR product has been modularized so there are plugins for origins and interfaces. Wouldn't the Interface plugin make it easy to integrate into SageTV?

Yes it could!

An fHDHR Interface plugin that behaves like a Sage Network Encoder would be a really cool idea and open up a lot of options.

--John

[pjpjpjpj]

Being a user of HDHRs but being completely not a programmer (i.e., most lingo in the OP was Greek to me ), I would love to know if there is a possibility that this could be packaged up into a SageTV plugin. Could that happen?