SageTV V7.0.17 Release Candidate 1 is Ready!

[Narflex]

Howdy again all!

Oh yeah...it's the Release Candidate stage. Getting close to being done with V7.0 now...estimating about 3 more weeks and then we'll be final. No more features will be added now, it's purely bug fixing going on. So if you have any bugs, please report them!

We do have a couple last minute features that snuck into this one though:

-Default language selection for audio tracks and subtitles
-UserRecord API for plugin developers to allow generic data storage in the SageTV Database

IMPORTANT: The Wiz.bin file from 7.0.17 is NOT backwards compatible with prior versions due to the introduction of a new datatype for plugin developers

All of the high-level information on V7 can be found here:
http://forums.sage.tv/forums/showthread.php?t=48421

Be sure to read the above post as it contains important information regarding upgrade pricing and new features

As always, report bugs you find here:

http://sagetv.com/bugs.html

Here's the download links for V7.0.17:

SageTV for Windows
http://download.sage.tv/SageTV_V7_0_17Setup.exe

SageTVClient for Windows
http://download.sage.tv/SageTVClient_V7_0_17Setup.exe

SageTVPlaceshifter for Windows
http://download.sage.tv/SageTVPlaces..._0_17Setup.exe

SageTV for Windows Home Server
http://download.sage.tv/SageTV_V7_0_17Setup-WHS.msi

SageTV Media Center for Linux
http://download.sage.tv/linuxbeta/server_7.0.17.tar.gz

SageTV Placeshifter for Linux
http://download.sage.tv/linuxbeta/mi..._7.0.17.tar.gz

SageTV Media Center for Linux - Debian Package Installer
http://download.sage.tv/linuxbeta/sa....0.17_i386.deb

SageTV Placeshifter for Linux - Debian Package Installer
http://download.sage.tv/linuxbeta/sa....0.17_i386.deb

The release notes from version .15-.17 are below.

SageTV V7.0.17 RC1 9/23/2010

Core Updates
1. Fixed bug when 'remove padding on back-to-back Favorites' was enabled and a Favorite was up against a ManualRecording, the ManualRecording could cause padding from the Favorite to be removed if there was an overlap even if the ManualRecording was not based on a Favorite.
2. Updated show redundancy check logic so that ShowIDs with the 'DT' prefix would not be considered unique by default. Without this change, certain shows would not have every episode recorded. Users that have EPG data with the 'DT' prefix will likely want to enable the advanced check for repeat airings in Detailed Setup->Customize as a result of this.
3. Disable EPG data scanning on DVB-S inputs by default. It can be re-enabled by setting the property "mmc/disable_dvbs_epg_data_scanning=false"
4. Added support for handling progressive download/playback of MPEG2-TS files (none are included in our standard set of online videos, but custom feeds may include these)
5. Fixed issue where if format detection failed we wouldn't retry it properly in some cases
6. Added property "ui/system_memory_2dimage_cache_scale" which is an integral scale factor applied to the image caches that use system memory on the PC to store decoded images. This defaults to 2. This was done to prevent blowing the image cache when 3D mode was disabled.
7. Added experimental property "fast_network_encoder_switch" which is capture-device specific. This will enable using seamless file transitions with network encoders. This is NOT officially supported and is intended mainly for 3rd party network encoders that wish to support this capability. It should however work with regular SageTV network encoders, however this has not been tested and is not supported.
8. Fixed power management code so that changes to its settings in the UI take effect immediately now
9. Fixed bug where halt detections in recordings could falsely occur if the user has modified the properties settings to use a very short detection window and also had a long post-tuning delay with the capture device.
10. Fixed bug with seamless file transitions where if multiple tuners were changing channels at the same time the transition could end up not being very seamless at all (the transition no longer requires certain synchronization locks, so it can happen without interruption now)
11. Fixed bug where we'd ignore directories during library scanning that started with a period on non-linux platforms. On Linux these are considered hidden directories, and therefore are ignored.
12. Added support for specifying the default audio language used for playback and also the default subtitle language (or no subtitles).
13. Fixed bug where the 'Signal Lost' message wouldn't always clear itself once the signal was regained.
14. Fixed bug where the setting for always starting playlist items from the beginning used a server-based configuration setting, but in the UI the setting was client-specific (the setting is now client-specific).
15. When transitioning between segments in a recorded file, re-run the file verification to ensure that the segment were moving to is valid.
16. Incremented database version (Wiz.bin from 7.0.17 is NOT backwards compatible with prior versions)
17. Fixed bug with transcoding of LATM wrapped AAC audio (listed as a bug with HE-AAC audio)
18. Fixed bug with Matroska format detection where if no 'title' metadata was specified for the whole file we would use the 'title' metadata from the first track as the title for the whole file. Fixed bug in Matroska format detection where it wouldn't properly identify DTS-HD/MA audio tracks (they would still playback as DTS-HD/MA on the media extender though).
19. Updated DVB frequencies for Belgium-telenet.

Windows Updates
1. Fixed bug where the volume in the DirectShow media player could get reset if the player loading exited early due to an error.
2. Fixed bug where using two monitors of different aspect ratios where one had a larger height than the other and then the other had a larger width, and then moving the SageTV Windows between them would cause a black bar to appear on one side of the window depending upon how the screen sizes differed.
3. On Windows Vista/7 use the platform style window by default now instead of our fake WinXP style window borders
4. Fixed bug where using the platform style window title bar would cause transitioning to full screen to not work properly.
5. Added registry setting "HKLM\Software\Frey Technologies\Common\DSFilters\MpegDeMux\EnableHDAudio" which is zero by default, and will then cause DolbyTrueHD and DTS-HD/MA to be output as AC3 or DTS respectively (the core streams). There is a UI setting to enable HD audio output instead.
6. Fixed crash when playing .dts files
7. Fixed issue on Vista/Win7 where analog recordings could sometimes have a weird echo in them from recording multiple audio tracks at once.
8. Disabled synchronization of capture device teardown between different graphs unless a PVR350 TV-out is in use (that's the reason it's synced). This should fix the issue with SageTV crashing on some systems after resuming from standby and starting a recording.

Extender Updates
1. Fixed failure in extender DVD playback where seeking at certain times related to when a DVD menu would show would cause playback to stop.
2. Fixed bug in media extender playback where selecting a DVB subpicture track individually would not properly enable it, it would only do it properly if toggling on subpictures.
3. Fixed bug with extender DVD playback where the audio would sometimes be lost in the DVD menus

Placeshifter Updates
1. Fixed bug in placeshifter when playing back an audio-only TV file (from a radio channel) would cause the video area to not be cleared properly and latent UI rendering would occur.

Studio/API Updates
1. Added internal definition for java.lang.Class.forName when used through the SageTV API in the Studio. This is done so that it uses our internal class loader. This will resolve issues with STVI plugins that use that call to access JAR files that were just installed and are not part of the standard classpath yet (they would be after a restart of SageTV though).
2. Fixed bug where getting the airing start/stop/duration times for manual recordings in certain STV hooks would give the schedule times instead.
3. Added Configuration API calls GetSubpicAudioLanguageOptions, Set/GetDefaultAudioLanguage, Set/GetDefaultSubpicLanguage which are used for configuring the default audio language and default subpicture language.
4. Added checks in Add/UpdateFavorite API calls so that Favorites are not created that match every single Airing. This would occur if all the values passed in were false/null.
5. Add SeriesInfo API calls GetSeriesInfoProperty(SeriesInfo, Name, Value) and GetSeriesInfoProperty(SeriesInfo, Name) which allow for setting arbitrary name-value properties in SeriesInfo object for plugin cusomization.
6. Added SeriesInfo API call "AddSeriesInfo"
7. Added new API for UserRecords which allow developers to store custom data inside the SageTV database using a 'store' namespace, 'key's to index records and then name-value pairs within those records.

Plugin System Updates
1. Added support for the <ServerOnly> tag specification in plugin manifests. This can be set to true to indicate a plugin should not be allowed to be installed on SageTVClient.

STV Updates
1. Hidden: Can use numbers 1-0 to jump to % position in list for TV Show Editorials menu.
2. Created base translation file for the SageTV7 STV: SageTV7_i18n.properties
3. Hidden: Can send "ViewNumber" to a malore menu via AddStaticContext() in order to specify which view is to be shown. If not used, then the last-used view will be shown.
4. When using Pause to change the NTE mode, accept the currently entered value before changing the mode.
5. Added Detailed Setup -> Video/Audio -> HD Audio Output option for Windows systems. The option controls whether to output DolbyTrueHD or DTS-HD/MA streams when present (enabled) or to output AC3 or DTS streams (disabled/default).
6. Added Detailed Setup -> Customize -> Power Management settings option for "Idle timeout", to control how long SageTV can be idle with no user input or video playback before allowing the operating system's settings for going into standby to take over. Default: 2 minutes
7. Removed Detailed Setup -> Customize -> Power Management settings option for "Status check frequency", since it shouldn't need to be changed.
8. Don't call Fork() before opening the "Preparing to start playback" dialog, otherwise it is possible to attempt multiple playback starts.
9. While loading the STV: either save the Custom STV mode variables via properties if those global values exist, or restore the saved values if the properties exist & the global values do not.
10. Hidden: Fixed "Premieres, Finales, Specials" malore menu to perform its forced duplicate filter after other filters have been applied. Also disabled the "Remove Duplicate Airings" option for this menu since duplicates are always removed.
11. Hidden: Stopped filtering empty items from the malore Program Guide menus, other than "No Data" entries.
12. Updated info in the Setup -> Help -> View TV Indicators and Markers dialog.
13. Updated info in the Setup -> Help -> View Menu Header Information dialog.
14. Updated HD300 recommended firmware version to "20100909 0".
15. Hidden: Changed Detailed Setup -> Customize option for Custom Menus to 'Add links to malore's custom menus on the Main Menu'; controls whether any malore menu items are added to the Main Menu, not just the Custom Menus submenu.
16. Updated MR/Fav/Other filters to match how the other status filters work: Ignore the filter, filter to Include, or filter to exclude.
17. Hidden: Added malore menu option to group by past, present, and future airings. This grouping option is most useful when using the malore menus for Future & Past Airings, i.e.: when the "Custom Additional Airings" option is enabled.
18. Can use Info to jump to the editorial's details on the TV Show Editorials menu.
19. Can use Info to close photo info dialog.
20. Added Detailed Setup -> Multimedia options to set "Default Audio Language" and "Default Subtitle Language".

SageTV V7.0.16 Beta 9/2/2010

Core Updates
1. When deleting a file in SageTV; if there is a corresponding .properties file for that MediaFile, delete it as well. (since we now will create those when users modify categories/ratings, we need to clean them up when deleting files)
2. Added property "irtune_prefix_extra_delay" which can be set on the server to indicate the delay that should occur after sending the prefix command for a channel change but before the actual channel digits. Useful for waking up sleeping set-top-boxes before a channel change is done.
3. Fixed issue with scheduler where the first couple minutes of a Favorite recording could be missed if the prior airing was a Favorite and had stop padding on it. The scheduler would originally have put the recording at a later time where this wouldn't occur; but then after the stop padding ended it would start it up. Now it will retain the schedule in that format and not make a last second adjustment causing loss of the first few minutes.
4. Added .dts and .mka to the list of supported audio file formats (they already worked, but weren't included by default)
5. When requesting a new Manual Recording that would conflict with existing manual recordings; only prompt about cancelling existing recordings that could actually end up resolving the conflict. Previously; if different tuners had mutually exclusive channel lineups, it would still prompt to cancel recordings on those other tuners even though doing so could not possibly resolve the conflict.
6. Fixed bug where playing a playlist or group of videos that required parental control checking for any of the content (aside from the first file) would hang when that content was reached. We now do a parental controls check on an entire playlist before starting it. (if a playlist is modified during playback to add items that would exceed the parental limit, and it didn't get initial parental approval, playback will fail w/ a parental warning when those items are encountered)
7. Fixed bug where text-based subtitles would sometimes change their font size when bringing up the OSD during video playback.
8. Fixed bug in layout system where x/y padding was applied around items even if they were zero size.
9. update Norway-Oslo frq.
10. Added property "enable_bluray_metadata_extraction" which defaults to true; and can be set to false to disable extracting title and thumbnail information that is included in some BluRays.
11. Added support for TX3G subs that are embedded in MP4 files
12. Fixed format detection issues with MPEG-2Video R5000 recordings and some HDPVR recordings when watching live TV.
13. Fixed bug: the QAM stream carring DVB-C PSI ( in Lubbock TX ) scews up channel information during channel scanning.

Windows Updates
1. On Vista/Win7 when doing an EPG data scan on a digital tuner; always set an initial channel because this is required sometimes by DirectShow on those operating systems.
2. Use the WindowsMedia Video Decoder DMO by default for VC1 video playback in DirectShow unless another decoder has been configured for it
3. When playing back non-MPEG files with DirectShow, use the configured MPEG Audio Decoder if the file has AC3 content. (since we use the same decoder for TV recordings with AC3 audio)
4. Fixed bug where trying to resize the window in certain ways would cause the mouse pointer to no longer be aligned with the window bounds.
5. Added potential fix for a bug where SageTV crashes when starting a new recording after resuming from standby. (we can't reproduce this, so we can't verify the fix)
6. Fixed bug where digital TV tuner setup on Windows 7 may give an error the first time it is performed (regression fix from 7.0.14)
7. Added support for WVC1 decoders
8. Added support for LPCM audio in the stream demux
9. Fixed bug where trying to seek beyond the end of an online video being downloaded would hang the media player
10. Fix DVB-T DVB-S tuners support broken in V7.
11. Added support for DVBLogic tuning devices
12. Support 8 port DiSEqC switch

Extender Updates
1. Fixed issue with playback of HDPVR recordings on media extenders when the HDPVR recording had invalid timestamps at the beginning of the file due to an issue with the HDPVR.
2. Added IDR alignment when seeking in MPEG2-TS files with H264 video. This will allow playback to resume a little quicker when skipping around HDPVR recordings on media extenders.
3. Fixed bug where DVD subtitles embedded in MKV files sometimes had an extra null byte after the init header which needed to be skipped

Placeshifter Updates
1. Added image width x height information to resource strings used for uniquely identifying cached image resources in the placeshifter so the cache can retain copies at different sizes.
2. Added offline cache cleanup to the placeshifter clients. They have always stored compressed images in the filesystem for later retrieval, but this cache was never cleared in any way. It now enforces the 100MB limit on that cache and will clear items out when it gets too big.

Studio/API Updates
1. Updated RequestToExceedParentalRestrictions hook so that the first argument can be a Playlist as well as an Airing. This is needed since we now to a parental controls check on an entire playlist before starting it. (if a playlist is modified during playback to add items that would exceed the parental limit, and it didn't get initial parental approval, playback will fail w/ a parental warning when those items are encountered)
2. In the Studio view for Debug UI Components; so an orange indicator in the bottom right corner of a Widget's icon if that Widget's properties are controlled by a Theme. (right-clicking in that view on the Widget will then show the 'Highlight Themed Widget Source' button as previously; but now there's an indicator to show that w/out having to open the context menu)
3. Extended EPGDBPublic interface to include a new method addSeriesInfoPublic(int seriesID, String title, String network, String description, String history, String, premiereDate, String finaleDate, String airDOW, String airHrMin, String imageURL, String[] people, String[] characters) to allow plugins to add additional series information to the SageTV database.
4. Add '.id' metadata for GetMediaFileMetadata for audio, video and subpicture streams. This will return the PID for that stream if it is defined.
5. Disable 'Save As...' functionality in the Studio when plugin imports are active; as saving this way and reloading would then cause the STVI plugins to be imported multiple times. You can still use 'Save A Copy As...' though.
6. Added new option to Database API call FilterByMethod if the method is specified to be "UserCategories". It can then take a comma delimited list of categories to filter against which will apply to the Show Category/Subcategory and also to any UserCategory properties set on the corresponding ManualRecord/Favorite/MediaFile linked to the filtered object.
7. Updated MediaPlayer API calls StartPlaylist and StartPlaylistAt so they have a return value. The return value is similar to that of the Watch API calls; however for starting playlists, the only possible error case is if it fails the parental control check.
8. Add SeriesInfo API calls GetSeriesID(SeriesInfo) and GetSeriesInfoForID(SeriesID)
9. Fixed bug where having preload_expression_cache=true set would cause the initial Widget view in the Studio to not include items from plugin imports.

Plugin System Updates
1. Added support for automatically converting imported files to TV recordings if their external ID also starts with "IE" or "IM" (requested by plugin developers)
2. Do not allow setting the ExternalID for a MediaFile to be the null/empty string as this can cause data cross-linking.
3. Added new plugin event "RecordingSegmentAdded" with a single MediaFile parameter. This will be called if an active recording stop recording to one file and starts recording to a new one; either due to file size limitations of the filesystem or due to a halt detection where the encoder stopped working and SageTV is trying to reset it.
4. The 'MI' and 'IE' prefixes for Show ExternalIDs are now allowed when trying to determine the series information for a given Show. Previously; only the 'SH' and 'EP' prefixes would allow linkage with series information data.
5. When sending events to plugins; use an un-modifiable map so plugins don't do bad things to the items in the map before other plugins get the map.

STV Updates
1. Fixed issue where some music items were not getting their focus status cleared when they lost focus.
2. Make sure 'ResultsIndex' is not null on the "Online Video Search Results" menu.
3. Make sure online video properties files are loaded in the Main Menu, but don't force a reload.
4. After downloading new online video properties files, force a reload of those properties files.
5. Perform Category + User Category filtering via FilterByMethod()'s new "UserCategories" method instead of via STV code. Removed STV-based category filtering code.
6. Hidden: Fixed channel number sort for malore menu left pane.
7. Updated version upgrade check to track last-checked times for software & extenders separately.
8. Updated calls to StartPlaylist() and StartPlaylistAt() for video playlists to check return values to fix issue when playing playlists that exceed parental restrictions.
9. Updated RequestToExceedParentalRestrictions hook to handle new first parameter of 'AiringOrPlaylist' instead of 'Airing'.
10. Added checks to distinguish between HD200 & HD300 where needed and added HD300 checks for recommended firmware version and check for availability of new firmware.
11. Hidden: Added channel filter for malore menus; removed old movies-only channel filter.
12. Plugin list: When viewing installed plugins, added slide-out option to uninstall all plugins, with double confirmation.
13. Added option to view hidden files/dirs in file browser menu, file browser dialog, and folder browser dialog.
14. Added once-per-day check for new installer & firmware version upgrades after jumping to the Main Menu. If an upgrade is available, a System Message is generated.
15. Added options in Detailed Setup -> Advanced to configure whether 'Automatic Update Checks' are performed.
16. Fixed Channels.com item on Main Menu so it will work the first time it is selected.
17. Added ability to append or remove categories when editing user categories for multiple TV items.
18. Added ability to append or remove categories when editing categories for multiple imported videos.
19. Check for & handle youtube.com video link in a podcast feed.
20. Can specify a path when selecting a destination folder for video conversion.
21. When editing video categories or TV user categories, can use Delete to remove user-added category names. If the category name is still in use, it will still remain listed after the deletion.
22. Right-hand airing info: added year to 'Aired On' line and added 'Original Airing Date'.
23. Removed Main Menu's Online -> Google Videos link. (It is still available in the Online Services menu.)
24. Hidden: Can use numbers 1-0 to jump to % position in list for SageTV Recordings, Search Results, Interleaved & By Day Recording Schedule, Favorites Manager, and Browse by Category menus.
25. Hidden: Don't include channel previews when updating the Disk Space Bar.
26. Added Channels.com Web Shows to the Online Services menu.
27. Updated GeekBrief.TV podcast feed to the GeekBeat.TV feed.
28. Download online video updates from 7/7_0_15 folder.
29. Fixed SageTV Recordings subgroup menu to correctly handle the new recording view settings.
30. Hidden: Fixed use of multiple user category filters in malore menus.
31. Added option to set the number of views on the SageTV Recordings menu, value can range from 4 to 8; default: 4.
32. Hidden: Set max # of malore menu views to 8. If reducing view count, change to max view if current view no longer available.
33. Combined Category and User Category selection dialogs and merged category filters to process the overall category + user category lists at the same time.
34. Fixed width for display of recording group count.
35. Added ability to tag Favorites, Manual Recordings, or individual recordings with 'User Category' tags.
36. Added User Category filtering to the SageTV Recordings menus.
37. Added "Random Slideshow" item to the Photos submenu on the Main Menu.
38. Added link to TV category color configuration dialog at Detailed Setup -> Customize -> TV Category Background Colors.
39. Updated Photo viewer's tip and options areas to v7 style.
40. Most menus that offer to return to the Main Menu do so via the Home command so that if the menu was loaded from a custom STV, returning to the Main Menu may return to the custom STV, depending on how that custom STV configured its jump to the default STV.
41. Added ability to define a theme description in theme.properties. The description is shown in the theme selection dialog.

SageTV V7.0.15 Beta 8/11/2010

Core Updates
1. Fixed bug where we did not preserve the current title # when storing watched information for DVDs and BluRays. (it was broken when watched tracking for DVDs/BDs was updated recently)
2. Fixed bug where transcoding files with subtitle streams would fail sometimes (subtitles are now disabled by the transcoder)
3. Fixed issues with embedded audio streams inside of HD audio streams being detected by the transcoder
4. Added server based property "seeker/num_recent_watches_to_keep" which defaults to 2 and controls how many recently watched shows are protected from deletion. This has always been there; but now the setting is configurable in the properties file.
5. Fixed bug related to new watched tracking for DVDs/BluRays where resuming playback of a DVD would cause exceptions to occur and loss of playback control.
6. Fixed regression bug where disallowing adding a channel with a zero station ID would prevent creation of the internal zero-station ID channel used for all imported content.
7. Fixed bug where transcoding from AVIs did not work properly
8. Added Italy-Genova DVB-T frequency
9. Fixed bug where live TV from network encoders was missing the video stream in format detection

Windows Updates
1. Fixed bug where we didn't always select the right audio decoder to use in DirectShow if all the audio tracks didn't have the same audio format.
2. Fixed bug on Windows with 3D rendering where if SageTV was started on one monitor and then moved to another monitor with a larger display size, then part of the user interface would be cutoff at full screen.
3. Changed the default setting for the autodial property to be false since this sometimes causes issues on Win7/Vista.
4. Fix: if a channel is missing a tune entry in frq on windows 7, there is trouble tuning an ATSC channel, ERROR (-4,0x8007001f).
5. Fixed bug with DirectShow DVD Player where selecting a subtitle language didn't automatically turn on subtitles as well
6. Fixed bug where the audio tracks listed in the UI didn't always match the actual ordering used
7. Regression fix for exiting FSE and trying forever to reset the D3D device

Linux Updates
1. Fix: linux crash when EPG scanning. after fflush fifo empty, the push data thread tries to use empty buffer in fifo (thread racing issue)
2. Fixed bug where seamless file switching would wait forever until it found the transition point, which is bad if there's no signal

Extender Updates
1. Disable DVB subpicture selection for the HD100 since it doesn't support display of them.
2. Send a command to disable subpicture display for MPEG2-PS files to avoid hangs on media extenders that cannot display DVB subpictures properly
3. Fixed bug where bd-xxx subpicture PIDs were not properly parsed (these were used for DVB subs inside MPEG2-PS files)

Studio/API Updates
1. Added new Widget API call "ExecuteWidgetChainInCurrentMenuContext(Widget)" which is similar to ExecuteWidgetChain but instead of using an empty variable context it will execute within the currently loaded menu's variable context.

STV Updates
1. After selecting an audio language or subtitle in dialog during playback, wait up to 500 ms while checking to see if the change occurred before refreshing the list & marking the currently active language or subtitle.
2. Allowed use of Watched command to set/clear Watched status for DVDs & BDs.
3. Updated Standard theme preview image.
4. Updated preview images for playing video as menu background or in preview window.
5. Hidden Extras: Fixed display of alternate view names in malore menu slide out options.
6. Hidden Extras: Added malore menu options to 1) draw separator lines between items, 2) draw outlines around Manual Recordings & Favorites, 3) draw airing category background colors always, not the default category color, or never.
7. Hidden Extras: Updated malore menu focus highlight image - MaloreHighlight.png
8. Hidden Extras: Updated malore menu font styles for right-side episode lists & upper info area. Bold titles for Fav/MR; Italic for Watched; Plain text for all else.
9. Hidden Extras: Solved excessive refresh issue when using a malore menu for the first time.