OpenDCT and R5000

[checkbin]

I recently upgraded to SageTV 9 on Kubuntu Linux. In the process I switched from Prime Encoder to OpenDCT. I'm also using Netxcomm's R5000HD, which worked very well using a second Windows server to host the R5000 and an NFS mount for SageTV to see it. Since upgrading, I'm having lots of stability problems and it seems wiz.bin keeps getting messed up. Does anyone know if these issues could be cause by incompabilities between the R5000 and OpenDCT, or perhaps between the R5000 and SageTC 9? Any suggestions or thoughts would be greatly appreciated. Thank you. Happy Holidays to the Sage community.

[EnterNoEscape]

OpenDCT doesn't interact with other network encoders, but could possibly interfere if it supports the same devices as another network encoder. This is not the case in your situation.

I don't think forced_video_storage_path is a problem since I would assume that's managed by SageTV. OpenDCT just writes out to whatever file SageTV tells it to use.

I have some ideas of what might be going on, but I would need to see logs. If you can post logs of things failing from both SageTV and OpenDCT, that would help sort this out a lot better. The most recent OpenDCT log will be at /var/log/opendct/opendct.log.

[checkbin]

Here attached is the opendct.log with both opendct and R5000 enabled.

[checkbin]

Attached is the sagetv log as well. Timeframe is slightly earlier but the error messages all through the log were the same as these.

[EnterNoEscape]

There should be a lot more logging in sagetv_0.txt, can you please make sure debug_logging is set to true in Sage.properties?

Edit: Also are you running the latest version of SageTV v9? Your stack trace doesn't line up with the current commits.

[Fuzzy]

The R5000HD network encoder is pretty autonomous, so i can't really see much in the way of potential conflicts. It sort of just does what it does on it's own, actually with very little interaction with sagetv.

[EnterNoEscape]

Originally Posted by Fuzzy

The R5000HD network encoder is pretty autonomous, so i can't really see much in the way of potential conflicts. It sort of just does what it does on it's own, actually with very little interaction with sagetv.

I agree. This is something happening on the SageTV side of things. The logs are showing an NPE which could be a new bug, so I'm interested in what else turns up with a more complete log.

[checkbin]

Thanks to both of you. I really appreciate your help. I am attaching new logs with debug enabled. I restarted SageTV and first just recorded and watched shows on the 2 R5000s and all was good. I then tried to record and then watch a show on one of the HDHomerun Primes. As soon as I did that, I keep getting an Error (-17). Playback request could not be completed due to network failure. I get this if I try to watch the Prime shows and also even with the R5000 shows (although those shows seem to keep recording since they're on another server). The prime shows I record show up twice for each show in Recording Schedule, but they are not actually recording.

Thanks again for your help.

[EnterNoEscape]

Originally Posted by checkbin

Thanks to both of you. I really appreciate your help. I am attaching new logs with debug enabled. I restarted SageTV and first just recorded and watched shows on the 2 R5000s and all was good. I then tried to record and then watch a show on one of the HDHomerun Primes. As soon as I did that, I keep getting an Error (-17). Playback request could not be completed due to network failure. I get this if I try to watch the Prime shows and also even with the R5000 shows (although those shows seem to keep recording since they're on another server). The prime shows I record show up twice for each show in Recording Schedule, but they are not actually recording.

Thanks again for your help.

You're running SageTV v9.0.4.287 which is about 6 months behind, it wouldn't hurt to upgrade.

I think your usage of forced_video_storage_path is to blame here. Make sure you don't have any typos in that property and that it contains the full path from SageTV's perspective to the directory you would like it to use. Since you're running on Linux that means the path will start with a forward slash (/).

My reasoning is that in the log, we're seeing:
Thu 12/29 11:04:00.678 [Seeker@9602829] VideoStorage for new file: null

The only way that is possible from what I've seen is if none of the paths you have provided for recordings start with the path provided in forced_video_storage_path. It might not be a bad idea to handle this situation more gracefully in the code, but that's not really your problem.

Edit: I did find one other possibility. If SageTV thinks the directory is offline, you will also have this result, but you would have also seen a notification in the UI.

[checkbin]

EnterNoEscape, your advice got me to look once again at the /forced_video_storage_path directive, which I did check before (several times in fact). My Sage.properties forced_video_storage_path directive uses /sage_recordings as the recording path, which forces opendct to use my recording directories called /sage_recordings1, /sage_recordings 2, /sage_recordings3.... etc. This directive worked fine previously with SagetV7 and the Prime Encoder. After pondering your last post, the "light bulb" came on in my head and I realized that during my upgrade to SageTV 9 and OpenDCT, I had also added a new recording directory but had used a slightly different name from the others. After bringing SageTV 9 on-line, I had manually set Sage to use that new directory since it had lots of available space. As soon as Sage started a recording using an OpenDCT tuner, it could not find a matching recording directory path and Sage would lock up, since as you pointed out, VideoStorage was being seen as null.

I renamed my new directory so it began with /sage_recordings like the rest of the directories, and OpenDCT and the R5000s work flawlessly together now. I recorded a bunch of stuff on both tuners simultaneously all weekend and SageTV never missed beat.

Thanks again to you EnterNoEscape and to Fuzzy as well for helping me figure out my stupid mistake. SageTV is working so well now and , I'm a happy camper :-) As always, you and all the SageTV community are the best!