Using the OpenDCT Generic HTTP Capture Device

[something fishy]

I took @boukmandutty's advice and redid this using the generic pipe capture device.

This worked, but the process was so close to my previous effort that it makes me wonder if there is an issue in getting a tuner created with the generic http capture device loaded. @hvymetal in post 32 of this thread appeared to be having similar issues.

For the record my process was:

1. Stop OpenDCT docker

2. Start with a clean OpenDCT.properties (from the default file provided)

3. Add 2 devices:

generic.pipe.device_names_csv=SatPIPE1,SatPIPE2

4. Restart OpenDCT docker to allow it to create the necessary entries in OpenDCT.properties

5. Stop OpenDCT docker

6. Add the pipe commands, I am taking @boutmandutty's instructions in the CHANNELS DVR with Generic Pipe Capture (PLUTO TV as well) thread and modifying for the syntax that TVHeadend needs, so:

sagetv.device.<device ID>.streaming_executable=ffmpeg -i http://[tvheadend_ip]:9981/stream/channelnumber/%c%.mpg -f mpegts -codec\:v copy -codec\:a copy -

7. Restart OpenDCT docker, wait about a minute...

8. Start the SageTV docker, and attach a SageTV client to it

This is much more promising, the 2 virtual tuners I created now appear in the add sources box, I see two control tuning boxes - I've chosen the first

9. Use schedules direct, enter schedules driect credentials, select linup and choose Basic service, do any necessary channel remappings so that the "physical channel" is the number that TVHeadend expects (doing this on a large bouquet it might be easier to edit the channel numbers in TVHeaded to match SageTV rather than the other way around)

10. Test tune a channel from the program guide.

At this point my tune failed with the OpenDCT log reporting that it could not find ffmpeg, as a short term fix I installed ffmepg into the OpenDCT docker. I have subsequently redone this using the combined SageTV & OpenDCT docker which doesn't have this problem.

Next step is to fully populate OpenDCT with all eight tuners (the SatIP server offers 8 satellite tuners, I could actually create more as TVheadend can tune multiple channels on the same mux using only one tuner), map all channels properly and copy the (hundreds of) recording rules from my main system to soak test stability.

Thanks to
@boukmandutty for suggesting the generic pipe and giving me the template from the Channels DVR thread and
@rickgillyon for suggesting this might be possible in the first place and of course:
@enternoescape for OpenDCT and @jusjoken for the SageTV dockers.

[something fishy]

@egeller

I have just posted that I am able to get this to work using the generic pipe device, but I agree that it should work with the generic http device.

I set up TVHeadend to run without authentication (a * as the username does this I think).

I wonder if there is a problem with OpenDCT or if it was user error on my part.

Thanks

Eric

[boukmandutty]

I am tempted to get my testing system up to see if I can get it to work in the way @eller suggests.

I wonder if something similar to the wmc turner setup would get it to work that way. Notice however that for that set up the %c% appears in the tuning_executable:

sagetv.device.<unique_id>.tuning_executable=http://localhost:40510/tune%20%c%

https://forums.sagetv.com/forums/showthread.php?t=63212

WMC also has a tcp/ip controller in which the "tune" command changes the channel. Does tvh have anything similar?

[something fishy]

Once TVH headend has scanned the channels, you can arbitrary (or automatically) assign them a channel number.

TVH will then serve that channel to a client that send its a http request:
For eg

http://192.168.1.14:9981/stream/channelnumber/4001

Will stream whatever physical channel has been assigned channel number 4001 in the TVH configuration screen.

In my case I've set the TVH channel numbers to match the "physical channel" in SageTV from my schedules direct listing (as its quicker to change a large number of channel numbers in TVH than in SageTV).

So practically TVH can stream any source that it can control (in my case a SatIP server that neither Sage nor OpenDCT natively support).

As far as I can see, it should work how I initially tried, but using

http://192.168.1.14:9981/stream/channelnumber/%c%

OpenDCT was passing nothing to SageTV (neither in the docker nor my main Win10 SageTV server).

Open DCT did pass a virtual tuner that has the TVH channel number hard coded and I could view it in SageTV, so that part is working. The problem is not talking to TVH its something in the Open Generic HTTP Capture Device that stops it working as expected from the first post in this thread.

[something fishy]

I'm still trying to get the Generic HTTP Capture Device to work, however I cannot.

If I create a test device "Test1"

generic.http.device_names_csv=Test1

and populate the resulting properties so:

sagetv.device.80698815.channel_padding=0
sagetv.device.80698815.consumer=opendct.consumer.DynamicConsumerImpl
sagetv.device.80698815.custom_channels=
sagetv.device.80698815.delay_to_wait_after_tuning=0
sagetv.device.80698815.device_name=Test1
sagetv.device.80698815.encoder_listen_port=9000
sagetv.device.80698815.encoder_merit=0
sagetv.device.80698815.encoder_pool=generic_http
sagetv.device.80698815.exclusive_server_address=
sagetv.device.80698815.fast_network_encoder_switch=true
sagetv.device.80698815.http_password=
sagetv.device.80698815.http_username=
sagetv.device.80698815.last_channel=2
sagetv.device.80698815.pretuning_executable=
sagetv.device.80698815.stopping_executable=
sagetv.device.80698815.stopping_executable_delay_ms=15000
sagetv.device.80698815.streaming_url=http\://192.168.1.14\:9981/stream/channelnumber/%c%
sagetv.device.80698815.streaming_url2=
sagetv.device.80698815.streaming_url2_channels=
sagetv.device.80698815.transcode_profile=
sagetv.device.80698815.tuning_delay_ms=0
sagetv.device.80698815.tuning_executable=

OpenDCT does not load the tuner. It never appears in the OpenDCT web status page. It is obviously not available to SageTV.

If I replace the %c% in the .streaming_url property with a hard coded channel number, the tuner does load and is visible to SageTV but obviously cannot dynamically change channels.

I tried hard coding the channel number for the purpose of adding the tuner to SageTV and then switching back to %c% . In this case SageTV requests the tuner from OpenDCT which replies that it does not exist. (if I'm reading the log file correctly)

I am attaching the full properties file and opendct.log and wrapper.log.

The properties file has definitions for 8 Generic pipe tuners which all work as expected (but suffer more stream interruptions than I will tolerate (I've used the SatIP server with npvr and never noticed any unreliability in the streams, so I am trying to simplify as much as possible to see where this unreliability is coming from).

Thanks
Eric

[hvymetal]

Originally Posted by something fishy

If I replace the %c% in the .streaming_url property with a hard coded channel number, the tuner does load and is visible to SageTV but obviously cannot dynamically change channels.

In one of the threads EnterNoEscape the creator of OpenDCT admitted that %c% does not work with the http tuner url(For some reason I can not find the thread). He said he would fix it but had issuses as it would break some other things. When using a http tuner, the tuner executable works with %c%. Another alternitive is use a pipe tuner with ffmpeg as it also works for %c%.

I take that back I use some creative Google searching and found the post

https://forums.sagetv.com/forums/sho...7&postcount=23

[something fishy]

@hvymetal
Thank you for flagging that, I thought that I had reviewed the forums on this but missed that.

At least I know that its not a simple user error on my part.

Cheers

Eric