[mythtv-users] Does MythTV need a Beginner's FAQ Collection?

Ray Olszewski ray at comarre.com
Wed Jun 25 20:32:09 EDT 2003


Thanks for the feedback, Isaac. Some comments below.

At 08:23 PM 6/25/2003 -0400, Isaac Richards wrote:
[...]
> > 6. How do I get and install MythTV?
>
>Really think a link to the appropriate section in the howto would be better,
>here.

And what section would that be?

Information on CVS is in Section 1 (How to Obtain This Document). It's a 
good illustration of the improbable locations problem I just mentioned in a 
response to Robert. I only found it myself by accident, earlier today, 
because you link to it on the Website.

Information on the tarball is, quite reasonably, at the start of Section 5 
(Downloading and Compiling). But all it says there is: "Get MythTV from the 
mythtv.org web site. Save the tarball to a directory you can find." I 
should waste a reader's time and energy with a link to that? I should and 
will, though, reference the HowTo's section 5.4, which lists the commands 
needed to unpack and build Myth, instead of the README file in the tarball.

CVS is not mentioned anywhere in Section 5, BTW ... though I assume the 
"build" instructions of section 5.4 apply to it too.

Information on distro-specific packages is ...well, mostly nowhere, as far 
as I can see. Section 5.6 mentions the Debian-Woody packages, but the HowTo 
has no mention I can find of the other distros you link to on the Myth 
Website or of Debian-Sid.

Finding information this way is like playing a boring implementation of 
Zork. "Twisty little passages" indeed.

[...]
> > To watch MythTV-captured television on a Windows computer (or through a
> > standard Linux app such aas xine or mplayer), you need to convert the files
> > from the idiosyncratic MythTV capture format to a standard format. This
> > process is called "transcoding" and can be done with <add details>.
>
>idiosyncratic?

What is your question?  Idiosyncratic is a good word, one that means 
exactly what I wanted to say here, while adding that word-of-the-day 
feeling I like to toss somewhere in anythung lengthy I write. I could have 
said "not conforming to any industry or Linux standard", but that seemed 
too wordy and banal.





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