[mythtv-users] is mythtv smart enough to do this(overlap/back-to-back) with recordings?

[Michael T. Dean]

On 07/28/2006 08:17 PM, Steve Hodge wrote:
> On 7/29/06, Michael T. Dean <mtdean at thirdcontact.com> wrote:
>   
>> On 07/28/06 17:22, Steve Hodge wrote:
>>     
>>> On 7/29/06, Michael T. Dean <mtdean at thirdcontact.com> wrote:
>>>       
>>>> /me anxiously awaits the post from the guy coding it when he realizes
>>>> that the perfect situation discussed here doesn't cover it all ( and
>>>> that it's a much more complex issue, as discussed at
>>>> http://www.gossamer-threads.com/lists/mythtv/users/215475#215475 )
>>> I don't see the relevance of the objections you raised in that post.
>>> Can you elaborate? We are talking about a single tuner writing all of
>>> both recordings, not having one tuner start a recording and a second
>>> tuner finish it. So the multiple backend scenario you mentioned
>>> doesn't apply.
>> So, as soon as you install a second capture card, all your overpadded
>> recording rules begin to conflict because Myth's behavior /all of a
>> sudden/ changes?
> What's a second card got to do with it? I don't see what you're getting at.

Did you even read the post or just copy its link?  OK, I'll assume you 
read it, but I was not clear in presenting the ideas.  So, let me try again.

Your words: "We are talking about a single tuner writing all of both 
recordings, not having one tuner start a recording and a second tuner 
finish it."

Since you didn't understand my post (linked above), the Cliff's Notes 
version is:  "Back-to-back recordings are not always captured using the 
same capture card, to ensure the highest-priority shows get recorded on 
the highest-quality capture cards."  (And we're not talking a small 
percentage of the time, either--I would say bordering on 50% of the 
time, at least, on my systems.)

So, once someone installs a second capture card, we're not talking about 
a single tuner writing all of both recordings, anymore.  If the system 
includes one hardware encoder and one software encoder or one encoder 
(hardware or software) and one digital tuner (or, worse, one of all 
three), how can data from two different types of encoders get written to 
the same file?

2 minutes of HDTV followed by a jarring switch to BTTV-captured software 
encoded SDTV?  Not even looking at the technical issues involved in the 
MPEG-2-encoded HDTV and RTJPEG- or MPEG-4-encoded SDTV, this doesn't 
seem like a good solution.  And, /if/ the cards are on different 
backends, it's even harder to find a workable solution.  (Note, though, 
that we /still/ have a problem if they're on the same backend.)

So, if we say, "Well, we'll just make it only work when /all/ capture 
cards are the same type /and/ on the same backend," that means that 
Myth's behavior changes when someone installs new capture cards.  So all 
the recording schedules they've set up with a one PVR-150 Myth system 
(schedules that include overzealous padding) work fine, but when the 
user adds her new HDTV card, she all of a sudden has /more/ conflicts 
and--by adding a new capture card--has reduced the number of shows she's 
able to record.

Anyway, I'm bowing out of this thread, now.  If my point still isn't 
clear, feel free to start writing the code and attempting to submit a 
patch for inclusion.  If you don't start to see the issues then, you 
won't ever see them (or, you're far more creative than I and have come 
up with an ingenious solution for them).

Regardless, it's not me you need to convince.  Bruce Markey and David 
Engel (and, of course, Isaac) are the ones who will likely make 
decisions about whether to commit this type of functionality.

Mike