[mythtv-users] Zap2It - isn't this a two part problem?

Tim Schall tschall-mythtv at fortgirlfriend.com
Fri Jun 29 15:50:46 UTC 2007


Greetings Everyone:

I (Well, I and several other guys...) take care of KCTS-TV in Seattle, WA 
and it was suggested by some friends that I stick my head in here and say 
something.  I am also a MythTV user.

All digital television stations are required by the FCC to transmit guide 
data out 12 hours.  At KCTS we transmit 10 days worth but the first 12 hours 
are all that's required.  Most major traffic systems at television stations 
(And places like Discovery Networks and HBO and....) are capable of 
outputting all sorts of sorted data.  We output a comma delimited text file 
from our traffic system that my PSIP generator grabs and parses out EIT's 
and ETT's for our digital television station.

I'd be glad to answer whatever questions I can about the internal workings 
of guide data generation at television stations or parsing it off the air 
for the digital stations.

Tim Schall

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Chad" <masterclc at gmail.com>
To: "Discussion about mythtv" <mythtv-users at mythtv.org>
Sent: Friday, June 29, 2007 8:39 AM
Subject: Re: [mythtv-users] Zap2It - isn't this a two part problem?


On 6/28/07, Jay R. Ashworth <jra at baylink.com> wrote:
> On Thu, Jun 28, 2007 at 04:45:24PM -0400, Chris Ribe wrote:
> >      There's a station in North Florida that appears to be an ABC/CW
> >      dual-affil... which is the first time I've seen a dual with a 
> > major.
> >
> >    We aren't a dual affiliate per se. We broadcast two "channels" on
> >    our digital transmitter and the cable co. carries us as 2 distinct
> >    channels. We don't do an NTSC broadcast of the CW.
>
> Ah.  I *thought* that might be what was going on from the Titan logs,
> but the fact that your website's CW logo is up top and the ABC logo
> buried down the side muddied the water.
>
> >    The CBS affiliate in our market does basically the same thing with
> >    MyTV on a digital subchannel - although I think they may also do an
> >    NTSC broadcast of MyTV.
>
> Ah.
>
> >    Anyhow, the amorphousness Jay was referring has to do with the fact
> >    that we don't have the listings information that we are looking
> >    for as MythTV users. All we have is a program schedule - episode
> >    information never touches the inside of the station.
>
> Indeed; they're leveraging Titan to do that.  Titan is a division of
> DecisionMark; I'm not sure how they get their data.
>
> Cheers,
> -- jr 'was *trying* not to blow your cover...' a
> --

Hello,

Do all stations provide *some* EIT data?  If we could get generic
listings (without descriptions) from a large source (screen scraping,
stations directly, whatever) and then have EIT update those channels
24-48 hours ahead (depending on how much data the station actually
provides, maybe even just 2 hours...) then we would be relatively ok
since the EIT data would have the most accurate info to help deal with
conflicts, repeats, etc.  The flaw in this is the expectation that
every station provides any EIT data, which I assume from subscribers
of cable, this isn't always available.

-Chad
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