[mythtv-users] The PNG Thumbnail generated by Default: Is it used for anything?

[Bruce Markey]

Michael T. Dean wrote:
> On 05/14/2007 01:20 PM, Mike Perkins wrote:
>> Michael T. Dean wrote:
>> <snip>
>>   
>>> and has nothing to do with whether they're created--only whether they're 
>>> displayed.  Short of hacking the code, you cannot stop the creation of 
>>> these thumbnails.  We create them so that they're available /if/ they're 
>>> ever needed because doing so doesn't hurt anything.
>> It would be useful if one could get rid of them.
> 
> Because you're saying that the 14MiB would be useful...how?  Compared to

Mike, you've focused on disk space as the focal issue which,
of course should not be an issue. What bugs me is the latency
as the thumbnails are generated. It has to seek, decode, convert,
and send data over the network. The extra files in the dir can
be annoying and a slip up in "rm *.png" could be disastrous.

It used to be that if the option was turned off, the thumbnails
would not be created but that changed. Now they are created
automatically to get a head start and this can cause latency
on the playbackbox even if you've specifically asked not to
show the previews.

> Having code to turn off preview thumbnail creation is a waste of code.

Um, a one liner? (I won't bother with the ratio of bytes of
code vs terabytes of recordings ;-).
  
> Having a setting to turn off preview thumbnail creation is annoying (we 
> have too many settings already).  And, explaining to all the users (who 

If the preview option is turned off for all frontends then
there should never be any pixmaps created.

> The point isn't that the thumbnail images are useful or not useful, the 
> point is that they don't use enough resources to even allow a person 
> <quietly>with control issues</quietly> to disable them.  ;)  If you can 

...interesting...

> convince me of a reason why that 14MiB of space on your recordings 
> directory is important,

Goody, I love a challenge! The Watch Recordings is slow to respond
at the beginning of new recordings while the data for those 14MiB
is being generated and written even when the preview option is
turned off.

>  I will personally write a patch to allow 
> disabling the creation of preview thumbnail images.

Make sure that all frontends have the preview option turned off
so that none of the frontends (for now) need the pixmaps. If even
one host has the option set, then enable the automatic pixmap
generation. Use four spaces for indentation and no tabs (I'll
test it and catch any badness before commit anyway).

You've given your word so don't go "Dreamz" on us now (oh, yeah,
you don't watch reality TV ;-). Good luck! It should actually
be pretty easy and would be much appreciated.

Thanks, Mike,

--  bjm