Manage Recordings

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Software-update-available.png This page is up-to-date as of MythTV version 0.27.6, the current release is 34.0

Introduction

The Manage Recordings menus consists of four entries:

Schedule Recordings This has further menus under it for various ways of scheduling recordings.
Recording Rules Displays a list of your existing recording rules, so that you may check them or modify them.
Upcoming Recordings Displays a table of shows that will be recorded for the next two weeks or however long you have guide data.
Previously Recorded A list of all previously recorded shows, including those that have been deleted from your system. This list is used internally by the system for preventing recording shows that were recorded previously.

Schedule Recordings

(Manage Recordings->Schedule Recordings)

This section covers the different ways to schedule recordings in MythTV frontend. The Scheduling Recordings article also has detailed information about MythTV's scheduling system.

You can also schedule recordings using MythWeb. MythWeb uses a browser interface, shows more data on screen and offers an easier interface if you are prepared to use a keyboard and monitor to do your scheduling. MythWeb is described in a separate article.

Program Guide

(Manage Recordings->Schedule Recordings->Program Guide)

The electronic program guide (EPG), allows you to see what is currently being shown on the channels you receive. The EPG is color coded, each color represents a different category of show. The colors are determined by the theme currently being used and can be customized by editing the file "ui.xml" in the directory for the theme.

The guide needs data from somewhere. In North America you can get this data from Data Direct, in other parts of the world you use XMLTV. mythfilldatabase retrieves the program data and should be run nightly. DVB-T sources can use EIT to build the program guide.

Select the show that you want to record and press the Enter or Select key to open a window with record options.

RecordingsGuideSelect.png

A message at the top of the screen identifies whether the show was already scheduled. If it was not already scheduled the following list of options is displayed.

Record this showing Record only this Programme at this specific time and this station. This is the best way to be sure that a certain showing is recorded. However, if the TV listings change and the show is not broadcast at that time, the show will not be recorded but will be marked as Not Listed to let you know that you should investigate.
Record all showings Record this title on any station at any time. This can be useful if a station has sister stations where shows are rebroadcast allowing the scheduler to record rebroadcasts on the other station when the original airing cannot be recorded.
Record one showing(this episode) Record a title once from any of the times that appear in the TV listings. This is useful for recording a movie or special that has multiple showings because it allows the scheduler to choose one that doesn't conflict. It will only record a matching episode so if the one selected cannot be recorded for any reason it will wait until that episode is shown again.
Record all showings (this channel) Record this title on this channel at any time. You may want to rather use the option that lets you record on any channel in case a reschedule to another channel occurs. Note that if there are some channels you prefer, perhaps they are higher quality signals or less likely to be preempted, you can set channel priorities in the channel setup, rather than setting recordings on a specific channel.
Edit recording rule This gives you more flexibility to get the recording set up the way you want it. See Recording Options for details.

If it was already scheduled the following list of options is displayed.

Don't record this showing This will skip just this one recording, and try to record it some other time.
Never record this episode This will flag this particular episode as it it had already been recorded, so that it never records it.
Add override rule This allows you to add an override for this particular showing. For example if this showing was to be skipped because you had already recorded it before, you can override it so that it will record. If there was a conflict and this was to be skipped, and override can ensure this showing is recorded and something else is skipped instead.
Edit recording rule This edits the recording rule as described below, so that you can make changes to how episodes of this show are recorded. See Recording Options.
Delete recording rule Deletes the recording rule so that no more episodes of this show are recorded.

Program Finder

(Manage Recordings->Schedule Recordings->Program Finder)

The Program Finder allows searching by letter or number to find what shows are available. In the left hand column, select the appropriate letter. In the second column, a list of titles is available. In the third column will be a list of times the show is airing. This is good for scheduling lots of shows as well as when you want to schedule something that is more than a day away, saves lots of scrolling and searching the EPG.

A description of the program appears at the top of the screen, showing the original air date and the time and channel of the next airing.

Use RemoteUp.png RemoteDown.png RemoteLeft.png RemoteRight.png keys to select your shows to record.

ScheduleRecording1.jpg

Once you have highlighted an episode, you can use Select or Enter and set up your recording the same way as in Program Guide above.

Search Words

(Manage Recordings->Schedule Recordings->Search Words)

You can search for programs based on words found in the title or other places. This menu provides the following sub-menus.

  • Titles
  • Keywords
  • People
  • Advanced
  • Stored Searches

Each type of search stores prior searches so that you can easily get back to them.

Titles, Keywords and People show a screen where you can type in a value to search, or select a previously stored value. All new searches are automatically stored.

TitleSearch.png

As with all frontend pages, you can get an on-screen keyboard by pressing Enter or Select while in the entry box.

Advanced Search displays a menu where you can enter or select values from a number of places:

AdvancedSearch.png

You can enter words from Title, Subtitle, Description, and select values from the list of program types, genres, and channels.

Stored Searches allow you to choose searches that have been saved from Custom Record. To use this, you must first go into the Custom Record (Manage Recordings->Schedule Recordings->Custom Record) and enter a name and a SQL search clause. You can then user the Store button to store as a search. After that you can use the stored search. This gives you the full power of SQL to construct complex queries.

To delete or update a stored search, go back to Custom Record and cycle through the Sample Clauses until you find it. To delete it then store with blank SQL, or to update it store with changes.

Once you have found and highlighted an episode, you can use Select or Enter and set up your recording the same way as in Program Guide above.

Search Lists

(Manage Recordings->Schedule Recordings->Search Lists)

This search provides various lists of programs.

New titles lets you choose between All, Premiers, Movies, Series, Specials. Once you have selected one of these it displays shows that are in the current listings and have not been in your listings previously in the past 320 days. This is useful for finding new things on TV that are not reruns.

Movies provides a list of movies rated by number of stars that you can select, from 1 star and above to 10 stars and above or Unrated.

Categories lets you choose a category from a list containing hundreds of options, from Action/Adventure to Wrestling and everything you could imagine in between.

Channels lets you select a channel and display all shows in that channel. You can get the same thing using Search Words->Advanced and selecting a channel, or from Program Guide in a different form.

Time shows a list of programs starting at the current time. You can press M or Menu and change to a different starting time. this shows the information available in Program Guide in a vertical list rather than a grid.

Once you have found and highlighted an episode, you can use Select or Enter and set up your recording the same way as in Program Guide above.

Custom Record

(Manage Recordings->Schedule Recordings->Custom Record)

Here you need to construct your own SQL to find the programs you want. There are some sample SQLs to get you going. Here are some examples of when you may want to use this:

Reason SQL needed
You know that a new series called "The Expanse" is starting later in the year. It is not yet in the guide so you cannot select it. Note that a Title search will do the same. program.title = 'The Expanse'
You want to record "Masterpiece Classic" but only those episodes with "Downton Abbey" in the subtitle. program.title = 'Masterpiece Classic'

and program.subtitle like '%Downton Abbey%'

You want to record "Hawaii Five-0" but only episodes that originally aired after 2010. This is useful if you had watched episodes before you set up MythTV and do not want them re-recorded, or if you want to it to record the 2010 series of Hawaii Five-0 and not the 1968 series of the same name. program.title = 'Hawaii Five-0'

and ( program.originalairdate > '2010-01-01' or program.originalairdate is null )

You can construct complex queries including time calculations, channel numbers, channel priorities and anything else on the database. The SQL is case insensitive so if you type hawaii five-0, or Hawaii Five-0 it will find a match, but will not find it if you use Hawaii Five-O. If you are not sure whether that character after Five- is O or 0, you can use like 'Hawaii Five-%' and it will match on either and will also match Hawaii Five-9 if such a thing existed.

Invalid SQL will not be accepted and you will be notified.

Be careful especially if doing something complicated. I recommend going immediately to look at Upcoming Recordings to see the result of your SQL. It is possible with a simple error to set MythTV to record every program on every channel if you have something wrong. For example if you said program.title != 'Hawaii Five-0' it would record every show on every channel except shows called Hawaii Five-0. This would immediately start up all tuners recording, obviously there would not be enough tuners and hundreds of recordings would be flagged as conflicts in the Upcoming Recordings list.

Manual Schedule

(Manage Recordings->Schedule Recordings->Manual Schedule)

Manual Schedule allows the MythTV user to manually enter parameters to be used for recording. This is very similar to controls that were made popular on VCR (video cassette recorder) devices.

Use this if you are recording a channel for which you have no listing in your program guide, or you know that the listing in your program guide is wrong.

The options are very straightforward and simple to use:

Channel: The desired channel to be recorded

Date or day of the week: This can be set to record a show up to two months in the future.

Time: The start time of the recording. Can be selected in 5 minute increments.

Duration: From 1 to 360 minutes

Title (optional)

Once this information is entered, the next step is to Set Recording Options.

Recording Rules

(Manage Recordings->Recording Rules)

This displays a list of recording rules in the system. You may want to review these from time to time, so that you can delete rules for programs that no longer are shown or that you no longer want to record.

You can select any recording with Select (Enter key) or Edit (E key) and make changes to the Recording Options.

If you have multiple tuner cards, MythTV will try and resolve schedule conflicts by searching for repeat broadcasts of the same show as well as trying to handle non broadcasts due to changes in schedules. For recording of multiple episodes of a show, MythTV will look at the episode information to identify unique episodes.

You can change Recording priorities in the frontend Setup->Video->Recording Priorities (see Recording_Priorities).

Templates

You can create a Template or update an existing one, to supply default values for future recordings that use the template. There is always a template called Default and you can update it to change options for future recording rules that you create.

Recording Options

You can set or change the recording options from any of the recording setting pages. The options are described here. In the Steppes theme there is an additional dialog which presents a subset of the most commonly used options, and to get the full list you have to press M (Menu).

Some of the options are only available in Custom recording rules.

Schedule Type

Option Values Default Explanation
Schedule Type Do Not Record
Only One Showing
One Showing Every Week
One Showing Every Day
All Showings
Record This Showing Do Not Record will delete the recording rule. Other options are as described.

Schedule Options

Option Values Default Explanation
Priority -99 to +99 0 Sets the priority of this recording. The priority of a particular showing of the program is calculated by adding the priority of the recording to the priority of the input and channel. Priority determines which of many possible showings of an episode is recorded and which recording will be skipped in case of a conflict. You can set a positive or negative number. The higher the number the higher the priority.
Input List of your tuners Any Available You can select an input here. Normally you should leave Any Available so the system can assign a tuner.
Start Offset Number of minutes early or late Start on Time Set a value here to start recordings early or late.
End Offset Number of minutes early or late End on Time Set a value here to end recordings early or late. If you expect the show may overrun the end (e.g. sports), set a time here.
Dup Method Subtitle & Description
Subtitle then Description
Subtitle
Description
Don't match duplicates
Subtitle & Description The system will match duplicates using the program id in the listings if there is one. If not, it will use the method selected here. However, if you select Don't Match Duplicates it will not use the program id and duplicates will be recorded.
Dup Scope Current and previous Recordings
Current Recordings Only
Current and previous Recordings Current recordings are those you have not deleted. By default it will not re-record something even if you have deleted it. Yo u can set this to Current Recordings Only so that once deleted, an episode can be re-recorded.
Auto Extend
(New in v32.)
Do not automatically extend recording
Automatically extend recording using ESPN
Automatically extend recording using MLB
Do not automatically extend recording The system will periodically check with a service to determine if the sporting event has finished, and will extend a recording to cover the end of the game. This works mainly for team sports.

Filter Options

Option Explanation
New episode Episodes whose original air date is within the last 14 days.
Identifiable episode The individual episode is identified in the listings as a specific episode if it is a series. If not a series then all episodes are recorded. If your listings source does not supply program ids it checks for subtitle and description filled in.
First showing If the episode shows several times during the period for which you have schedules, only record on the first occurrence.
Prime time Start time between 7 PM and 10 PM local time.
This episode Record the episode from which the recording was created in the listings.
This series Matches the series id from which the rule was created in the listings. Without this setting, it will record movies or other series with the same name as this. Has no effect if yor listings provider does not use series id.
This time Starts at the same time of day as the time on the listing from which it was created, or up to 10 minutes earlier or later.
This day and time Starts at the same time of day and day of week as the time on the listing from which it was created, or up to 10 minutes earlier or later.
This channel Record on a channel with matching callsign to the listing from which this was created.
Commercial free Record on a channel that you have marked as commercial free in channel setup.
High definition Record only a program flagged in listings as high definition.

Tips:

  • Instead of specifying High Definition you can give high definition channels a higher priority. That way it prefers high definition channels but will revert to standard def if there is no high def channel with your program.
  • I prefer not to use New Episode. If you leave that turned off and you miss an episode you will catch the episode when it comes around to rerun time for the series.
  • Identifiable Episode is useful in case future episodes are listed without information. Without that setting, it can flag such an episode for recording on several channels which carry it, creating conflicts and possible duplicate recordings.

Storage Options

Option Values Default Explanation
Recording Profile Default
LiveTV
High Quality
Low Quality
Others...
Default Recording profiles are set up in backend setup. See Setup Recording Profiles. With Digital TV there is not much to set up there, all shows are recorded with the full quality of the digital transmission.
Recording Group List of groups used previously
Create new group
Default Recording groups are a way you can organize your recordings to make it easier to locate them when you want to watch them. Thus you may put children's shows in a separate group for example. You can create a new group name here or use one you have used before.
Storage Group List of storage groups you have set up Default You can use Storage Groups to put recordings in different directory locations. In most cases you should put all of your storage file systems in the default storage group and let MythTV manage it. To set up storage groups see Setup Storage Directories.
Playback Group List of Playback Groups you have created Default Playback groups determine how the forward skip and back skip behave when playing back, and some other features. To set up playback groups in frnt end setup see Playback_Groups.
Maximum to Keep 0-100 0 If you specify 0, all shows recorded with this rule will be kept. If you specify a different number, only that number will be kept on disk at one time. The next setting below determines what action is taken when the number is exceeded.
Max Newest Don't Record
Delete Oldest
Don't Record Determines what to do if the maximum to keep is exceeded. If you specify Delete Oldest it is deleted immediately a new show is recorded. It will not be found in the Deeleted Group and cannot be undeleted.
Allow Auto Expire Checkbox Unchecked If the system runs low on disk space it can delete the oldest recordings. If you want this show to be included as a candidate to delete, set this option.

Setting Maximum to Keep and Delete Oldest is a convenient way to record the nightly news so that you always have the latest available. There is no point in keeping old versions of nightly news.

Post Processing Options

Option Explanation
Commercial Flag Enable this to run commercial flagging after recording.
Look Up Metadata Enable this to obtain season and episode numbers and artwork online after recording.
Transcode Recordings Enable this to run the transcode job after recording.
Run name There are four of these entries, one for each user job. If you have set up user jobs with names, the job name will show here. If not it will show User Job #1, etc.

If you plan to use commercial flagging, transcoding or user jobs, these need to be setup. See Job Queue and subsequent sections, also Jobs.

Metadata Options

In most cases, MythTV can automatically look up the metadata and find the season and episode, as well as appropriate artwork for the background images. Sometimes it may not find anything or may find the wrong thing if there are other shows with a similar name. You can correct that by setting this up.

If this is a TV series, in a browser navigate to http://thetvdb.com/ . Type the program name in the search and press enter. Choose the appropriate series if more than one is displayed. Look at the URL, it will look something like this http://thetvdb.com/?tab=series&id=266398 . Copy the number from the id and paste into the input box for the id. Either enter ttvdb.py_ followed by the id, for example ttvdb.py_266398 or else just enter the id and select season 1 episode 1. Click Perform Query and it should be found.

If it is a movie (TV movie or theatrical movie) do the search with the URL https://www.themoviedb.org/ . You will find a URL like this https://www.themoviedb.org/movie/331446-sharknado-3-oh-hell-no. Use the returned number and enter tmdb3.py_ followed by the id, for example tmdb3.py_331446or else just enter the id and select season and episode of 0. Click Perform Query and it should be found.

If no error message is returned above, you can escape from the entry, or you can click the buttons to find cover art etc. Validate that what you find matches the show.

Schedule Info

This presents a set of buttons that can be used to display schedule information for the show selected.

Option Explanation
Program Details Shows full details of the program selected from the guide, as stored in the guide. Includes subtitle, cast, categories, etc.
Upcoming Episodes Displays a list of future episodes that are in your guide data and identifies any that are scheduled to record.
Upcoming Recordings Displays a list of future episodes that are in your guide data and identifies any that are scheduled to record.
Previously Recorded Lists all episodes of the show that were previously recorded.

Preview Changes

Shows a list of future episodes that are in your guide data, and identifies which of them will record, and the reason for those that will not.

Use Template

You can create a template with default values for shows that you plan to record. There is always a template called Default that is used by default. You can change the Default template, for example to set it to run user job 1 on all shows, or you can create your own template that cna be selected when creating a recording rule. Templates are created and updated in the Recording Rules section.

Upcoming Recordings

This screen lists all of the future scheduled recordings, showing the time, channel, and title.

When a program is actually recording, that is identified in some way depending on the theme selected. Once a program has been recorded, it is removed from this list by MythTV.

The MythTV master backend is responsible for managing the schedule for all TV tuner cards on the master and any slave. Its job is to search the TV listing for the shows you have requested and assign recordings to the TV tuner cards. If none of the shows that you've chosen overlap, it simply records all of the shows. However, if there are shows where the beginning and end times overlap, the scheduler follows rules that you've specified or makes logical decisions about what would be best if you haven't expressed any preference.

If you have a lot of recordings scheduled, you can check to see what they are, as well as resolve any conflicts that the system can't handle, with the upcoming recordings browser. RecordingsUpcoming.jpg

There are two 'views' available.

1.Press 130.png to include all of the items that match record rules even if they do not need to be recorded.

2.Press 230.png to focus on just the things that will record and items that may need your attention.

Alternatively, you can change the view by using the M (Menu) button and selecting Important or All.

Conflicts Reminder

This tells you if there are any conflicts that would prevent one or more shows from being recorded.

Highlight Colour

In the Steppes theme, each item is identified at the top either by the number of the tuner in Blue, or a reason code for not recording in White. Each item that is recording now is shown with tuner number in Green.

In the MythBuntu theme, there is a colored light at the left of each row. For an item that will record it is Blue, and items that will not record are Gray with an X. The Number of tuner or reason code for not recording are on each row at the end. Each item that is recording now has the light shown in Green.

In the MythCenter theme, each row for an item that will record is Blue, and items that will not record are Gray. The Number of tuner or reason code for not recording are on each row at the end. Each item that is recording now is shown in Green.

In the Terra theme, items that will record have a blue bar next to them, and ones that will not have a gray bar. The reason code is on each row at the end. Each item that is recording now has a green bar.

In all cases, if you select an entry in the list an expanded display is shown for the entry, with full explanation of the code where applicable.

The items in the list are colored in the record color for things that will record, white for things that may need attention, gray for those that do not need to record and yellow when there is a time conflict. Items at the top of the list may also be highlighted in red indicating that the recording is in progress.

Tuner Number and Status Code

Numbers indicate which card number has been assigned to record the show. Recording status characters are used to indicate the reason that something will not be recorded. You can see what the letter means in the "Record Mode" Below.

Record Mode

This is a short status message for the highlighted item that indicates the type of record rule that was matched, the "total priority" for this showing and a one or two word explanation of the status code.

Press RemoteSelect.png to see and/or edit the matching recording rule.

RecrodingRecordOptions.jpg

Previously Recorded

As its name implies, the Previously Recorded screen showcases all of the titles that have been recorded by your MythTV box, as well as any episodes that aired within the last 10 days and matched one or more of your recording rules. This allows you to check why a show was or was not recorded, even if the show has already aired.

MythTV will not record an episode again unless the recording rule specifies no duplicate checking. If you want to force it to record an episode again you can delete the episode marked P (previous) from this list. Select the program and another screen will show with the following options:

  • Never record this episode
  • Remove this episode from the list
  • Remove all episodes for this title

Removing items from this list will not delete the recordings, however.

Each item in the list will show a recording status character to indicate how the episode was handled by MythTV.