Using Multiple Binaries
If you need to run multiple versions of the mythtv binaries, you can use the following method to switch between the two.
Method 1
Yes it can be done, and is relatively straightforward. I do this so I can switch between versions to test and code against each one.
What i do is to compile them with different prefixes. ie
fixes/0.27: --prefix=/usr/local/myth-0.27 and for convenience of my wrapper scripts (more on these in a bit) I symlink /usr/local/myth-prod -> /usr/local/myth-0.27 master: --prefix=/usr/local/myth-git
Then build each one in turn and install it
Then I have wrapper scripts which I stick in /usr/local/bin and name appropriately: mythbackend-prod, mythbackend-git etc
They are all basically the same
Example: /usr/local/bin/mythbackend-prod -------- #!/bin/sh PATH=/usr/local/myth-prod/bin:$PATH LD_LIBRARY_PATH=/usr/local/myth-prod/lib:$LD_LIBRARY_PATH MYTHCONFDIR=$HOME/.mythtv-prod/ PYTHONPATH=/usr/local/myth-prod/lib/python2.7/site-packages export PATH LD_LIBRARY_PATH MYTHCONFDIR PYTHONPATH exec /usr/local/myth-prod/bin/mythbackend $@ --------
Some key items to note
PATH obvious, where to find the binaries
LD_LIBRARY_PATH as per PATH, where to find the libraries
MYTHCONFDIR moves where the config files (normally in ~/.mythtv) live. Different versions, use different databases which means different config files!
PYTHONPATH, like PATH means the python bits we install will be found. This allows things like the metadata grabbers to work
On the database side, I have 2 different databases named mythprod and mythdev. I on purpose do not use mythconverg, so that I can be explicit about which database to use, and anything being stupid and just using mythconverg will be caught.
I run both a prod (fixes/0.27) and dev (master) backend on the same server. For tuners I have 1 dual DVB-T and 1 dual DVB-S2, so i split each tuner, and use 1 of each type of input for prod and dev (so they have identical tuner setups)
My frontends use exactly the same setup, with the same scripts (literally just change mythbackend to mythfrontend in the script)
Method 2
There are ways. That's how I do here.
First make sure the binaries are installed in two different paths. that means you can't use 0.27 and 0.28 binary packages you'll have to compile one yourself
Eg. ./configure --prefix=/something/that/is/different/to/the/other/install
then make / make install
The easiest then is to use a different user to run it so you have no conflicting mythtv config: to run it: LD_LIBRARY_PATH=/something/that/is/different/to/the/other/install/lib /something/that/is/different/to/the/other/install/mythfrontend