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[RELEASE] PseudoTV Addon: Virtual EPG and TV Channel Surfing Script - Printable Version

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RE: [RELEASE] PseudoTV Addon: Virtual EPG and TV Channel Surfing Script - mwkurt - 2013-11-27

(2013-11-26, 23:49)RockDawg Wrote:
(2013-11-26, 17:13)Lunatixz Wrote:
(2013-11-26, 13:38)mwkurt Wrote: Guess you could be right, but I am using Flexraid on my 5400rpm drives, and like I said, no delays.

Mark

There is a problem with his setup, a media server needs to have better management of its HDD spin down timer. PseudoTV runs on the idea that media is always available.

That being said, It wouldn't be hard to send a file request to the leading file in a playlist when the "coming up" prompt displays...

But honestly this problem falls on the side of the user... setup a longer idle time for the HDD or setup some cron or watchdog to wake drives when you're using XBMC...

There is nothing technically wrong with his system. Maybe it's configuration could be fine tuned in regards to hard drive spin down/spin up, but there is not necessarily any setting that's ideal. He may have 17 hard drives. If he has it set so that when one spins up they all spin up, it could solve his issue in PTY, but having them all spin up just to watch a single movie that's on a single drive is a waste. It's a matter of choice.

(2013-11-26, 13:38)mwkurt Wrote:
(2013-11-25, 22:03)RockDawg Wrote: There's no problem in his setup. He's just using a system (unRAID?) that spins down drives when not in use. It can take a few for the drive(s) to spin up and start playing the file.

Guess you could be right, but I am using Flexraid on my 5400rpm drives, and like I said, no delays.

Mark

It all depends on how your system handles drive spin up/down. It could not even be enabled in which case all drives are always spinning. Or it could be enabled but it's spinning up all the drives when a single drive has activity. In either scenario you wouldn't have delay between shows as the drives are already spinning. Rest assured though if the drive the file is on is spun down, there will be a noticeable delay.

Do you like FlexRAID? I've been considering trying it out.

Yeah, FlexRAID is pretty good. I have no complaints. I set it up and let it go. I have it update the data once a week. It is pretty easy to set up. Give it a try.

Mark


RE: [RELEASE] PseudoTV Addon: Virtual EPG and TV Channel Surfing Script - Adrenachrone - 2013-11-27

(2013-11-17, 22:45)spanktastic2120 Wrote:
(2013-11-17, 22:25)Adrenachrone Wrote: The iphone remote doesn't control PseudoTv. You can get a remote with an IR port off of ebay for 10-15$ from japan.


On another note, I finally updated my xbmc to frodo 12.2 and i'm now getting a script error when trying to launch Pseudo. Can anyone confirm that it works or if I will need to revert to Eden. Thanks!

it works with frodo but you need to use the stable-pre version not the master version. theres a link in the first post of the thread.

Sorry for the delay in getting back on this one... just wanted to say thanks. Up and running again. Cheers and big thx to Json for the continued work on the best plugin for xbmc!


RE: [RELEASE] PseudoTV Addon: Virtual EPG and TV Channel Surfing Script - EGOvoruhk - 2013-11-30

(2013-11-27, 00:32)Lunatixz Wrote: BTW I never said anything was wrong with his system... just his configuration...

There is nothing wrong with his configuration. I have the same configuration too, on purpose. I have a 24 HDD media server. I don't want every single drive spinning up when I use XBMC (I've got 3 XBMC machines in the house hitting it at almost all times!), I'd much rather wait 10 seconds for the drive to spin up so they last a little longer and my server doesn't just constantly eat extra power. His suggestion of a pseudo-network bumper is a great idea, and one I'd love to see. Just load up a short generated slide show with some media information and a "Now playing" banner or something for a few seconds if you need it, and if all your drives are always spun up like yours are, it will have zero effect on your experience

Anyway, I'd like to +1 this request. I was looking into PseudoTV for my dad's XBMC machine 'cause all he does in channel surf, and it would come in handy to help keep the experience going when loading media


Re: RE: [RELEASE] PseudoTV Addon: Virtual EPG and TV Channel Surfing Script - Lunatixz - 2013-11-30

(2013-11-30, 20:57)EGOvoruhk Wrote:
(2013-11-27, 00:32)Lunatixz Wrote: BTW I never said anything was wrong with his system... just his configuration...

There is nothing wrong with his configuration. I have the same configuration too, on purpose. I have a 24 HDD media server. I don't want every single drive spinning up when I use XBMC (I've got 3 XBMC machines in the house hitting it at almost all times!), I'd much rather wait 10 seconds for the drive to spin up so they last a little longer and my server doesn't just constantly eat extra power. His suggestion of a pseudo-network bumper is a great idea, and one I'd love to see. Just load up a short generated slide show with some media information and a "Now playing" banner or something for a few seconds if you need it, and if all your drives are always spun up like yours are, it will have zero effect on your experience

Anyway, I'd like to +1 this request. I was looking into PseudoTV for my dad's XBMC machine 'cause all he does in channel surf, and it would come in handy to help keep the experience going when loading media

So a servers HDD should spin down?

I'm glad you don't run any servers I access...

Plan simple fact! Server HDD should not spin down...

Didn't say it was ideal but its the truth. For practical reasons of course you want unused equipment to sleep... But then don't have issue with the fact that it takes time to spin up a drive.

Simple truth... Sleeping HDD takes time to wakeup, have issues with the time it takes?... His configuration is wrong!


RE: [RELEASE] PseudoTV Addon: Virtual EPG and TV Channel Surfing Script - EGOvoruhk - 2013-11-30

(2013-11-30, 21:15)Lunatixz Wrote: So a servers HDD should spin down?

Where did I say anything about "should"? All I said was that is was configured that way on purpose. What benefit do I gain from doing otherwise? No more 10 second delay? That's not worth the extra money on my power bill. No "should' there, just my opinion based on my feelings toward my bank account and wallet's well being

Now stop putting words in my mouth, and stop making blanket statements about servers. They are not all created equal. If you're holding home servers to the same standard that you hold all other ones, I would certainly like to take a look at yours. I mean, I certainly hope you keep in it it's own dedicated cool room, with an up to code A/C and exhaust system, and a fire alarm shut off, and thousands and thousands of dollars of other improvements only businesses need. We're not running web or development servers here, they're just for media

(2013-11-30, 21:15)Lunatixz Wrote: I'm glad you don't run any servers I access...

Plan simple fact! Server HDD should not spin down...

Didn't say it was ideal but its the truth. For practical reasons of course you want unused equipment to sleep... But then don't have issue with the fact that it takes time to spin up a drive.

Simple truth... Sleeping HDD takes time to wakeup, have issues with the time it takes?... His configuration is wrong!

I think you might be confused about the difference between opinion and fact. There are no "facts" or "truths" here, just personal preferences which can't be wrong or right


RE: [RELEASE] PseudoTV Addon: Virtual EPG and TV Channel Surfing Script - Lunatixz - 2013-11-30

(2013-11-30, 21:47)EGOvoruhk Wrote:
(2013-11-30, 21:15)Lunatixz Wrote: So a servers HDD should spin down?

Where did I say anything about "should"? All I said was that is was configured that way on purpose. What benefit do I gain from doing otherwise? No more 10 second delay? That's not worth the extra money on my power bill. No "should' there, just my opinion based on my feelings toward my bank account and wallet's well being

Now stop putting words in my mouth, and stop making blanket statements about servers. They are not all created equal. If you're holding home servers to the same standard that you hold all other ones, I would certainly like to take a look at yours. I mean, I certainly hope you keep in it it's own dedicated cool room, with an up to code A/C and exhaust system, and a fire alarm shut off, and thousands and thousand of dollars of other improvements only businesses need. We're not running web or development servers here, they're just for media

(2013-11-30, 21:15)Lunatixz Wrote: I'm glad you don't run any servers I access...

Plan simple fact! Server HDD should not spin down...

Didn't say it was ideal but its the truth. For practical reasons of course you want unused equipment to sleep... But then don't have issue with the fact that it takes time to spin up a drive.

Simple truth... Sleeping HDD takes time to wakeup, have issues with the time it takes?... His configuration is wrong!

I think you might be confused about the difference between opinion and fact. There are no "facts" here, just personal preferences which can't be wrong or right

If this wasn't a fact I would agree with you (every has an opinion)... but how do you think data farms work? without redundant information hdds don't sleep... FACT!!

Plus its a clear question... does his configuration work for him? No it doesn't!!

If I set my PC to sleep after 2 minutes idle, and don't like how long it takes to wake up... should I write microsoft and ask them to change the code to allow a wakeup every two minutes? NO!! I would change my configuration to my needs. This isn't opinion but common sense!

I agreed that a feature like he requested would be possible and may be included in my build... but seriously if you can't see that a fundamental configuration problem is present I don't know what to say...

There is so much software out there to manage I/O idling... nuts to think every problem should be adapted to an individual's needs...


RE: [RELEASE] PseudoTV Addon: Virtual EPG and TV Channel Surfing Script - EGOvoruhk - 2013-11-30

(2013-11-30, 22:00)Lunatixz Wrote: If this wasn't a fact I would agree with you (every has an opinion)... but how do you think data farms work? without redundant information hdds don't sleep... FACT!!

Not sure what data farms have to do with this topic. It's getting very strawman now...

(2013-11-30, 22:00)Lunatixz Wrote: nuts to think every problem should be adapted to an individual's needs...

There you go, putting words in people's mouths again. No one said anything about "every problem" and it "should be" adapted to my needs. Sounds like your problem is that you don't agree with the idea of feature requests, because that's all this is, a feature request for a very niche group of people. How dare we, right?

Here, let me help you out. There's a whole forum filled with people making outlandish requests when they could probably use 100 cobbled together solutions. Go tell them how wrong they are for suggesting new ideas that could benefit them


RE: [RELEASE] PseudoTV Addon: Virtual EPG and TV Channel Surfing Script - Lunatixz - 2013-11-30

(2013-11-30, 22:55)EGOvoruhk Wrote:
(2013-11-30, 22:00)Lunatixz Wrote: If this wasn't a fact I would agree with you (every has an opinion)... but how do you think data farms work? without redundant information hdds don't sleep... FACT!!

Not sure what data farms have to do with this topic. It's getting very strawman now...

(2013-11-30, 22:00)Lunatixz Wrote: nuts to think every problem should be adapted to an individual's needs...

There you go, putting words in people's mouths again. No one said anything about "every problem" and it "should be" adapted to my needs. Sounds like your problem is that you don't agree with the idea of feature requests, because that's all this is, a feature request for a very niche group of people. How dare we, right?

Here, let me help you out. There's a whole forum filled with people making outlandish requests when they could probably use 100 cobbled together solutions. Go tell them how wrong they are for suggesting new ideas that could benefit them

What are you talking about... I have no problems with feature requests... but many "feature requests" can be fixed with a proper setup... It's not a "feature" to wake a hdd up... it should be handled by his OS!

You started your reply stating to me that his configuration is setup correctly... I disagree since if it was setup correctly he wouldn't have any problems with slowdowns because of idling HDD...

We will agree to disagree on this one!


RE: [RELEASE] PseudoTV Addon: Virtual EPG and TV Channel Surfing Script - RockDawg - 2013-11-30

Lunatixz - I think you are just trying to argue here. Of course data farm servers don't spin down hard drives. What does that have to do with anything? You really think those principals should or do apply to home servers? Of course not.

The poster had an issue with his configuration and PTV and asked if absolution could be implemented. Nothing wrong with that and it doesn't mean there is something wrong with his system.


RE: [RELEASE] PseudoTV Addon: Virtual EPG and TV Channel Surfing Script - EGOvoruhk - 2013-11-30

(2013-11-30, 23:32)Lunatixz Wrote: It's not a "feature" to wake a hdd up... it should be handled by his OS!

I'm not requesting a feature to wake up the drives, I'm requesting a feature to help not break the PsuedoTV immersion/experience for those of us that idle our drives

My OS handles waking up my HDDs just fine. Sure, the 10 seconds may be a problem, but if I changed the idle timeouts or left the drives always on, I would have a larger problem on my hands of wasting power when I don't need it. I have 3 strictly-XBMC machines, so only 3 drives can be used max at all times, (assuming no other random activity on PCs). I have 24 drives in my unRAID server. I don't always need, nor do I want, them spinning

Essentially, I'm faced with a small problem (10 second delay), or a large problem (extra power usage). I obviously want to solve the large problem first, but the solution, to enable idle timeouts, creates the smaller problem

If there's an easy fix to both of my problems, I'm all ears. I'd love to not have to deal with them


RE: [RELEASE] PseudoTV Addon: Virtual EPG and TV Channel Surfing Script - Lunatixz - 2013-12-01

(2013-11-30, 23:55)RockDawg Wrote: Lunatixz - I think you are just trying to argue here. Of course data farm servers don't spin down hard drives. What does that have to do with anything? You really think those principals should or do apply to home servers? Of course not.

The poster had an issue with his configuration and PTV and asked if absolution could be implemented. Nothing wrong with that and it doesn't mean there is something wrong with his system.

I'm not arguing...

I posted a possible solution for his problem and my opinion on the matter. I was only trying to re enforce my suggestion. Because I truly believe its in the best interest of the user to fix it without PTV's help... after all i'm sure he watches media using other programs other than PTV so his problem is "system" related... since another program would yield the same performance issues due to a sleeping HDD.

I do apologize if you take offense to my post, it wasn't meant negatively.

(2013-11-30, 23:59)EGOvoruhk Wrote:
(2013-11-30, 23:32)Lunatixz Wrote: It's not a "feature" to wake a hdd up... it should be handled by his OS!

I'm not requesting a feature to wake up the drives, I'm requesting a feature to help not break the PsuedoTV immersion/experience for those of us that idle our drives

My OS handles waking up my HDDs just fine. Sure, the 10 seconds may be a problem, but if I changed the idle timeouts or left the drives always on, I would have a larger problem on my hands of wasting power when I don't need it. I have 3 strictly-XBMC machines, so only 3 drives can be used max at all times, (assuming no other random activity on PCs). I have 24 drives in my unRAID server. I don't always need, nor do I want, them spinning

Essentially, I'm faced with a small problem (10 second delay), or a large problem (extra power usage). I obviously want to solve the large problem first, but the solution, to enable idle timeouts, creates the smaller problem

If there's an easy fix to both of my problems, I'm all ears. I'd love to not have to deal with them

I believe its in your best interest to have your system spin up your drives when using any type of media program... The solution your suggestion on PTV end isn't really possible... Sure I could have it request your next file when the upcoming prompt pops up... but what about your random selection from the EPG? how would PTV know before your pick a show what to "queue" up?

which is why I suggest you fix your configuration... a watchdog program that looks for some info that PTV, XBMC, is in use then have it spins up all your drives...

otherwise there will never be a way to have PTV work well with sleeping drives!


RE: [RELEASE] PseudoTV Addon: Virtual EPG and TV Channel Surfing Script - EGOvoruhk - 2013-12-01

(2013-12-01, 00:04)Lunatixz Wrote: I believe its in your best interest to have your system spin up your drives when using any type of media program...

Like I said, 24 drives, all with media in the XBMC library (Yes, all). I don't want all those drives spinning up just to watch something that's on 1 drive. That problem supersedes all others (for me)


(2013-12-01, 00:04)Lunatixz Wrote: The solution your suggestion on PTV end isn't really possible... Sure I could have it request your next file when the upcoming prompt pops up... but what about your random selection from the EPG? how would PTV know before your pick a show what to "queue" up?

My solution wasn't to have PTV spin up the drive I might chose, I'm aware that's not possible. My solution was to create some sort of filler/title screen based on the database of the movie/TV show selected, like loading up a half screen with the poster, cast info, plot, etc at the bottom, and have it say "Now tuning..." on the top part of the screen. Basically how PTV is a fake channel guide, just fake another screen that fits within the theme. Or if you're currently using PTV to watch something on a drive already spun up, and select something that happens to be on a different idled drive, have PTV display a little overlay in the bottom corner that says "Changing channel..." until it's able to load/access the file

I'm sure there are a bunch of other cool different ways you could create little transitions to cover up the delay

I know I could let everything stay spun up, but I'd rather break the immersion than waste a few dollars a month, I cannot stress that enough. This is just a feature request/wouldn't it be cool if it could work a little differently for people like me, nothing more


RE: [RELEASE] PseudoTV Addon: Virtual EPG and TV Channel Surfing Script - Lunatixz - 2013-12-01

(2013-12-01, 00:25)EGOvoruhk Wrote:
(2013-12-01, 00:04)Lunatixz Wrote: I believe its in your best interest to have your system spin up your drives when using any type of media program...

Like I said, 24 drives, all with media in the XBMC library (Yes, all). I don't want all those drives spinning up just to watch something that's on 1 drive. That problem supersedes all others (for me)


(2013-12-01, 00:04)Lunatixz Wrote: The solution your suggestion on PTV end isn't really possible... Sure I could have it request your next file when the upcoming prompt pops up... but what about your random selection from the EPG? how would PTV know before your pick a show what to "queue" up?

My solution wasn't to have PTV spin up the drive I might chose, I'm aware that's not possible. My solution was to create some sort of filler/title screen based on the database of the movie/TV show selected, like loading up a half screen with the poster, cast info, plot, etc at the bottom, and have it say "Now tuning..." on the top part of the screen. Basically how PTV is a fake channel guide, just fake another screen that fits within the theme. Or if you're currently using PTV to watch something on a drive already spun up, and select something that happens to be on a different idled drive, have PTV display a little overlay in the bottom corner that says "Changing channel..." until it's able to load/access the file

I'm sure there are a bunch of other cool different ways you could create little transitions to cover up the delay

I know I could let everything stay spun up, but I'd rather break the immersion than waste a few dollars a month, I cannot stress that enough. This is just a feature request/wouldn't it be cool if it could work a little differently for people like me, nothing more

I never said my idea was ideal, but IMO it's the only one you have!!

From a technical point of view what you're asking for would never happen...
the amount of work needed to code a backend to universally communicate with every OS I/O system to know if a drive is a sleep or not is a lot of work...

then you would have to re write PTV from the ground up because what your asking could never easily be squeezed into the framework in place...

So we are back to my suggestion which really is the only one... or you could move all your data around and only spin up a few drives for PTV...

Don't shoot the messenger!!


RE: [RELEASE] PseudoTV Addon: Virtual EPG and TV Channel Surfing Script - EGOvoruhk - 2013-12-01

Never said it was an easy feature request Wink


RE: [RELEASE] PseudoTV Addon: Virtual EPG and TV Channel Surfing Script - johnnie.it - 2013-12-01

Guys, please, there's no need to fight Smile
I came up with an idea that was the best way to improve my experience with pseudotv, and I proposed because I thought that 1) it wouldn't take much time or effort to implement and 2) other people would find use for that.
Someone mentioned it was quite easy, but frankly I wouldn't know where to start, or I'd done that myself.
If someone could develop a "patch" of this kind I'd love to take advantage of that, but if it's not possible, well...I've lived for a few years without it, I can carry on.

(2013-11-30, 21:15)Lunatixz Wrote: So a servers HDD should spin down?

I'm glad you don't run any servers I access...

Plan simple fact! Server HDD should not spin down...

Didn't say it was ideal but its the truth. For practical reasons of course you want unused equipment to sleep... But then don't have issue with the fact that it takes time to spin up a drive.

Simple truth... Sleeping HDD takes time to wakeup, have issues with the time it takes?... His configuration is wrong!
Lunatix I'm sorry you have to hear that from me, but...ever heard of nearline and tiered storage? Because it's exactly the case for this kind of file server.
I do work with SAN, object storage, storage virtualization and intelligent data management devices every day, and I assure you that not everybody is doing big data analytics using GPFS on a DS8000 system. Even enterprise systems do spin down their disks. That's actually one of the best selling points for all the new(ish) Dell 12g servers offering, for instance. Mind the environment. Green is the new black!
Bottom line: it's not an issue, it's a choice, a compromise. I thought it wouldn't be that hard to have a solution for that, is all.
Damn, I just want to watch a couple of tv shows episodes in a row, I don't think that should require a Compellent flash storage system.

That said, again, the idea to load a banner for the next episode is quite nice indeed.
Just like actual "coming up next..." banners on TV, if one could also add some kind of after effect (but see, NOW I know I'm asking for a lot Smile ).
Of course that would mean that the artwork should reside on the same disk as the episode itself, and it's not always the case.
How about just looking up some metadata from the file? IDK, for example its duration, as spanktastic2120 suggested? Sounds simple enough to me (though, as I already said, I'm not that programming-savvy).
For other use cases (like changing channel), well...when you (or anybody else) come up with an idea that is simple enough to implement, well, that problem will be solved too.

But anyway, if it can't be done, it simply can't be done. Enough. I never intended to start a flame. Angel
And sorry for the long post. Here's a potato for the inconvenience I caused.
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