BeyondTV 4 Channel Change through Girder 4 & GlobalCache

[nurowolf]

Hi All,

Has anybody had any success using Girder 4 to do Channel changes on a set-top box from Beyond TV.

If so, can you please advise how you achieved it.

Thanks a bunch
Nuro

[Promixis]

How does BTV send the events to G4?

[nurowolf]

It uses a 3rd party product called SSGirderTuner.DLL

I have included the files in the attached ZIP.

This was designed for Dirder 3.3 and BeyondTV prior to v4

I haven't had much luck with the CSEVENT.EXE and GBPVR for channel changing - so have been looking at what else is out there that supports multiple tuners.

[Promixis]

are you getting the channel change events into Girder?

ie can you see them in the logger?

[nurowolf]

Hi Mike

For BeyondTV - no - I am getting nothing through to Girder hence the original post.

For GBPVR. Yes and No.

For the GBPVR scenario I must use CSEVENT.exe as GBPVR makes use of a different user to do background recording. The scenario I get is as follows

a) Start GBPVR and select channel from Guide [no message sent to Girder and therefore no channel change]

b) Change channel within LiveTV on GBPVR - receives event but sometimes wrong message. For example change to channel 25. This sends event to girder called 25, however on occassion Girder only receives event 2 (the 5 disappears). Since this is an invalid channel on the cable box - the Channel is not changed and the wrond program is recorded.

This was all working great with Meedio - except that meedio only supports 1 line-up and I have 3 TV cards each with different line-ups - hence my problem.

Thnaks for the help

Cheers
Nuro

[Promixis]

so GBPVR sends a channel change event to CSEVENT which sends it to G4's Comserver?

with what params are you calling CSEVENT?

[nurowolf]

csevent.exe localhost 1024 girder {channel} 18

where {channel} is replaced by GBPVR with the requested channel number without brackets.

GBPVR resides on the same machine as Girder.

Also I am having troubles with ComServer and my NVidia firewall. I need to turn off the firewall to allow csevent.exe to work.

I have even expressly enabled all communications through 1024 and allowed CSEVENT.EXE internet access - but no joy. Would very much like to just use EVENT.EXE - that seem to be a better choice for same machine config - but alas GBPVR doesn't support it.

[Promixis]

i am wondering why the channel isn't coming across right. this shouldn't happen with csevent. i am thinking that gbpvr is dropping the ball. is there anyway to track exactly what it is sending?

[nurowolf]

I will post on the GBPVR site to see if there is anyway of logging what happens on channel changes and get back to you.

[Promixis]

I will post on the GBPVR site to see if there is anyway of logging what happens on channel changes and get back to you.

Ok

[nurowolf]

Ok Mike

I found the logs for GBPVR. Sure enough, it records in the log that it always makes a call to the 'External Channel Changer' (in this case CSEVENT.EXE), and always passess the correct channel number. This is the case for both LiveTV channel changes & Scheduled Recording Channel Changes.

LIVETV---------
It would seem that my issue here is one of timing. Girder does receive the messages from CSEVENT.EXE - however the issue seems to be related to my sending commands to GlobalCache. Sometimes the numbers seem to be sent to close together that the GlobalCache Device dumps the second digit. So this 1 I can work on.

Scheduled Recording
--------------------------
Girder Never receives and messages from CSEVENT.EXE in this instance. For the life of me I can not work out why.
GBPVR makes use of the 'localsystem' account to call CSEVENT.EXE - so this should work.
I have no firewalls active
- Windows Firewall is switched off
- NVidia Firewall is switched off.
I do have a firewall on my Network, but since this is making a call to the localhost - it shouldn't get to that firewall at all.

I have included a link to my GBPVR post if that helps.
http://forums.gbpvr.com/showthread.php?p=83512&posted=1#post83512

[Promixis]

can you confirm that when recording, the event is fired?

do you have the g4 comserver enabled and using port 1024 <- note the default port is 20005

[nurowolf]

Hi Mike

I am at work at the moment. What I can confirm is this

a) Port is set to 1024 to Com server. This is confiremed because liveTV uses exactly the same command as scheduled Record. Only difference is the user account making the call.

b) I can confirm that GBPVR is registering that a call was made to the CSEVENT.exe for scheduled record. Currently I cannot confirm if that was successful

c) On last look - the Girder logger was not recording an event received. But I will check again when I get home (in about 6 hours)

[x53]

I have the same problem as nurowolf (with Beyond TV).

I am using Beyond TV version 4. Nurowolf, is that also the version you are trying to use?

Since SSGirderTuner.dll as already pointed out is targeting pre-Girder 4, the registry changes (given in file "Channel Range Setup (edit before loading).reg") are targeting:
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\girder3\Plugins\SSGird erTuner]
Just FYI, I also tried to use:
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Promixis\Girder\4\Plug ins\SSGirderTuner]
But it is the same result: Girder does not receive any events from SSGirderTuner.

What I am trying to say is that "post-Girder 3.x" is one aspect of "Beyond TV -> SSGirderTuner -> Girder" not working, but so is "post-Beyond TV 3.x".

So let me ask: have anybody out there had luck with the combination: "Beyond TV 4 -> SSGirderTuner-v0.7 -> Girder 3.x"?

Thanks!

[nurowolf]

X53 - Yes it is with BeyondTV V4 that I am having troubles.

I tired with SSGirderTuner and another External channel changer from the Snapstream web sites. Niether worked

[nurowolf]

Mike - I did some more testing with GBPVR and here are my results using CSEVENT>EXE

a) Using an actual address
Instead of using localhost I tired using the actual IP address of the local machine. For some reason this didn't work at all. Girder got the message, however the port was wrong.
Messages sent:

csevent 192.168.1.114 1024 girder 11 18
where 11 is the channel number

The result was a refused connection.

b) Using Localhost addressAs above, except address was localhost

The result was connection was authenticated. However the Netremote plugin was enabled and this seemed to take over - so no message was sent to my external box for channel change.

c) Localhost & NetRemote Plugin Disabled
Success! Channel Changes for scheduled recording
No idea why. And this is going to be a problem going forward as I intend to take advantage of the NetRemote functionality on my PDA and then later web tablet.
------
This testing was done will all other background processes deactivated. Now I will reactivate meedio and see how we go.

Cheers
Nuro

[Ron]

edit: removed.

[Ron]

First make sure that the port address is set correctly on all computers.
The make sure there is no firewall blocking that port/service.

Testing here, the events go through no matter if the netremote stuff is enabled.

[tscales]

Why do you need Girder? BTV controls the set-top through the USB-UIRT just fine without Girder. Girder can share the USB-UIRT for other devices. That's the way I have it setup.

Tom

[tscales]

Oops. I was thinking the USB-UIRT and you said Global Cache.

[nurowolf]

Have done further testing

The Comserver is working fine. It seems that I am having issues with Girder to Global Cache communication. So GB-PVR is communicating as expected with Girder.

On the girder to GlobalCache - Sometimes it works fine. Sometimes it doesn't. When it doesn't it seems to be only receiving one digit instead of the 2 digits that I sent it.

It seems to be more problematic when I haven't sent a signal to the GC for a while - so am going to try a script that enables / disables the girder plugin as part of the communication process. See if that helps.

[Ron]

see http://www.promixis.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=13632

[nurowolf]

Ron - that is funny. That is my other thread. So you just gave me a circular reference.

:D

I have done some further testing and a few modifications.

I have written a cript that takes the payload from the CSEVENT.exe communications and parses it for channel information (found out the hard way that it is PLD2 that you use with CSEVENT.EXE)

CSEVENT is on the same PC as the GIRDER SERVER, I use CSEVENT as the GBPVR program scheduled recording under a different user ID - making it impossible to use EVENT.exe.

I am disabled all possible programs that could interfere and I still get intermittent problems. I have confirmed that GBPVR is always calling the CSEVENT program. And I have confirmed that GIRDER is always receiving it. However sometimes the GlobalCache does not seem to send the IR (even though my log says the message was sent).

I am still testing and will post notes as I go. Another point though is that the SendIR seems to be a little bit more reliable than the SendCF function in the treescript window.

[nurowolf]

OK - I have attached a screenshot to help identify the problem. Now these are the know issues I have
1) Girder registers message sent to GlobalCache - but IR not triggered by GlobalCache

2) CSEVENT received by comserver, but event not triggered.
This is the one that is really frustratimng me. This is the one I have attached a screenshot for.

CSEVENT ISSUE
I successfully send an event and payload to Girder using CSEVENT. Then I try again and I get the following issue.

If you look at pictures - the 2 square gotogether showing command executed and resulting log in GIRDER LOGGER. This was the successful one


Then look at the 2 circles. The logger shows communication received, however the LUA script associated with the event is not triggered.

I have no idea how to troubleshoot this.

[Ron]

Then honestly you have lost me. Sounds like there are 2 problems going on. That is hard to diagnose. Can you focus on one problem and let's try to solve that first. how about the trouble with the CSEVENT tool.

Try using that by triggering a script with this code:



print&#40;'csevent received'&#41;


then test that so that you are sure this is always triggered or not. If this is not one of the problem you are having please do explain both problem separate from eachother.

[Rob H]

A couple of points -

1) I don't see the itest event in the logger

2) The Lua console is showing a stack traceback - what is the error message?

[nurowolf]

Rah99 - that is the point

the itest event is not triggered. The CSEVENT.EXE is received, but the second one does not trigger the associated event. That is my current problem.

[nurowolf]

Ron - will create new threads to be more clear.

Cheers
Nuro

[Ron]

Thanks.

[Rob H]

Rah99 - that is the point

the itest event is not triggered. The CSEVENT.EXE is received, but the second one does not trigger the associated event. That is my current problem.
What I meant is that I don't see the word 'itest' in the logger which I would have expected

[nurowolf]

Rah99

1) Yep I agree - itest was expected to be logged. That is what I am troubleshooting.


2) The error in the logger - that was caused by another plugin
refer http://www.promixis.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=13855&sid=eb5eda3ddd9f4cb5ac9b79f688ca123a and apprently it is harmless.