Utility: ShowAnalyzer Beta

[Jere_Jones]

Originally Posted by oshapir

Can NOT go to your Web Site and upgrade - it was hacked

Please check it...

Oren.

As you can imagine, I am WAY not happy about this. I am investigating.

Thanks geogecko!

Jere

[Jere_Jones]

All is back to normal now. Thanks to everyone that let me know something was amiss.

Jere

[Jere_Jones]

0.9.5 - 4 April 2008
- Fixed crash when no audio could be found.
- Fixed error in closed captions when Erase Displayed Memory is transmitted instead of Erase Nondisplayed Memory.
- Fixed crash when an undefined PES extension is used in a transport stream.

Enjoy,
Jere

[toricred]

Has anybody gotten this new version working. When I install it it won't process an mpg and Schoolhouse presents a "Bad Allocation" error and won't launch. I want to make sure it's not just my system.

Edit: Jere fixed the download. It works perfectly now. Thank you , thank you , thank you for a great product.

[davidk21770]

There seems to be a web site problem. When I try to download from the showanalyzer page, I get "The requested URL /downloads/index.php was not found on this server." and when I try to download from the main page I get "PHCDownload Database Error; Could not make a connection to the server; Lost connection to MySQL server during query (MySQL error no; 2013)"

Edit -- Thanks. Got it later

[Jere_Jones]

They are rebooting the server (so they tell me). Give it a couple minutes.

Jere

[Jere_Jones]

0.9.6 - 13 April 2008
- Fixed bug in closed caption decoder. (This was causing a LOT of crashes on SD recordings)
- Added option to force ShowAnalyzer to conform to the SchoolHouse's quirks. That way if you have good detection in the SchoolHouse, but not in ShowAnalyzer you can get the exact same results.
- Fixed bug in settings file parser.

Enjoy,
Jere

[DIBU]

sorry, but with all the new versions i have this problem:

when SA comes to a file from my dbox (digital cabel mpeg), SA do nothing..i cant stop SA (only over the taskmanager)..SA stay in front and nothing 0%.

i mean: SA bring the windows, SA will analyze and than SA stand..

Comskip have not this problem. What can i do?

[Jere_Jones]

Originally Posted by DIBU

sorry, but with all the new versions i have this problem:

when SA comes to a file from my dbox (digital cabel mpeg), SA do nothing..i cant stop SA (only over the taskmanager)..SA stay in front and nothing 0%.

i mean: SA bring the windows, SA will analyze and than SA stand..

Comskip have not this problem. What can i do?

Do I understand you right that SA will successfully analyze the file but not close when it is done?

Jere

[davidk21770]

I just updated to the lastest version of SA and I now get the following in the commandline window:

Mon Apr-14 15:12 $ Eli Stone 080410.mpg -- (Copy of default.ini)
"C:\Program Files\Dragon Global\ShowAnalyzer\Settings\global.ini" (1,0) : error: unknown variable "version" found in Ini file
version = 0.9.6.289
^
"C:\Program Files\Dragon Global\ShowAnalyzer\Settings\global.ini" (2,0) : error: unknown variable "preventStandby" found in Ini file
preventStandby = 0
^
"C:\Program Files\Dragon Global\ShowAnalyzer\Settings\global.ini" (3,0) : error: unknown variable "threadPriority" found in Ini file
threadPriority = BELOW_NORMAL
^
"C:\Program Files\Dragon Global\ShowAnalyzer\Settings\global.ini" (17,0) : error: unknown variable "throttleSpeedLimit" found in Ini file
throttleSpeedLimit = 0
^
"C:\Program Files\Dragon Global\ShowAnalyzer\Settings\global.ini" (19,0) : error: unknown variable "liveHoldOff" found in Ini file
liveHoldOff = 0
^
"C:\Program Files\Dragon Global\ShowAnalyzer\Settings\global.ini" (20,0) : error: unknown variable "dvrmsToolbox" found in Ini file
dvrmsToolbox = 0
^
"C:\Program Files\Dragon Global\ShowAnalyzer\Settings\global.ini" (21,0) : error: unknown variable "dvrmsToolboxDir" found in Ini file
dvrmsToolboxDir =
^
"C:\Program Files\Dragon Global\ShowAnalyzer\Settings\global.ini" (23,0) : error: unknown variable "defaultoutFPS" found in Ini file
defaultoutFPS = 0
^
"C:\Program Files\Dragon Global\ShowAnalyzer\Settings\global.ini" (24,0) : error: unknown variable "edl" found in Ini file
edl = 2
^
"C:\Program Files\Dragon Global\ShowAnalyzer\Settings\global.ini" (26,0) : error: unknown variable "vprjSceneMarkers" found in Ini file
vprjSceneMarkers = 0
^
"C:\Program Files\Dragon Global\ShowAnalyzer\Settings\global.ini" (27,0) : error: unknown variable "vprjAbsPath" found in Ini file
vprjAbsPath = 1
^
"C:\Program Files\Dragon Global\ShowAnalyzer\Settings\global.ini" (33,0) : error: unknown variable "aspectRatios" found in Ini file
aspectRatios = 0
^
"C:\Program Files\Dragon Global\ShowAnalyzer\Settings\global.ini" (37,0) : error: unknown variable "srtEncoding" found in Ini file
srtEncoding = 16
^
"C:\Program Files\Dragon Global\ShowAnalyzer\Settings\global.ini" (38,0) : error: unknown variable "subEncoding" found in Ini file
subEncoding = 16
^
"C:\Program Files\Dragon Global\ShowAnalyzer\Settings\global.ini" (39,0) : error: unknown variable "smiEncoding" found in Ini file
smiEncoding = 16
^

I thought that global.ini got refreshed at each update?

(AND, Thanks for a great program! )

[Jere_Jones]

All of those can be ignored if they don't stop it from running.

Jere

[DIBU]

Originally Posted by Jere_Jones

Do I understand you right that SA will successfully analyze the file but not close when it is done?

Jere

no. SA open the file..SA will beginn..SA stand.. 0 Frames..NO EDL File is generated.

This is ONLY on my dbox-mpegs

[Jere_Jones]

DIBU,

I'm sending you a PM.

Jere

[Andrew54]

SA has been using 25% - 32% of CPU usage even though I have SA set to 7%. In DirMon I only use one instance.

One of the things I have tried to reduce CPU usage is to change the setting to 4% but it still stayed high. With SageTV using a good deal of CPU usage and now SA using a good deal CPU then things begin to slow up on the computer.

Any suggestions?

Thanks,
Andrew

XP SP2
1 gig of RAM
Pentium 4 3400 Mhz
40% of free hard drive space (200gigs free)
I'm using the version I registered - ShowAnalyzer - Version 0.9.6.289

[geogecko]

I've noticed the same thing. I have mine set to 12%, with 4 instances, and had to throttle that back to just 2 instances because it was causing problems. I would see spikes up to 34%, and sometimes higher.

XP SP2
2G RAM
AMD X2 Dual Core 4200+
Using the latest version of SA, 0.9.6

[Jere_Jones]

Limiting to a certain CPU percentage is really unreliable, especially in multi cpu environments. And it is quite useless. Let me explain. Windows has gotten really good at how it schedules processes for CPU time. More important processes get CPU time while less important processes have to wait. Only when the more important processes don't need any CPU time do the "lower" process get to use the CPU. There are exceptions to this rule, but by and large, that is how Windows works.

So, as long as ShowAnalyzer is set to a very low priority (which it is by default), it shouldn't interfere with anything else and limiting its CPU access is only wasting time.

One of the important exceptions to this rule is disk access. A low priority process that is constantly accessing the drive (by reading and/or writing) can slow the system down quite a bit. Anytime your system is sluggish, but the CPU meter is low, this is what is going on. The page file is famous for this. When a process has to "page in" or "page out" that is a lot of disk access that excludes almost everything else.

What can we determine from this?

• One is that memory makes a difference. If you are running your computer with it needing more memory used than you have then almost anything can bring your computer to a stand still. The solution is simple: Get some more memory.
• The other, equally important, determination is that disk access counts. When you are running 4 instances of SA, then you are reading a LOT at once. Remember that we are typically dealing with huge files that tend to be heavily fragmented. And while it isn't so important that you are reading a large number of bytes as it is important that you are reading a large number of bytes that are scattered across the drive and that means much seeking. If you are running those instances during the time that they are recording, then you are also writing a LOT. If you have SA writting logs then it is also trying to write to the disk frequently. The solution is even simpler: Limit SA's access to the disk. The setting is under Global->Settings->Misc.

I have already made the CPU limiter as accurate as it can be. Unfortunately, there is no API for limiting it. I have to take measurements, wait, take measurements, adjust the wait time and wait, take measurements, adjust the wait time and wait, etc.

My recommendation is to try limiting the disk access and see if that helps.

Jere

[m1abrams]

I just tried accesses your site and I get redirected to: http://host172.canaca.com/suspended.page/

[Jere_Jones]

I am so bloody tired of canaca! I'm working on it. You can try www.dragonglobal.biz

The forums aren't up, but everything else is there.

Jere

[Andrew54]

What number do you recommend starting at for "limit disk access"? With a number I can then monitor the CPU usage and go from there.

Thanks, Andrew

Originally Posted by Jere_Jones

If you have SA writting logs then it is also trying to write to the disk frequently. The solution is even simpler: Limit SA's access to the disk. The setting is under Global->Settings->Misc.[/LIST]I have already made the CPU limiter as accurate as it can be. Unfortunately, there is no API for limiting it. I have to take measurements, wait, take measurements, adjust the wait time and wait, take measurements, adjust the wait time and wait, etc.

My recommendation is to try limiting the disk access and see if that helps.

Jere

[Jere_Jones]

Originally Posted by Andrew54

What number do you recommend starting at for "limit disk access"? With a number I can then monitor the CPU usage and go from there.

Thanks, Andrew

I can't recommend a number. It depends on the speed of your hard drive, the bit rate of your recording, how many recordings you're making at once, are you watching the show, etc, etc... There are a large number of variables.

However, having said that. I would start at 1 megabyte a second (enter 1000000) and increase or decrease as you wish/need.

Jere