SageMC on SageTV Mac (yup!)

[dflachbart]

Originally Posted by soccerdad

Anybody successfully using the new SageMC 6.3.8a on a Mac? If so, which Java version does Sage report using?

I've installed the latest Java update, and put 1.6 at the top of the priorities list in the Java control panel. Sage still using 1.5. The latest SageMC apparently requires 1.6.

Try these jar files, I recompiled them with 1.5 (they are also now included in the full download file).

Dirk

[soccerdad]

Wow, thanks Dirk. The recompiled files work with Java 1.5.

Thank You !!!!

[sandor]

..just tested it out here at work on a fresh sage install - took about 3 minutes to get everything in the right places and fired up..

awesome.

[KingPumpkin]

Thanks for the hints. Got the updates working on OSX now thanks to the 1.5 JARS previously posted.

One thing continues to plague me, however. The imdb lookup recently broke and an update was posted here:
http://forums.sagetv.com/forums/show...&postcount=344

I'm still struggling to get it to work. Now I'm wondering if this JAR has a similar issue on OSX. Can someone please post a 1.5 version with the fix mentioned? or is there another workaround?

Thanks in advance.


UPDATE

I downloaded the code from sourceforge and made the change that flashbacck made in the post above. I have compiled it with Java 1.5, and now it seems to work flawlessly in OSX 10.5.6, SageTV 6.5.4, and SageMC 6.3.8a. I've zipped up the JAR file and attached it to this post.

[MCE-Refugee]

I followed the instructions given by wkoperwhats in post #11 but have produced the same result as seen by mcbrems i.e. It opened up with the SageMC menu text/buttons that I recognized from screenshots, but there was nothing other than white menu text on a black background.

I did not try loading Java 6 as flachbar indicated that SageMC is now built for Java 1.5 but just copied the files from SageMC zip file into the appropriate directories.

BTW Does anyone know why are there Windows .dll files included in SageMC. If they do something for SageMC on the Windows version where are the necessary files for the Mac version?

[mikejaner]

Originally Posted by MCE-Refugee

I followed the instructions given by wkoperwhats in post #11 but have produced the same result as seen by mcbrems i.e. It opened up with the SageMC menu text/buttons that I recognized from screenshots, but there was nothing other than white menu text on a black background.

I did not try loading Java 6 as flachbar indicated that SageMC is now built for Java 1.5 but just copied the files from SageMC zip file into the appropriate directories.

BTW Does anyone know why are there Windows .dll files included in SageMC. If they do something for SageMC on the Windows version where are the necessary files for the Mac version?

This happens on Windows also if you don't have the latest Java installed. SageTV does only require 1.4 or 1.5, but I am pretty sure SageMC requires 1.6

[MCE-Refugee]

I have tried loading Java 6 & still get the same white text on a black screen.

Please could anyone who is running SageMC on Mac Client give me the secret of success or at least confirm the versions of SageMC, OS X, SageTV, Java etc that they are using & the setup method.

[bcjenkins]

I don't believe Java 1.6 is available on the Mac in 32-bit. This is what you need.

B

[MCE-Refugee]

Originally Posted by bcjenkins

I don't believe Java 1.6 is available on the Mac in 32-bit. This is what you need.

B

That's right it's 64-bit only. Sp does this mean that SageMC is now unavailable for the Mac? The Java 1.5 jars in earlier posts are not for the current version of SageMC but I had thought that flachbar's comment "Try these jar files, I recompiled them with 1.5 (they are also now included in the full download file)." meant that a Java 1.5 version was included with the SageMC release.

What needs to be done to get this working on the Mac & keep it working? Obviously it was working a few months ago but clearly is not working for me now. Is it just the 32/64-bit Java 6 issue?

[MeInMaui]

There is a separate zip file in the full SageMC download that contains the jars compiled for Java v1.5. The ones installed by default are compiled for v1.6. The latest SageMC jar file is v6.3.8. There have been no updates to the jars since then. HTH

Aloha,
Mike

[MCE-Refugee]

I just loaded the 3 jar files from the full version zip file & now have SageMC working more or less. Some better (any?) documentation would help Mac users of SageMC. It's looking good though after the struggle to get it working so thanks everyone.

There is just one thing. As this is the first chance that I got to see SageMC I don't know if this is normal but there doesn't appear to be any 'Back' graphic in the top left hand corner of the screen like a "<" on regular SageTV. I can click on where the graphic should be & return to the previous screen though so should there be a graphic there? I was confused at first as there appeared to be no way to return from e.g. My TV or Play DVD to the main screen once that selection had been made.

[bcjenkins]

Originally Posted by MCE-Refugee

That's right it's 64-bit only. Sp does this mean that SageMC is now unavailable for the Mac? The Java 1.5 jars in earlier posts are not for the current version of SageMC but I had thought that flachbar's comment "Try these jar files, I recompiled them with 1.5 (they are also now included in the full download file)." meant that a Java 1.5 version was included with the SageMC release.

What needs to be done to get this working on the Mac & keep it working? Obviously it was working a few months ago but clearly is not working for me now. Is it just the 32/64-bit Java 6 issue?

SageTV is a 32-bit java app. It only runs inside the 32-bit JVM, which means 1.5 for Mac.

B

[MeInMaui]

Originally Posted by MCE-Refugee

I just loaded the 3 jar files from the full version zip file & now have SageMC working more or less. Some better (any?) documentation would help Mac suers of SageMC. It's looking good though after the struggle to get it working so thanks everyone.

There is just one thing. As this is the first chance that I got to see SageMC I don't know if this is normal but there doesn't appear to be any 'Back' graphic in the top left hand corner of the screen like a "<" on regular SageTV. I can click on where the graphic should be & return to the previous screen though so should there be a graphic there? I was confused at first as there appeared to be no way to return from e.g. My TV or Play DVD to the main screen once that selection had been made.

Glad you got it working. SageMC does not have any mouse-specific icons. The spot in the upper left corner is supposed to be invisible. I behaves as a back button in all screens except the main menu, where it toggles full screen.

For better mouse support, I suggest checking out my touchscreen plugin. I have a more comprehensive toolbar plugin as well, but that still needs to be updated to support the latest version of SageMC. HTH

Aloha,
Mike

[merneric]

First off, sorry for resurrecting an older thread, but my problems seem to be directly related to this one, so I thought I would post here.

Right now I am currently running SageTV Media Center Mac version 6.6.1 on a Power Mac G5 running OS X 10.5.8, so no 64 bit option for me, and as has been discussed, there is no 32bit version of Java 1.6 available for Leopard, and Snow Leopard is not an option as it is not an intel machine.

I installed Sage MC using the awesome instructions per this guide, and carefully copied over the three SageMC Jars that were recompiled in Java 1.5. It works great! Except for one small problem, I cannot get DVD profiler to work. I have come to rely on DVDProfiler, as it lets me have much more tighter control of MPAA ratings for my movies, and I use this to try to parental control our Sage Boxes throughout the house. In my experience, the other metadata miners just do not do a reliable enough of a job in obtaining the proper US MPAA ratings. Now, you are probably wondering how I could even use DVD profiler with a Mac, but its pretty simple, as I just run a windows session in VMWare Fusion, and then share the drive that the DVD Profiler info is stored in, and then point the directories in SageMC to that shared drive. I know this works, because I actually had it up and running on an intel mac, that was running snow leopard, which DOES run Java 1.6 in 32bit. On this set up, the DVD Profiler metadata import worked perfectly! Not to mention, that I did not have to run the Java 1.5 jars, I just installed all the regular default 1.6 jars instead. Unfortunately though, Snow Leopard and SageTV do not, at this time play well together (this is pretty well documented over in the SageTV Mac forums) and I am not really able to run a reliable SageTV Server on Snow Leopard, and besides, I would really like to put my PowerMac G5 to some good use anyway.

Now, I know that the DVDprofiler import depends on a certain java class, called DVDPro2Sage.class, so I guess the questions I have for the SageMC/Java experts out there are:

1. Do you know if the DVDPro2Sage.class is Java 1.6 or 1.5? Or is there such a difference in java classes vs Jars?

2. If so, do you think that by recompiling this particular class into Java 1.5 might solve the problem?

3. Besides the three Jars that were recompiled to Java 1.5 (df_sageutils.jar, mailcheck.jar, sagemc.jar), are there some other jars in SageMC that are in Java 1.6 that may interact with DVD Profiler that if also recompiled to Java 1.5 might solve my problem?


Thanks!

[merneric]

Well, I guess I'll reply to my own post...I know this is an old thread, and that most people here probably aren't running macs anyway, but I thought I would add this for good measure.

As stated in previous post, I run Windows 7 on a VMware fusion instance on one of my macs in order to run comskip and DVD Profiler, so after I read a post from gplasky, I realized that I may as well run an instance of SageTV Windows client on the VMware machine as well. (I had a registered copy of this from when I was still running everything on windows exclusively). Anyway, I installed that along with SageMC, and then ran the DVD-Profiler metadata update on that, which inturn updated the Wiz.bin file on my main SageTV Mac server. So now, I get the best of both worlds. SageTV Mac server, along with the updated DVD Profiler info that I was wanting. The only thing that does not work is even though the folder .jpgs work fine in folder view, for some reason they do not pop up in the metadata view, which I think must be called up by the java 1.6 class/jar that will not work in OS 10.5. That is a minor issue though, so I am quite happy with how the current setup works...

[Silky1]

I'm curious as to what tunner(s) you have attached to your Mac Server? I recently moved from PC to MAC and want to continue running Sage MC. My Hauppauge tuner card is not recognized by MAC and thus not visible to the VM. I'm thinking that I could get a WinPVR that is compatible with MAC and have it accessible to my VM Fusion.

I'd like to avoid purchasing another copy of Sage MC for MAC when I have an active PC license.

[merneric]

Silky1 - Probably the best place to discuss that would be over in the SageTV Mac forums. If you post your Q there you will get more replies from SageTV Mac users than just me.

But to go ahead and answer your question, my setup consists of 2 HD Homerun tuners (for a total of 4 ATSC tuners) and 3 set-top boxes (Motorola DCH-3200's) connected via firewire, using guho's AWESOME sagetv mac network firewire encoder. I had/have 2 HD-PVR's that I played around with when I had my windows box, but they just were not reliable enough for me. It is possible to run them as a network encoder on a windows client, and then have your main server as mac tho. Again, I played around with that, but since I am lucky enough to get all my HD channels via firewire, I have been doing that and haven't looked back. As for analog tuners that are mac compatible or non-US tuners, I do not have any experience with those.

As for your setup, a couple of comments/suggestions.

First, I don't know if it was just a typo on your part, but just in case not, you know that Sage MC is just an add-on to SageTV, so that when you say you do not want to by another SageMC license, I think you mean another (Mac) SageTV Media server license.

Second, if all you want to do is run your windows SageTV on your mac via VMware just to save on buying the mac license, then yes, you might have problems getting the tuners set up properly with the virtual machine. The reason I switched from PC to mac for Sage, is that my PC machine was not stable at all. It would frequently freeze up, drop recordings, etc. Now I know ALOT of people have very stable PC machines running SageTV, and that's fine, and I'm sure my problem was hardware/driver related, but I just got tired of continually messing around with it, and when I moved to mac, I just did not have the same stability issues. So my main SageTV server is running on a genuine mac with a SageTV mac license, and is rock solid. I would be hesitant to run my main SageTV server within a VMware instance tho. Again, the only reason I am running a windows client in VM is just so I can get the DVDProfiler import to update my wiz.bin database.

Finally, you didn't really specify what kind of tuners you are interested in, be it analog or digital. If all you need is digital, then you just can't beat the HD Homeruns as they are equally well supported on the PC and Mac.

Hope that helps, and again, if you need more info, check out the SageTV mac forums...

[mcbrems]

I also just purchased an HD Homerun because my EyeTV Hybrid (Hauppage 950) took a dump. I can't stress how happy I am with it. It records 2 OTA streams simultaneously, and the Sage TV EPG and scheduler works flawlessly. It just looks for the tuner that is open and begins recording. On top of that I can also be simultaneously watching a previously recorded program. As a result I now have more shows on my FW drive than I can keep up with.

One issue I have noticed with the HDHR is a glitch in the video about a half minute into the recording. It is about a half-second patch of severe blockiness that immediately disappears. I have verified it is in the file, and not a playback artifact. I need to gain more experience with it to determine exactly when it is happening, since I am usually not watching the stream while it is recording. It will take some concerted observation to narrow it down.

Still waiting for the Snow Leopard dust to settle a little bit before migrating.

Laterz,
MB


**UPDATE - Just discovered that the blocking happens at exactly 30 seconds into any recording. It is less pronounced when the action on-screen is less busy, and it is usually local to the area of the frame where the most action is happening. It is more pronounced when the second tuner is active and a second program is also writing to the drive. Don't know why, but it happens at 30 seconds in every file on my mini.

**UPDATE 2 - I have an open ticket with SageTV support and learned that the SageTV app sends the HDHR tuners a command at exactly 30secs to filter packets, reducing traffic. This is surely the cause of the blocking at 30secs. I will need to again go to SiliconDust online and confirm I have the latest firmware update.

**UPDATE 3 - I browsed to SiliconDust and downloaded the current Mac OSX firmware update for the HDHR (which is hdhomerun_mac_20091024.dmg). Blocking still persists at 30 secs into any recording.


Keywords: HD Homerun, HDHomerun, Mac, OSX, MacMini, Mac Mini

[mcbrems]

Originally Posted by MeInMaui

There is a separate zip file in the full SageMC download that contains the jars compiled for Java v1.5. The ones installed by default are compiled for v1.6. The latest SageMC jar file is v6.3.8. There have been no updates to the jars since then. HTH

Aloha,
Mike

Success at last! I'm going to recap here in a way that compiles all of the crucial info
scattered across this thread for myself and anybody else that might benefit.

I installed SageMC_6_9_3a over SageTV_6_6_1, went to Detailed Settings/Advanced,
switched over to SageMC_169.xml, and I would see the exact behavior that has been
reported in this thread before (black screen with white text, slightly whiter text when
in focus, and erratic button behavior).

As I understand now, the most recent version of SageMC has been compiled in Java 1.6.
Sage is a 32bit Java app, and unfortunately, the latest Java 1.6 for OSX only runs in 64bit.
So Mac users are stuck still using the older Java version 1.5, which supports 32bit mode.
Fortunately, flachbar has graciously provided SageMC jars compiled in Java 1.5 for 32 bit
operation, which will make SageMC compatible with OSX when copied into SageTV jar folder.

(jars provided here: http://forums.sagetv.com/forums/atta...0&d=1228691779).

Look for the Java Preferences app in the OSX Applications/Utilities folder that shows
you which Java versions you have installed, and what pecking order you want them in.
If you're going to run SageMC in 32 bit in Leopard, just make sure you have Java 1.5
installed (not sure if it needs to be at the top of the list, but somebody else may know).

More on that here: http://www.metaphoriclabs.com/articl...6-on-mac-os-x/

Cheers,
MB