Questions about customizing and using SageTV

[mskitty666]

I love SageTV but there are a few things that are very frustrating for me.

1. Is there a way to have the Favorites listed alphabetically, by channel etc? If I make the favorites list alphabetical manually, then my recording priorities are wrong. I just want to be able to have different views of the favorites without affecting priority.
2. Is there a way to have different tiers of recording priorities? For example, All my must see shows could have the same priority and SageTV would use some rules to determine what to record in case of conflicts without having to always have every show either higher or lower than any other.
3. The recordings area is driving me insane! Why can't I use grouping and sorting together? If I choose to group by category and sort by title, what I would like to see is the categories on the main page, but when I select one see all the shows with one title together (Crime- CSI, NCIS; Comedy- Chuck, Ugly Betty etc.). Right now I have to suffer with setting both the grouping and sorting to the exact same thing or end up with complete chaos.
4. How can I assign shows to categories manually? I really, really miss being able to assign shows to categories that make sense to me like on my ReplayTV.
5. How do I set up a favorite based on a category and tell SageTV not to record certain shows in that category? For example, I set up favorites for the category Soaps for each of the three networks (too many soaps on other channels I don't watch). I want to be able to edit the favorite Soaps- CBS so that Guiding Light doesn't record at all since I'm not watching it right now. Currently I have to mark all those shows as don't like ( even though I do like the show and may want to watch it when a storyline I like airs) and keep deleting the recorded episodes.
6. Is there a way to select multiple recording days and time slots in the advanced options? It seems very dumb that they have every day of the week listed, only let you select one and don't at least have Weekdays & Weekends as options.
7. What's the difference between using themes, STV and STVi? I'm a bit confused on this.
8. My HD playback ranges from jittery to horriffic and unwatchable. I'm still searching the many posts on that topic.

Thanks in advance for any help.

[stanger89]

Originally Posted by mskitty666

I love SageTV but there are a few things that are very frustrating for me.

1. Is there a way to have the Favorites listed alphabetically, by channel etc? If I make the favorites list alphabetical manually, then my recording priorities are wrong. I just want to be able to have different views of the favorites without affecting priority.

Should be theoretically possible in studio if that's what you're asking.

2. Is there a way to have different tiers of recording priorities? For example, All my must see shows could have the same priority and SageTV would use some rules to determine what to record in case of conflicts without having to always have every show either higher or lower than any other.

That's a core feature, that is, the priorities and the handing of, I don't think there's anything you can do to change that.

3. The recordings area is driving me insane! Why can't I use grouping and sorting together? If I choose to group by category and sort by title, what I would like to see is the categories on the main page, but when I select one see all the shows with one title together (Crime- CSI, NCIS; Comedy- Chuck, Ugly Betty etc.). Right now I have to suffer with setting both the grouping and sorting to the exact same thing or end up with complete chaos.

I use the Malore view so I'm not sure what you're getting at, but it's definitely changeable.

4. How can I assign shows to categories manually? I really, really miss being able to assign shows to categories that make sense to me like on my ReplayTV.

You can use the AddShow API call to create a new (or overwrite a current) show with a new one with a user-defined category.

5. How do I set up a favorite based on a category and tell SageTV not to record certain shows in that category? For example, I set up favorites for the category Soaps for each of the three networks (too many soaps on other channels I don't watch). I want to be able to edit the favorite Soaps- CBS so that Guiding Light doesn't record at all since I'm not watching it right now. Currently I have to mark all those shows as don't like ( even though I do like the show and may want to watch it when a storyline I like airs) and keep deleting the recorded episodes.

Here's the smart-@ss answer: Why not just set up a favorite for each of the shows you watch, there aren't that many.

6. Is there a way to select multiple recording days and time slots in the advanced options? It seems very dumb that they have every day of the week listed, only let you select one and don't at least have Weekdays & Weekends as options.

Not really sure. Looks like you can only define one timeslot for a given favorite.

7. What's the difference between using themes, STV and STVi? I'm a bit confused on this.

Themes are just referenced attributes of the stock STV (colors, sizes, font, pictures, etc).

STV is a SageTV interface definition file, it's the file that defines the entire SageTV interface, how it looks, and how it works.

STVi is really a patch for and STV (i stands for import), it's usually meant to add menus or change functionality of the STV it's imported into.

[mskitty666]

Should be theoretically possible in studio if that's what you're asking.

What is studio and where do I find it. I didn't see it in the downloads area.

I use the Malore view so I'm not sure what you're getting at, but it's definitely changeable.

If you're talking about the advanced menu, I like using the regular SageTV, but it doesn't work correctly. This is what happens. I group shows by category in one view. If I decide I feel like watching a scifi show I can just select that category. Great! Here's the problem. Once I select the category, if I choose to sort the shows by anything other than category, everything is all mixed up and impossible to find. Choosing category sort again lists all the shows seperately in alphabetical order. I would like to be able to sort by title, so that all episodes of a show are grouped together within a category.

You can use the AddShow API call to create a new (or overwrite a current) show with a new one with a user-defined category.

I will look for this in the downloads area, Thanks.

Here's the smart-@ss answer: Why not just set up a favorite for each of the shows you watch, there aren't that many.

There are that many and they are set up individually but.... I never watch live tv, well almost never. I also skip commercials. SageTV is so much better at categorizing shows, that using a favorite category is a great way to catch other similar shows I might like. It would just be logical to be able to exclude a few programs I don't want to see rather than have to input over and over all the shows I do want to see. Especially because there are no views in the favorites manager or ability to set recording defaults, I welcome the consolodation.

STV is a SageTV interface definition file, it's the file that defines the entire SageTV interface, how it looks, and how it works.

STVi is really a patch for and STV (i stands for import), it's usually meant to add menus or change functionality of the STV it's imported into.

Does this mean that the the STV stands alone, but the STVi must be used with the correspending STV?

[GKusnick]

Studio comes standard with SageTV. You don't need to download it separately. Press Ctrl+Shift+F12 to open it. But it's really meant for power users and third-party programmers. There's a pretty steep learning curve that may not be appropriate for casual users, and you can mess up Sage with it if you're not careful.

The AddShow API that Stanger refers to is part of the Studio programming interface, not a separate customization tool.

Yes, STVIs must be used with the specific STV for which they're designed.

Regarding question #2, I'm not sure I see the issue. If you have (say) three priority tiers, just put all your tier-1 favorites toward the top of the list, tier-2 stuff in the middle, and tier-3 at the bottom. If you don't care about ordering within the tiers, fine; the fact that Sage does care shouldn't matter to you. Or are you saying you want to specify some other rule to use within each tier?

[mskitty666]

If you have (say) three priority tiers, just put all your tier-1 favorites toward the top of the list, tier-2 stuff in the middle, and tier-3 at the bottom. If you don't care about ordering within the tiers, fine; the fact that Sage does care shouldn't matter to you. Or are you saying you want to specify some other rule to use within each tier

What I'd like to achieve is a way for SageTV to understand the difference between my must see shows and my filler material. With ReplayTV, this was automatic. There were show based recordings and then there were themes. The problem I have with all shows on a hierarchy is that I'm concerned about automatic conflict resolution. Eg. All of my scifi shows are equally important. If I missed Doctor Who or Atlantis or BSG I'd die. There is no way to tell sage all of these shows are equally important and if there's a conflict to notify me first and let me decide what to do. Under the current system one of these shows will always have higher priority than the others and could lead to me missing shows without knowing it until it's too late.

I just wish there was another way to have a show recorded all the time without it being a favorite. Maybe it could be called "Regulars". It would be like favorites, but SageTV would know that favorites are always most important. I never watch live tv so I program a lot of filler shows in addition to my must see shows. Managing the favorites list is very tedious with everything mixed together.

[stanger89]

Originally Posted by mskitty666

What I'd like to achieve is a way for SageTV to understand the difference between my must see shows and my filler material. With ReplayTV, this was automatic. There were show based recordings and then there were themes. The problem I have with all shows on a hierarchy is that I'm concerned about automatic conflict resolution. Eg. All of my scifi shows are equally important. If I missed Doctor Who or Atlantis or BSG I'd die. There is no way to tell sage all of these shows are equally important and if there's a conflict to notify me first and let me decide what to do. Under the current system one of these shows will always have higher priority than the others and could lead to me missing shows without knowing it until it's too late.

No it won't, unless you've told Sage "Always record BSG instead of Atlantis" or "Always ignore conflicts between these shows" it will throw a conflict for you to resolve if it can't record one of them.

[RobJ]

Originally Posted by mskitty666

What I'd like to achieve is a way for SageTV to understand the difference between my must see shows and my filler material. With ReplayTV, this was automatic. There were show based recordings and then there were themes. The problem I have with all shows on a hierarchy is that I'm concerned about automatic conflict resolution. Eg. All of my scifi shows are equally important. If I missed Doctor Who or Atlantis or BSG I'd die. There is no way to tell sage all of these shows are equally important and if there's a conflict to notify me first and let me decide what to do. Under the current system one of these shows will always have higher priority than the others and could lead to me missing shows without knowing it until it's too late.

I just wish there was another way to have a show recorded all the time without it being a favorite. Maybe it could be called "Regulars". It would be like favorites, but SageTV would know that favorites are always most important. I never watch live tv so I program a lot of filler shows in addition to my must see shows. Managing the favorites list is very tedious with everything mixed together.

It's always possible for shows of highest and equal importance to conflict with each other. If Atlantis and BSG occurred at the very same time on different channels for a user with limited tuners (and assuming they didn't die!), it would always be preferable for the user, not SageTV, to make the fateful decision as to which will be missed. As has been stated though, SageTV does raise the conflict flag. Plus, I believe the tiers of importance mentioned above will satisfy your criteria. I believe my own proposal below may be even more satisfactory.

I have wanted for some time to propose an enhancement to the Favorites prioritization, by adding a user-adjustable priority value to each, from 1 to 999 (perhaps preserving 0 for internal use). I would also like to propose a special entry in the Favorites list of 'Manual Recordings', that would allow us to assign the relative priority of Manuals to some of our Favorites. There are many of my Favorites that I would not like any Manual Recording to supersede, and I venture to say that every SageTV user has some shows they don't want anything to bump. I have known ladies who would half kill you if you tried to interfere with recordings of their soaps. Just as a Conflict resolution dialog pops up now if you try to schedule a Manual when too many other Manuals are already scheduled, I would want the same dialog to occur if I tried to schedule a Manual at the same time as a first recording of a very high priority Favorite. There's a reason I have marked many of them as Favorites, and I don't want most Manual recordings bumping them. By using this method, I could adjust the Manual Recordings priority to something like 400, and move my Favorites above and below that value.

Transition should be straight-forward, and preserve existing behavior, by assigning priority of one to Manual Recordings, and numbering the existing Favorites from the top as 100, 101, 102, etc. Everything would still work the same, until we in our own time begin to adjust the Favorites to our own preferences.

The original poster mskitty666 might then set up her SciFi shows in the 100's, perhaps a few other highest priority shows in the 10's, other important shows in the 200's, set Manual Recordings to 400, brand-new-don't-know-if-I'll-like-it shows to the 600's, other less important Favorites to 700's, and those bump-if-ANYTHING-else-is-on shows to the 900's.

If I adjust a priority to the same as an existing, then it will automatically increment the existing and those immediately above. If I have a 101, 102, 103, and 105, and set a new show to 102, then the existing 102 and 103 will become 103 and 104, no other changes.

And the last implementational detail is to set a default priority for new shows. I would suggest 500 (automatically incrementing any current 500 and those immediately above), and that doesn't have to even be configurable. This should be very usable and maintain current behavior, with no new prompts or dialogs. Overall, there would be one new prompt in Favorites Options, plus the addition of sorting options for the Favorites list.

Once the priority is an attribute, then the order of the Favorites is no longer important, and sorting choices can be applied to the Favorites list. It may desirable to sort alphabetically, by category, by priority, by date added, etc.

[GKusnick]

I don't understand what all that is meant to accomplish. It sounds completely equivalent to the existing priority scheme, except that you want to set priorities by typing in numbers instead of arranging items in a list.

In the current scheme, nothing stops someone from implementing an add-on to display the favorites in a different order, without altering the underlying priorities. Display order happens to be the same as priority order in the stock STV, in order to simplify the process of adjusting priorities, but there's no requirement that says it has to be that way. With appropriate customization code, you could sort and/or filter the list however you like, and figure out some other UI for adjusting priorities (or allow adjustment only when sorted by priority).

Also, you seem to be under the impression that favorite priority determines what order shows get recorded in. It doesn't. If a potential conflict can be resolved automatically by rescheduling one of the recordings to a different airing, then it will be, without regard to priority. Priority comes into play only when the conflict can't be resolved automatically and one of the recordings must be missed, in which case the higher priority recording gets scheduled, and the lower priority one gets flagged as a conflict for user action. So I don't see that putting manual recordings in at some intermediate priority level would accomplish anything useful. In case of unresolvable conflict, you'd still get a warning, and you'd still have the option of either missing the favorite or canceling the manual recording.