Feature request: smarter watched files management

[CadErik]

Originally Posted by nick_l

P.s. Are there really that many people who watch programs and then just leave them for Sage to deal with? I always delete a show after watching, provided I don't actually want to keep it for some reason.

This matter gets much more complicated when there are many people in the household. I don't always know what shows my wife is planning to watch and deleting a show brutally like that is a source of serious troubles.

Erik.

[Fuzzy]

Originally Posted by CadErik

This matter gets much more complicated when there are many people in the household. I don't always know what shows my wife is planning to watch and deleting a show brutally like that is a source of serious troubles.

Erik.

Another reason to just get more storage, and let sage do the deleting, if you ever get there.

[stanger89]

Originally Posted by nick_l

P.s. Are there really that many people who watch programs and then just leave them for Sage to deal with?

I do, I never delete my watched shows, never have, don't plan to start.

[CadErik]

Originally Posted by Fuzzy

Another reason to just get more storage, and let sage do the deleting, if you ever get there.

EvilPinguin gave some good examples. Adding more storage is not the answer and doesn't make sense - there is only so much time one can spend in a day on front of a TV. When I'll run out of space, SageTV could make some good decisions and delete first some watched low priority favorites before others...
I don't really figure out what is difficult to understand, adding more storage doesn't solve the case when you start running out of space.

Erik.

[nyplayer]

Originally Posted by nick_l

P.s. Are there really that many people who watch programs and then just leave them for Sage to deal with? I always delete a show after watching, provided I don't actually want to keep it for some reason. I wonder if Sage (the program) provides Sage (the company) with this information on our viewing habbits. I do know that TiVos do report back quite an extensive list of information.

I used to delete watched shows until I deleted an episode of a favorite my wife wanted to watch so that put and end to deleting...

[Fuzzy]

Originally Posted by CadErik

EvilPinguin gave some good examples. Adding more storage is not the answer and doesn't make sense - there is only so much time one can spend in a day on front of a TV. When I'll run out of space, SageTV could make some good decisions and delete first some watched low priority favorites before others...
I don't really figure out what is difficult to understand, adding more storage doesn't solve the case when you start running out of space.

Erik.

My point was that, ample storage, combined with proper configuration of favorites (keep and most, and autodelete on/off) will allow it to never miss a recording because of not enough free space, while still ensuring that no shows are prematurely deleted. It seemed the problem the OP was having is that he felt he needed to manually go through and delete his shows, to ensure that there was enough space to record upcoming broadcasts.

[CadErik]

Originally Posted by GKusnick

We've been assured many times that it doesn't, both on the forums and in the published privacy policy, and it tends to make the devs testy when you accuse them, without evidence, of planting spyware in their products.

Actually, it would be fun to see a chart of the most watched shows, average number of recordings ,etc.
I wouldn't have any issue sharing that information.

[briands]

I would LOVE (and have requested several times a year since way 2005) the Syndicated Option as it would address one of my problems with favorites. My implementation proposal was simply to add a Keep AT LEAST option for favorites as well as allowing recording of episodes that may be marked Watched. Ideally it would track watched on date and use that as a tie breaker for which to record/ keep.

Reminds me.. I guess I should resubmit officially...

Originally Posted by evilpenguin

I'm for this type of advanced recording management options. There are actually quite a few i'd like to see...

• Deleted watched first like the OP describes - I like this show and like to have the whole season archived, but if I need room and i'm out of syndicated shows to delete, you can delete the watched episodes of this one.
• Syndicated Mode - A show like Seinfeld or the Simpsons that's on daily and I like to watch, but I never want it to affect the scheduling of another show and always the first to delete for space purposes.
• Only record N per day -Seinfeld is on 4-8 times a day depending on the day, I only keep 4 at a time, that means that someday up to 4 episodes are recorded and then immediately deleted.
• Record first available -I like watching the first run of Mythbusters ASAP, but i'll often find that Sage's scheduler will push it back to make room for another show with a lower priority.
• Only delete watched episodes - I record Everyday Italian, but only check them out once a week when i'm going to be cooking dinner. The rest of the time its fine if it just holds onto the 4 epiosdes it has rather than overwritting them with new ones.
• Only record on a single day - I only care about the college football games on Saturday and don't want to catch any of the random game recaps that air during the week.
• Deleted watched first - I like this show and like to have the whole season archived, but if I need room and i'm out of syndicated shows to delete, delete the watched episodes of this one
• Never delete a first run to make room for a rerun - South Park is on 2-3 times per day, I save four, a first run episode gets recorded but before I get to watch it its deleted to make room for the next two days worth of reruns.

RE: Just buying more drives - The more space you have the more important it actually is to have options like this.

[evilpenguin]

Originally Posted by Fuzzy

Another reason to just get more storage, and let sage do the deleting, if you ever get there.

We still want Sage to do the deleting, but we just want to have a few more options to control it

as well as allowing recording of episodes that may be marked Watched

Yes! I forgot about that one. Every year I have to go through a few of my favorites and have it delete the watched history so it will start recording them again.

[GKusnick]

Originally Posted by CadErik

Actually, it would be fun to see a chart of the most watched shows, average number of recordings ,etc.

http://en-us.nielsen.com/rankings/in...ngs/television

Originally Posted by CadErik

I wouldn't have any issue sharing that information.

The SageAlert plugin can broadcast much of this sort of information to the world via Twitter, and you're free to search Twitter for information broadcast by other Sage users. You can also post polls on the forum asking about people's viewing habits.

Personally I would rather not have this sort of data collection built into the base product, and I suspect the devs would rather not deal with the kind of suspicion and distrust that arise from having such a capability built in.

[nyplayer]

Originally Posted by evilpenguin

We still want Sage to do the deleting, but we just want to have a few more options to control it

Yes! I forgot about that one. Every year I have to go through a few of my favorites and have it delete the watched history so it will start recording them again.

Why do you have to delete the watched history why no just go into the favorite and mark all not watched? I guess i do not get this one because I would not want Sage to record a series I watched unless I cleared the watch status.

[evilpenguin]

Originally Posted by nyplayer

Why do you have to delete the watched history why no just go into the favorite and mark all not watched? I guess i do not get this one because I would not want Sage to record a series I watched unless I cleared the watch status.

Yep, that's what I meant

[src666]

I'm really not sure why people are having so much trouble understanding the OP's issue.

Here's an example that I hope will clarify things: My wife likes The Family Guy, and has it set up to record as many as possible, and "Keep until I delete". This leads to us having 50 watched episodes sitting on the hard drive, taking up space.

If we could set a "Keep at most 10 watched" rule, then this logjam would be cleared _before_ Sage gets desperate for space. I could Archive the ones I really want to keep, and old shows would stop piling up.

When I review my system, I have at least 50% of my drive space being taken by watched episodes. Some of them (Robot Chicken for example) have more than 50 shows sitting there. Since my system has been running for some time, some of those shows are several YEARS old. It would be nice to have a slightly more intelligent handling of "dead" material than the current all or nothing options.

And before someone chimes in with the "more drives" refrain, I'm sitting on 3TB just for shows, so it's already pretty close to the point of insanity. Just let Sage be a bit smarter about what deadwood it keeps around.

[briands]

Originally Posted by nyplayer

Why do you have to delete the watched history why no just go into the favorite and mark all not watched? I guess i do not get this one because I would not want Sage to record a series I watched unless I cleared the watch status.

You could go to the favorite an mark as not watched, but that defeats the "Watched" score for Intelligent Recording... plus it is a manual exercise that has to be done occasionally.