Conflict notifier?

[APillowOfClouds]

There is a very basic feature from BeyondTV that I really miss in Sage. If I was scrolling through the guide and found somehting I wanted to record, when I chose to record it, BTV would warn me in a popup if there were other shows scheduled to record at that time and what they were. Is there any way to do this in Sage? Every time I go to record something from the guide, I have to make a note of the time and day, go back to the recording schedule, check there to see what's being recorded at that time, go back and record the show. And if there's already 2 shows being recorded (I have 2 tuners) and I care about one but not the other, there's no easy way for me to say "still record show A, but cancel B and record this instead", especially since there's no way to really hard-cancel upcoming recordings.

I may be wrong about all of this, I am hoping I am wrong hence the post. Any help is appreciated.

[QueOnda]

I use SAGEMC but I think it also works in the standard Sagetv. If you have a yellow ! on the top left of the main screen then you have a conflict. Go to "Schedule" then "Conflicts" to see what shows are conflicting.

[Oats]

Originally Posted by QueOnda

I use SAGEMC but I think it also works in the standard Sagetv. If you have a yellow ! on the top left of the main screen then you have a conflict. Go to "Schedule" then "Conflicts" to see what shows are conflicting.

This is correct. Just tell it to record the show, if no ! icon shows up then you are fine. If it does show up you can go into the Conflicts screen and it will give you an option on what show you want to skip.

[Opus4]

APillowOfClouds: Are you using SageMC?

I ask because the default STV already pops up a dialog if there is an immediate conflict with other manual recordings. If there are scheduling conflicts with Favorites that can't be rescheduled for another time, there is a menu header notification & a recording conflicts menu to consult; see pages 29 & 73 in the PDF manual.

- Andy

[CollinR]

Sage is much smarter then BTV unless it's manual or timed recording it will move it to maximize the schedule. If either of the other two items are regular favorites it will move them automatically to resolve the conflict. As was mentioned there is an icon in the top right yellow TV with red exclamation point, this lets you know a conflict was found.

[APillowOfClouds]

Originally Posted by Opus4

APillowOfClouds: Are you using SageMC?

I ask because the default STV already pops up a dialog if there is an immediate conflict with other manual recordings. If there are scheduling conflicts with Favorites that can't be rescheduled for another time, there is a menu header notification & a recording conflicts menu to consult; see pages 29 & 73 in the PDF manual.

- Andy

OK, clarifications:
1. I know about the conflict screen
2. I'm talking about conflicts with favorites, which are 99% of my recordings, when scheduling a manual recording, which are 1% of my recordings but important to me when I want to do them

Picture this scenario - I'm browsing the guide for stuff and I want to record modern marvels at 1pm on saturday. I select it in the guide and choose record. I get a brief blip of a conflict icon then an (M) indicator. Now I go out and look at the conflict resolution. I decide it's conflicting with something I want. So I set it back to record the other show. Now I go back to the guide to look for another showing. Rinse, repeat. Maybe I can choose another showing from the conflict screen, honestly I don't use it much because it's a clumsy process, but even at that I may just wind up with a different conflict and have to resolve that.

Now in BTV: I choose "Modern Marvels" from the guide and hit record. It immediately tells me there's a conflict and pops up in-place a window showing me the conflict and allowing me to choose which show to cancel. Done. No other screens or menu options required.

Trust me, it was much easier and more intiutive. Especially when trying to instruct my wife that each time she chooses something to record she has to look for the conflict indicator and go wade through the conflicts to find the one that resulted from her selection.

[stanger89]

The tricky bit is with the way Sage works, there's no way to know "instantly" whether the manual recording you are scheduling will result in an unresolvable conflict. When you create the manual recording, Sage will then begin to shuffle the schedule in order to record both the manual you specified and all your favorites.

[wrems]

I think the easiest is to add more tuners… I agree that the conflict resolution is not that intuitive. Especially, when you think you know what you’re doing when dealing with the conflict and Sage does something entirely different, got burned a few times for that.

[APillowOfClouds]

Originally Posted by stanger89

The tricky bit is with the way Sage works, there's no way to know "instantly" whether the manual recording you are scheduling will result in an unresolvable conflict. When you create the manual recording, Sage will then begin to shuffle the schedule in order to record both the manual you specified and all your favorites.

What would be nice is just for it to at least show me at a glance what other shows are scheduled at that particular time - that way if it's something like "The Big Bang Theory" I know that it's a first run that likely won't have another airing any time soon. That would help tremendously. I'll have to check into writing a plug in, I started to learn how to write one a while back but I got distracted.

[APillowOfClouds]

Originally Posted by wrems

I think the easiest is to add more tuners… I agree that the conflict resolution is not that intuitive. Especially, when you think you know what you’re doing when dealing with the conflict and Sage does something entirely different, got burned a few times for that.

I would definitely add more tuners, problem is with the cruddy boxes that I have to have from Cablevision - I was barely able to get enough signal through a splitter to run two of them. I really hate having to use boxes, especially since I don't even subscribe to anything premium like HBO.

[QueOnda]

Originally Posted by APillowOfClouds

I would definitely add more tuners, problem is ... - I was barely able to get enough signal through a splitter to run two of them.

You can get a cable amplifier

[APillowOfClouds]

Originally Posted by QueOnda

You can get a cable amplifier

I had one going at one point but it's still hit-or-miss because of the specific signal levels involved. I don't fully understand it all but I know the amp didn't permanently solve the problem. I had a cable tech come out, go through and test everything, re-crimp most of the ends, and I have all fresh runs from the main split to the boxes. When the tech came it was all good for a while, then it went south again, I would get pixellated or black shows on certain channels, now it's been somewhat stable again for a while. I live in the middle of the woods in a very small neighborhood so they basically just don't really care what the signal quality is like out here.

[Fuzzy]

If you are having signal strength issues, the cable company should take care of that. (They most likely have attenuators at the curb, and can remove/adjust them as necessary). Irregardless, Sage's scheduling system, unlike BTV's, 'just works'. Try not to over think or micromanage it. You simple have to tell it what you want to record, and let it do it's thing. If the conflict icon doesn't appear at the top of the screen, then nothing is being left out (something might be recorded at a different time, but that's it).

[QueOnda]

when I had issues it was because of squirrels. They sometimes chew partially through the ground shielding when the wires are going through the trees.

[APillowOfClouds]

Originally Posted by Fuzzy

If you are having signal strength issues, the cable company should take care of that. (They most likely have attenuators at the curb, and can remove/adjust them as necessary). Irregardless, Sage's scheduling system, unlike BTV's, 'just works'. Try not to over think or micromanage it. You simple have to tell it what you want to record, and let it do it's thing. If the conflict icon doesn't appear at the top of the screen, then nothing is being left out (something might be recorded at a different time, but that's it).

Although I understand what you're saying and when dealing with only favorites I agree, but it doesn't "just work" the way beyond tv did in this case, i.e. with manual recordings conflicting with favorites. Don't get me wrong, I much prefer sage in all other areas (like functioning versus not), but in BTV if my wife went to record a movie and there were 2 first run shows recording at that time, it would warn her and she would stop. Now she gets no warning other than a (very) brief icon change and she would have to go to another screen, which, being my wife, she's not prone to do. Then when she doesn't see her first run show recorded, she is very unhappy. And I can explain to her all day long about the conflict screen but trust me that's nto going far :-/

As far as the attenuators I agree there should be lots of stuff they can do, they are just not prone to do it. The phone techs instantly want to do a truck roll so they can get off the phone and keep their time per customer down, and the truck guys can only address certain things. The guy that came out last time was very nice and did his best, but despite it I still wound up with problems, which were obviously on the street level since they got better again on their own, but calling Cablevision just resulted in a "reboot and then I'll schedule a tech" conversation each time I called.

[QueOnda]

I hear you. That would be a great addition. The way I deal with it, is going to the conflicts screen myself to make sure my wifey didn't put something to record to bump something more important. I also use http://forums.sage.tv/forums/downloa...do=file&id=168 (sagetv tray) to quickly check or use the webadmin (addon).

With sagetv tray can also give you email notifications.

[razrsharpe]

Originally Posted by Fuzzy

... Irregardless...

OT I know, and I'm usually not one to be the grammar police, but this is one of my biggest pet peeves. Irregardless is not a word and has no proper use. ... oki I'll get off my soapbox now

[Fuzzy]

Originally Posted by APillowOfClouds

Although I understand what you're saying and when dealing with only favorites I agree, but it doesn't "just work" the way beyond tv did in this case, i.e. with manual recordings conflicting with favorites. Don't get me wrong, I much prefer sage in all other areas (like functioning versus not), but in BTV if my wife went to record a movie and there were 2 first run shows recording at that time, it would warn her and she would stop. Now she gets no warning other than a (very) brief icon change and she would have to go to another screen, which, being my wife, she's not prone to do. Then when she doesn't see her first run show recorded, she is very unhappy. And I can explain to her all day long about the conflict screen but trust me that's nto going far :-/

That brief change you see on the guide when you are adding it (where after adding it shows the conflict icon, and then it changes to a Manual Recording icon (red circle M), is not indicating a conflict. That is just shown until the scheduler completes its processing (A quirk in how it processes it). The only way to know a conflict exists is to see the icon.

I agree, it might be nice to have a message pop up after adding a manual recording that causes a conflict. However, I think it would be far more important to improve the manual recording mechanism. I'd love to be able to create a One-Time favorite. Instead of the manual being forced to a specific airing, I'd love for it to create a favorite, at the top of the priority list, that once gets a complete recording, will delete itself. This would allow it to shuffle it around to find a less-conflicting time. This would be ideal for Cable movies and such that air often.

Originally Posted by razrsharpe

OT I know, and I'm usually not one to be the grammar police, but this is one of my biggest pet peeves. Irregardless is not a word and has no proper use. ... oki I'll get off my soapbox now

hehe.. yeah yeah.. i know that... it's still fun to say.. like porcupine.. fun word... :-)

And technically, it IS a word.. might not be recognized in any official dictionary, but by its very use in the general population, it IS a word, and DOES have an understood meaning. It's not my fault the dictionary is incomplete.. ;-)

EDIT: Look at that.. Webster's caught up to the real world.. http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/IRREGARDLESS

[razrsharpe]

Originally Posted by Fuzzy

I agree, it might be nice to have a message pop up after adding a manual recording that causes a conflict. However, I think it would be far more important to improve the manual recording mechanism. I'd love to be able to create a One-Time favorite. Instead of the manual being forced to a specific airing, I'd love for it to create a favorite, at the top of the priority list, that once gets a complete recording, will delete itself. This would allow it to shuffle it around to find a less-conflicting time. This would be ideal for Cable movies and such that air often.

pretty please

Originally Posted by Fuzzy

hehe.. yeah yeah.. i know that... it's still fun to say.. like porcupine.. fun word... :-)

And technically, it IS a word.. might not be recognized in any official dictionary, but by its very use in the general population, it IS a word, and DOES have an understood meaning. It's not my fault the dictionary is incomplete.. ;-)

EDIT: Look at that.. Webster's caught up to the real world.. http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/IRREGARDLESS

My problem with irregardless is it has the EXACT same meaning as regardless. How can "irsomething" and "something" mean the same something??? It just doesn't make sense. You are correct though it IS a word as it is being used by the general population. However, Webster says it best:

Originally Posted by Merriam-Webster

... it is still a long way from general acceptance. Use regardless instead.

[david1234]

Originally Posted by razrsharpe

pretty please

My problem with irregardless has the EXACT same meaning as regardless. How can "irsomething" and "something" mean the same something??? It just doesn't make sense. You are correct though it IS a word as it is being used by the general population. However, Webster says it best:

But, if we never use it it will never be generally accepted :P

This is actually funny... I had a professor, who's stated goal was to get irregardless into enough articles to get it included in the dictionary without the big astrisk. He gave extra points if it showed up in a paper with the correct context.