Guide to EPG setup with DigiGuide

[starfire]

After seeing lots of posts and queries, and the current sticky threads being out of date thought I would post the basics of how to configure the Sage EPG for use with DigiGuide. There are lots of different ways of doing this but this is my approach, I have also attached the needed files as they can be difficult to find.


The basic overview for the EPG data from source to target is:-

DigiGuide Web Service <- Grabber -> XML file <- XMLTV Importer -> Sage

1. Make sure Sage is installed and you have scanned for all the channels you want, this will have created .frq files for each tuner in the SageTV install directory

Note, if the scan doesn't find what you want then the alternative to a Sage scan is to use ScanChannelsBDA, this is very good at tuning and will produce a .frq file sorted into LCN (ie like a set top box) order. So if you want to use this then simply edit the .frq produced by the Sage scan and paste in the bits you want from the ScanChannelsBDA scan.

2. Backup your .frq files as they may be deleted in the next steps

3. Install DigiGuide, configure in the channels you want (Tools -> Add/Remove channels)

Note you must have the Web Service running whenever the grabber in step 4 runs - you could leave it running minimised 24/7 if you want

4. Setup the XMLTV Grabber

The grabber extracts the data from the DigiGuide Web Service and puts it into an XML format file

A couple of different grabbers I have used, XMLTV GUI & DG2XML. I currently use XMLTV GUI due to episode numbering issues with DG2XML.

XMLTV GUI
Birtles XMLTV GUI which can grab from the Digiguide Web Service as well as other sources.

Install, run XMLTV GUI, Tools -> Settings -> Grabbers choose UK_Digi

Hit Grab Listings and make sure it works OK and produces an output file

DG2XML (for those who want to try it instead of XMLTV GUI)
Follow steps 1,2,3,4 and 6 in the included README
NOTE: Need .Net 3.5 Framework installed for DG2XML I think
NOTE: I found a forum post saying in step 4 you don't need to select the skin in DigiGuide any more
Step 6 from the README will create an initial XMLTV file for use below.


5. Launch Sage, go into tuner setup and select "Clear All Remapped Channels" and then delete all your tuners - this may also remove the .frq files that you backed up.

6. Exit Sage completely, make sure service etc. is all shut down

7. Setup the XMLTV Importer

The importer will read the XML file produced by the grabber in step 4 and load it into Sage

This guide uses Stephane's excellent importer

Follow the setup instructions - follow from step 3 all the way to the end where you reconfigure your tuners, taking into account the notes below.

Make sure you point the Importer at your grabber executable from step 4 so it can call it automatically (this is part of the setup instructions above).

You typically only need 1 lineup as all the tuners will use the same data if they are all from the same source ie. DVB-T, if you configure say DVB-S as well then typically this would use a second lineup as the channels will be different.

Under Channel Lineups the "Logical Number" column is the order they will appear in your EPG, so set BBC1 as 1, BBC2 as 2, ITV as 3, Channel 4 as 4 etc, the "Physical Number" column relates to the CH:xx entry in the .frq file

Call Sign in XMLTV Importer is what gets displayed as the channel name in the EPG and this must match the channel logo filename to show channel logos.

Do not bother about "First Run & Rerun Optimization" at this stage.

In the "Scheduled Update" section if you bought the donator version you can schedule when to run the utility, and if you also told it where your grabber was it will also call this automatically as well. Do not worry about filling out the Web Server url part.

As per the instructions, do not scan for channels at the end as we already have this data in the .frq's and if you scan it will probably mess up the lineup.

8. Exit Sage completely again

9. Paste back in your .frq files so Sage can correctly tune to the right frequencies for each channel

10. Restart Sage, test things out


Note: If you edit the .frq files you need to restart Sage completely to make it aware
Note: To get Sage to reflect any new import you made and update its guide data immediately (rather than waiting 24hrs) you can disable and then re-enable a channel in the channel manager