Messages

1

Users / Re: Status of the LinuxMCE DVD's

« on: October 04, 2007, 06:03:16 am »

***Finally*** they've arrived, and yes they work.  I shipped off the first 100 discs today.  The shipping is a bit slow since 75% of the orders are international and I have to fill out a customs form for each disc.  But they're on their way, and all 1,000 discs should be sent out over the next few days.  Very sorry again for the delays.  This was a real learning experience, but at least now I have lots of extra discs on hand and know exactly how to get discs replicated next time.

2

Users / Status of the LinuxMCE DVD's

« on: September 28, 2007, 08:47:18 am »

I found another plant shortly after my last post.  This one is ISO certified and seems to be much bigger and more professional.  As such they had strict rules about verifying the license and copyright for all the software on the disc to be sure I wasn't violating copyrights.  This delayed things a few more days as I had to detail every software package on the DVD.  That's done now, and I expect the DVD's in approx 1 week.

3

Developers / Re: All Developers, please read.

« on: September 22, 2007, 04:31:43 pm »

I think the svn isn't that big.  It's probably 300MB if you add the graphics and other stuff to it.  I don't expect the bandwidth load on it will be too high either since it's just devs.

4

Users / Re: New update for schedules direct

« on: September 10, 2007, 07:25:17 pm »

Before running asgard's command to force an update you can run:
echo "SELECT FK_Device,IK_DeviceData FROM Device_DeviceData WHERE FK_DeviceData=234" | mysql pluto_main

That will list each device and the version it was updated to.  Device 1 is the core (ignore device 19), the other devices are likely media directors.  If the 2nd column is 0, then the update has not been applied yet.  If it's 1, then you got the update.

Then: cat /usr/pluto/bin/DataDirectProviders.sh

The line that starts with /usr/bin/wget, if the URL is: http://webservices.schedulesdirect.tmsdatadirect.com  then the update was applied successfully.

In 1audio's case, the 2nd column in that mysql select was 1, meaning it did get the update and try to apply it.  But the DataDirectProviders.sh file was old.  The reason was that 1audio had manually upgraded the slimserver on his box so there were broken packages.  Such broken packages were a constant problem with LinuxMCE 1.0, so 0704 bypasses the usual apt-get upgrade mechanism and instead downloads update rules from linuxmce.com.  The updates themselves are still mostly .deb packages, but this way when multiple packages need to be updated in parallel across multiple repositories (ie Kubuntu's, LinuxMCE's, 3rd party kernel modules, etc.) they all get done at once.  But if you manually do some updates it's possible to still have broken packages like with 1.0.

asgard's instructions assume that you got the update downloaded, but that like 1audio it didn't apply correctly.  I would suggest adding to asgard's instructions to run the command like this: /usr/pluto/bin/LMCEUpdate_Apply.sh | tee /var/log/pluto/applyupdate.log
so the output is archived in /var/log/pluto/applyupdate.log and that way you have a copy of it and can paste it in this forum.

I'd really like to know re: the other users with issues if they were: 1) that you didn't get the update (ie the mysql select above shows the version is 0), 2) that you got the update, but like 1audio it didn't apply correctly because you have a non-standard LinuxMCE install, or 3) that you got the update and do have a standard LinuxMCE install, but something is broken in LinuxMCE's update mechanism.

Let's keep this thread on the topic of helping ensure everybody gets the currently released update and gets schedules direct working.  I started a new thread here: http://forum.linuxmce.org/index.php?topic=2422.0  where we can post comments about the update mechanism in general and get into details about how to make it better for the next release.

5

Users / Comments on the LinuxMCE update mechanism

« on: September 10, 2007, 07:24:14 pm »

The first LinuxMCE update is out to handle MythTV and schedules direct.  There's a thread about it here: http://forum.linuxmce.org/index.php?topic=2300.0

I wanted to start a thread for people to comment on suggestions for improving the update mechanism in general.

6

Users / Re: Status of the LinuxMCE DVD's

« on: September 10, 2007, 06:23:35 pm »

>>I'd be happy to chip in to help lower the cost of the first learning experience

Thanks for the offer, but don't worry.  I paid for the first production run with a credit card and so if the plant won't give me my money back I'll dispute the charge.  Considering that I have a master DVD which has readable files, and their production DVD's have different files, I'm assuming visa will give me my money back.

>>place your order outside U.S. with possibly lower price

Maybe I'll do that for the second batch.  Right now I'm really anxious to get a good batch of DVD's as fast as possible to fill the orders that have piled up.  Thanks for the tip, though.

7

Users / Status of the LinuxMCE DVD's

« on: September 10, 2007, 12:57:46 pm »

There have been hundreds of status requests from Google Checkout for the DVD offered on linuxmce.org.  Since it's impractical to send individual responses I created this thread to report the latest status, and allow users to comment, or vent.  I am very, very sorry for the delays.  Here is what happened:

In early August I started offering a 9GB (dual-layer) DVD that has both the LinuxMCE installation disk, and the HD demo videos in multiple file formats.  These are not just recordable DVD-R's (DVD Duplication) that are burned one at a time because those recordable discs are not widely compatible, and don't work in all dvd players.  Rather I ordered professional replicated DVD's made from a glass master, like the commercial DVD movies and software distros, ordered in lots of 1,000.  I hadn't done this before, but was told I could just burn a recordable dual layer disc and send it to the replication plant.  I did this, but just before the estimated delivery date of August 30 they reported a problem because they said for a 9GB DVD (dual layer) they make 2 glass masters for a double-layer disc and I need to split the images in two.  It was frustrating that they didn't say this when the order was placed, but we worked this and got it going and then they gave me a revised delivery date of September 6.

I received the DVD's on September 6, however they don't work because some of the files on the DVD are corrupted.  It's not that the discs are unreadable, it's that some of the files have 0's (NULL's) in certain blocks.  The replication plant has now said "Yes, that's perfectly normal.  No glass master is perfect, there are always errors."  They insist that the fewest number of errors on any DVD master is >500.  I don't know anything about DVD replication procedures, and this may happen with movie DVD's.  Assuming that a few blocks are missing the movie would probably still play and just drop a frame.  But this obviously cannot happen with data dvd's.  You cannot have even 1 error.  If you're uncompressing an archive and even 1 bit is changed the checksum will fail and it won't work.  The replication plant insists that even the data DVD's from companies like Microsoft have hundreds of errors on them, and I'm insisting that's impossible.  The idiots at the plant are arguing the discs are not useless as I maintain because they're "99.9% accurate" and out of 9 billion bytes "there's only a couple hundred that are bad".  I did not check the references on the replication plant before placing the order because, it was my understanding there are only a dozen or so plants in the USA, and it costs millions to build a plant, so they all must be legit.  However upon more digging I'm finding out that's not really the case and some of the replication plants specialize in cheap movie DVD's for B-movies and porn and they make low-quality glass masters that have errors, and don't do data DVD's.

I've now found another replication plant that is telling me they do will guarantee their glass masters have zero errors.  However, like the first plant, they're quoting 2-3 weeks to turn around an order.  I'm going to send this new plant a master disc on Monday.

I am very sorry to all you who ordered the discs.  It's as frustrating to me as it is to you, particularly since the first plant charged thousands of dollars and I'm not sure I'll be able to get my money back even though all the discs are useless.  However, that's my problem and my lesson learned since I haven't done commercial dvd replication before.  If you can't wait and want your money back I totally understand and can't blame you.  If you can wait another 2-3 weeks, then thank you for your patience.  I assure you I'm not going to give up until I have the dvd is done right and they are sent out.  Once I get this first batch I'll have stock on hand, and the glass master will be kept for future production runs, so going forward I'll be able to send out new orders immediately as they're placed.  Sorry again...

8

Developers / Re: All Developers, please read.

« on: September 09, 2007, 09:40:14 pm »

The immediate priorities, imho, are (1) building a community, and (2) any stability or installation issues that will allow a majority of users to get going with LinuxMCE.  Most of the emails I get are for feature requests.  But LinuxMCE already has a gazillion features, and while there certain new features that would be really nice to have, I think the community will be better off if the features that are already there are accessible by everyone.

So, if I was to put the priorities in order, I would say:

1) Find someone who has knows the FOSS world well, has some clout in the FOSS community, and has some free time, and who can act as a community liason to start building a team.
2) Find someone who's good at writing docs, ORG charts and other tools to document LinuxMCE, both enhancing the existing quick start guides, but also laying the foundation for developer docs so that as developers join they can jump in right away.  There's actually a ton of info already in the wiki, I think it just needs a clear roadmap.
3) Working with the team to identify the high priority tasks.  My personal votes are: A) improving the integration with MythTV.  I still get complains that Myth is less stable in LinuxMCE than in stock Ubuntu, which baffles me given that LinuxMCE is stock Ubuntu + stock MythTV.  But since the PVR is such a key component, this needs to be resolved.  B) Trying to determine what are the installation issues that prevent a lot of users from getting their systems going.  C) Implementing the PIN code to protect private media (ie keep the kids from watching Dad's porn ).
4) The next big, new task will be re-doing the UI to make it easily re-skinnable and themable and improving the designer stuff.  This way the creative design guys can work on making it look really beautiful, since the aesthetics seems to be the first thing people pay attention to.

9

Users / Re: New update for schedules direct

« on: September 09, 2007, 09:25:20 am »

>> I found the particular version of mythtv that ships with LMCE to be more then unstable.

I'm really baffled.  It's a stock Kubuntu distro, and with all stock, pre-built myth packages.  I didn't change anything at all with Myth.  LinuxMCE is just some extra software that goes on top, it doesn't replace anything in the kernel or in MythTV.  It does auto-update config files, but I've gone over the way LinuxMCE auto-configures MythTV and can't find anything wrong with it.  If LinuxMCE really has done something to make MythTV unstable, *please* email me directly at webpaul1 [at] gmail.com so I can fix it, since that would be a big issue.

>> Try running apt-get update and see if it actually hits the LinuxMCE server

You shouldn't ever do that.  The normal update mechanism is disabled in LinuxMCE and instead it has it's own.  If you do that it will cause it to update the packages from Ubuntu, which may include kernel updates that break the other kernel modules in LinuxMCE (like PVR cards, etc.).

>> update.linuxmce.com

Where did that URL come from?  It's updates with an s, which resolves to 208.109.177.142 the same as linuxmce.com/linuxmce.org, and does respond to pings.  I saw several guys used update without the 's'.  Did I type that in somewhere?

>> I did the update, no errors noticed, but when I try to enter my username and password in the wizard, it says, "There was an error retrieving your provider information, please check your username/password/location" ...

If someone who has trouble could help debug this I'd really appreciate it.  Here's what to do: ssh into your core and run this command to follow the router's log: TailDCERouter.sh

Look for the log entry:Command:Spawn Application.  Underneath are the parameters for the command.  Note the Filename and the Arguments.  Run the filename + arguments with a bash -x so you can see what it's doing.  It should be hitting the SD servers, passing in the username/password, and echoing back to the console the list of providers/lineups.  Maybe you can see why it's not working?  If you want me to try it using your username & password, you can email me that privately and I'll test it on my box to see if there's something different with your SD account instead of mine that's causing the script to break.

10

Developers / Re: All Developers, please read.

« on: September 03, 2007, 10:20:57 am »

Sorry if I'm not totally familiar with that 'slice' hosting and what the advantages are over a normal dedicated server.  But it seemed quite a bit more expensive than a normal dedicated server.  I'm using a server from go-daddy.  It's about $100/month for a p4 with 1gb ram, and then you pay $40/month for each extra 1TB of bandwidth; linuxmce uses about 2tb/month.

The problem, though, with using one of those go-daddy servers as a build box is that it only comes with Fedora.  When I do the building I always do it with the LinuxMCE/Kubuntu distro so all the headers and stuff match.  I guess it could be built on a fedora box, but it's probably more work.

11

Developers / Re: Building from the source tarball

« on: September 03, 2007, 10:17:18 am »

I'll look into more.  But in case this helps, what I do to compile is untar the file to /home/source.  Then cp /usr/pluto/lib/* /home/source/src/lib/

Then: export SNR_CPPFLAGS = "-DKDE_LMCE -DDEBUG -DTHREAD_LOG -DLOG_ALL_QUERIES -I/opt/libxine1-pluto/include -I/opt/libsdl1.2-1.2.7+1.2.8cvs20041007/include -I/opt/libsdl1.2-1.2.7+1.2.8cvs20041007/include/SD"
export SNR_LDFLAGS = "-L/opt/libxine1-pluto/lib -L/opt/libsdl1.2-1.2.7+1.2.8cvs20041007/lib"

then cd to one of the binary directories, like cd /home/source/src/App_Server, and run: make clean bin
or cd to one of the plugins, like cd /home/source/src/Media_Plugin, and run: make clean so

Then I edit the files locally and recompile as needed.  To test it, I either (a) copy the output to /usr/pluto/bin (backup the original file first), (b) make a symlinc in /usr/pluto/bin point ot my output directory, or (c) kill the screen session that's running the device and run it manually from the source directory with: [binary name] -d [device id] -r dcerouter

I'll work on coming up with a clean set of instructions to build all the code and packages from that tar ball.  It is the correct set of sources afaik.

12

Users / Re: Device already enabled popup keeps coming back

« on: September 02, 2007, 11:05:57 pm »

The next update, which is due in a couple days, will fix this, and include a new mythtv with schedules direct.

13

Developers / Re: All Developers, please read.

« on: September 02, 2007, 12:15:01 am »

I first tried source forge, but the problem there is that they only host small projects.  Each project only can use 100mb, and the forums/bug tracking, etc., are really geared towards small projects.  LinuxMCE's sources were too big.

14

Users / New update for schedules direct

« on: August 31, 2007, 10:06:04 am »

A new update is coming for schedules direct.  See the news item on the main site which will be posted later today, and, if possible, follow the instructions in the news article to be a beta tester of the update before it's released to the general public.  If there are any problems with the update, post them immediately to this thread, please.  Thanks!

15

Developers / Re: All Developers, please read.

« on: August 31, 2007, 05:06:06 am »

RE: SqlCVS, SVN, remote assistance, submitting new code, daily builds, etc....

When I first did release 1 I tried to branch from Pluto completely and sever all ties.  Unfortunately, just managing the build server, sqlcvs server, svn, etc., was a huge (and expensive) task.  Pluto was very supportive of LinuxMCE and offered to help and let me use their resources.  So I sort of abandoned my own svn and sqlcvs and went back to using theirs.  There are build servers that make new builds every hour, and full releases each night.  There have been some users that have submitted patches by emailing me.  These *have* been merged into the svn head, and I am regularly downloading the nightly builds to be sure nothing broke.  The problem with making this all public is that the nightly releases are 4gb (it's a new quick start dvd each night).  And it's not my server so it wouldn't be my place to give out the URL and take down their servers with constant hits from people downloading the nightly releases.

For pluto it's not a problem because they all work in an office and they have testers that install the daily builds each day as far as I know.  And me being one guy who remotely downloads the latest dvd once every couple days isn't going to be a problem.  However we do need to find a way to get the latest versions out to the community, not just the official releases.  I'm open to suggestions, since I don't have a clear cut answer.  There are other projects, like Mono, that are also huge and have tons of binaries.  I'm not sure if there are ways to distribute patches or diff's to the binaries?  One possibility is to streamline the build process so it's easier for each dev to build his own.  While that's good, the fact that it takes 5 hours to compile/build all the code makes it unlikely a developer would want to do it on his own.  What I find useful myself is to take just the contents of the bin & lib directories from each nightly build and then update the database with sqlcvs.  But this doesn't really bring the system current...  Anybody have more ideas on this?

For now, it's still using pluto's server for sqlcvs.  I do want to get our own, it's just a matter of cost.  It's expensive to setup another server, so I'm just using theirs for now.  As far as I know, the way it's supposed to work (with Pluto at least) is that every user who learns new i/r codes or gsd codes, that stuff is automatically sent to their sqlcvs server each night and put into a 'quarantine' until it's approved.  i haven't had a chance yet to see if this mechanism works in LinuxMCE.  So it's possible the i/r & gsd stuff is getting sent to pluto and they have tons of records in quarantine waiting for approval.  It's high on my priority list to figure out if this mechanism still works with LinuxMCE, and if so, to get our own sqlCVS server, or work out some way to get linuxmce community guys permissions to use pluto's existing one to do approvals on quarantined records.