Tvheadend

Adam Sutton wrote:

This has been discussed quite a bit recently in #hts and I would like to see something similar too . However wyou are correct that its fairly low priority. We also need to find someone with the appropriate skills, I have chatted to a few people but nothing firm yet.

Adam

What kind of skills are needed? In other words: what language/framework is used for the backend? Django with Ext-jS?

C + ExtJS (2.2.1)

I have always looked at the EPG as something that could work just like google maps. So each program is it's own tile and you can move around (up/down/left/right) with you mouse just like google maps. And you can even "zoom" in which only makes the tiles bigger (higher/wider) so that more information can contained in it.Then you also do not have scrollbars at the left and bottom part but one continuous flow of EPG data.

Now the only question is: Can something like that can be constructed using ExtJS or does that require it's own javascript.

It requires that tvheadend can serve the "EPG Tiles" in the required size and some relation between the tiles to correctly move them around. And then a client side script that can request new "EPG Tiles" from tvheadend (or it could generate them locally using the standard EPG calls to get the data)

Damn you beat me too it I'd only just loaded the page!

Yeah as Hein said the backend is all C, we have small embedded custom server written by Andreas. That isn't going to change, so ideally it needs to be be someone who is ok with writing/modifying C. Though maybe a team of 2?

Also its worth nothing that "most" of what you need already exists and is provided by the JSON interface used by the existing UI, however it might require some extensions. There have been plans to extend the JSON APIs to be more complete to allow other integration with TVH without the need to use HTSP.

Hein's idea is an interesting one, but I'm not sure. If it can be done it might be worth looking at. But I think a standard grid view with scroll bars would be fine for most.

However whether this uses ExtJS or some custom javascript I'm not sure. Personally I see ExtJS as good for building "functional" sites, i.e. some basic menu's, dialogs and LOTS of very boring spreadsheet like grids. I don't think I've ever seen an extjs UI that didn't involve LOTS of basic grids/tables of data. But I'm not a webdev, so I'm very ignorant about such things.

Personally I quite like the way the sky TV guide site looks, although performance isn't always great. tv.sky.com/tv-guide

Adam

Should also have pointed out, that yes we use a very out of date ExtJS lib (as noted be Hein). There are some thoughts on getting this upgraded as it's getting harder to support, and the newer libs do offer greater functionality. But it's not a trivial job to update.

However this UI does not necessarily have to use the same ExtJS library.

Also it would be good if whatever we do is compatible (or at least has a variant) that works well with mobile devices. I know we have native TVH apps for Android and iPhone, but it would still be nice if this was able to be used as well as an alternative.

I agree with Adam. I think ExtJS is not suitable for something like this. ExtJS is really good in creating online applications. Not in creating more interactive things like a cool EPG.

I made a small start with a simple EPG that talks to tvheadend via JSON calls. For now it shows the programs currently running and 5 hours ahead (just some arbritary number I choose). If I click on the program I see the description and I can choose to record the program if I want too (also via a JSON call).

For this quick test I used PHP to quickly filter the data serverside. But I think a pure javascript solution would be better. I am not sure how much time I am able to spend on this but would it be okay to use jQuery for creating an EPG that could be integrated in tvheadend later on?

• Make use of tags to filter favorite channels
• Mark the current time with a line (and move this automatically)
• Scroll horizontally for more hours
• Scaleable timeframe (zoom in/out)
• Colorcoding indicating how long a program is running already (now colors are random)
• Use icons for genre information (if available)
• Optional cronjob (PHP/Python/whatever) that collects metadata for shows in EPG/recorded programs with a crawler like YAMJ (and show RottenTomato/IMDB scores and possible even create automatic NFO files for tvheadend recordings), could also work on demand
• Would be cool if this metadata also contained images so that you can show a more rich EPG interface
• If available through metadata the option to mark certain actors as a favorite and automatically highlight shows/movies that one of your favorite actors has a role in
• Integration with Sickbeard and CouchPotato so that you can grab all previous episodes of a certain tv show
• Skinable via CSS
• Mobile friendly
• Option to access the EPG directly without going through the tvheadend backend. You need login/password for JSON access anyway.

I like the idea of zooming in to show more information about a show. But I think this would be a lot of work to get right. Making the stuff I mentioned above would be a nice start ;).

I am not that great in C but I am a professional webdeveloper that focus more on frontend interactive stuff. Like games, calculators, online product selectors, microsites and stuff like that. So creating an EPG fits right in my ally. Unfortunately I don't have a lot of time available for projects like this.

If I would like to contribute to tvheadend by creating an EPG would it be possible to work with the tvheadend developers to extend the JSON API?

This is exactly what I've been looking for. What is that written in? Looks like you've written the JS from scratch, you're not using a framework (jQuery etc..)?

Adam

Ah, just read the page, iUI, not heard of that one (but then I don't do UI dev so no surprise there).

Adam

very nice work. well done.

Just for me, I've install from repository ppa:adamsutton/tvheadend-beta and I've make a symbolic links to /usr/share/tvheadend/src/webui/static/mobile

so in order :

cd ~
mkdir src_tvheadend
cd srcvheadend
git clone git://github.com/polini/TvheadendMobileUI.git
sudo mkdir /usr/share/tvheadend/src/webui/static/mobile
sudo ln -s `pwd`/TvheadendMobileUI/mobile/ /usr/share/tvheadend/src/webui/static/

and on my iphone : I've had to add index.html to the url : http://ip:9981/static/mobile/index.html

It just missing a favicon.ico

Thanks.

Is there any update on this?
any plans to include a nice new website in TVH?

the propose of poling is good, but no one seems to work on it anymore.

I would love to use TVH with such nice EPG.

Nobody is working on this. But appearently, there are open source libraries around which can be used for this purpose like visjs.org - demo - http://visjs.org/examples/timeline/other/groupsPerformance.html .

Joe Cool wrote:

Is there any update on this?
any plans to include a nice new website in TVH?

the propose of poling is good, but no one seems to work on it anymore.

I would love to use TVH with such nice EPG.

But why not just use an external program? Kodi, for instance, has an excellent EPG-timeline. TVHeadend was always thought of as a backend, running on a server, right? And even if you run it on a Desktop computer, why not just install KODI on the same computer... Opening KODI is just as easy as, if not easier than, opening a web-page for tvheadend.....
It just makes more sense (at least to me) to have a TVHeadend be the server-part in a Client-Server-model, and rely on others to develop client-tools, such as EPG timeline.

Poul Kalff wrote:

Joe Cool wrote:

Is there any update on this?
any plans to include a nice new website in TVH?

the propose of poling is good, but no one seems to work on it anymore.

I would love to use TVH with such nice EPG.

But why not just use an external program? Kodi, for instance, has an excellent EPG-timeline. TVHeadend was always thought of as a backend, running on a server, right? And even if you run it on a Desktop computer, why not just install KODI on the same computer... Opening KODI is just as easy as, if not easier than, opening a web-page for tvheadend.....
It just makes more sense (at least to me) to have a TVHeadend be the server-part in a Client-Server-model, and rely on others to develop client-tools, such as EPG timeline.

Why should one install a HTPC client software like KODI, if you only want to access the EPG webui from a PC, a tablet, a notebook or whatever?
I like KODI but for this purpose only it is much to heavy weight!

Jaroslav Kysela wrote:

Nobody is working on this. But appearently, there are open source libraries around which can be used for this purpose like visjs.org - demo - http://visjs.org/examples/timeline/other/groupsPerformance.html .

Just a timeline is only a part of an EPG, but no a full solution.

I was thinking of something like the EPG functions of VDR-Live (which also include a timeline)

Joe Cool wrote:

Jaroslav Kysela wrote:

Nobody is working on this. But appearently, there are open source libraries around which can be used for this purpose like visjs.org - demo - http://visjs.org/examples/timeline/other/groupsPerformance.html .

Just a timeline is only a part of an EPG, but no a full solution.

Sure, but it's one possible component.

I was thinking of something like the EPG functions of VDR-Live (which also include a timeline)

It would be really good to have a javascript programmer which can do it. The webui was mostly designed for the configuration.

Has there been any progress on a good EPG GUI?

I would love to see a more useful EPG view, I don't like being negative (especially about an excellent free product like TVH) but the current one is pretty bad

Me2

Neutrino yWeb EPG Plus is open source.

 Y_EPG.js
 Y_EPG_Plus.yhtm

But how can that be used?

Ton VH wrote:

But how can that be used?

Need to be edited with adoption of TVH API

Jonathan Thomson wrote:

I would love to see a more useful EPG view, I don't like being negative (especially about an excellent free product like TVH) but the current one is pretty bad

I think "pretty bad" is an understatement. It is an embarrassment to an otherwise good package. There needs to be the ability, from within the TVheadend, of the user choosing whether to display the EPG as a list of events (as happens at present) or as a time-versus-channel grid, as most other PVR software uses. It should be built in to TVheadend, not require other packages to be installed.

KODI as a front end is overkill when all you want to do is to schedule recordings, because you use something else like VLC to view the programmes and don't go near the clumsy 10-foot interface of KODI.

Martin Underwood wrote:

Jonathan Thomson wrote:

I would love to see a more useful EPG view, I don't like being negative (especially about an excellent free product like TVH) but the current one is pretty bad

I think "pretty bad" is an understatement. It is an embarrassment to an otherwise good package. There needs to be the ability, from within the TVheadend, of the user choosing whether to display the EPG as a list of events (as happens at present) or as a time-versus-channel grid, as most other PVR software uses. It should be built in to TVheadend, not require other packages to be installed.

KODI as a front end is overkill when all you want to do is to schedule recordings, because you use something else like VLC to view the programmes and don't go near the clumsy 10-foot interface of KODI.

Please do consider helping improve the EPG if you have the know-how rather than moan about how bad it is.

Note that we miss mostly a javascript developer, but it seems that those people are really wanted and they probably work on a paid project rather than improve an open source one.

If it is possible to add some frame to current UI and run some external webapp (on port 9984 )
with will parse xmltv export
https://github.com/inspace-io/INSElectronicProgramGuideLayout

Although I do like the mock-ups, for me, the question would be, how do people actually use the EPG and for what purpose? You can't really redesign an interface without knowing how it will be used.

I think scrolling EPGs are fine when tvs had a handful of channels and you are really only using it to swap between programmes you already knew were on.

Do people seriously scroll through 500+ channels x 14 days looking for things to record? Even with my cut-down system, it has over 70,000 programmes. That's got to be a lot of scrolling and RSI pressing the info button on the programmes in a scrolling EPG... At least with the existing ui you could see an advert for a show, type its name in the epg and hit record.

Don't get me wrong: the existing tvh ui has too much data and not enough information. However, different people seem to have such vastly different setups wrt artwork, episode details, icons, that it means you would have to implement skins (like Kodi) to please people with layout. And if you're doing that, why not just use Kodi for the EPG and use the skin you like?

Newer versions of Kodi with the default skin have better PVR support than old skins and old versions.

Obviously Kodi can't replace built-in tvh for advanced scheduling since it has to be general purpose enough for different backend PVRs, and suitable for a 10' interface rather than a 10" keyboard interface.

And if not Kodi, then one of the apps that work on your tablet...many of which have a scrolling EPG...

Although tvh could replicate Kodi's timeline, and it would look nice, would you actually be able to find any programme on it? So, if I wanted to see when a new episode of Simpsons is on, how would I go about it? How would it look for someone with xmltv images vs without? Quickly the screen either becomes crowded, or you end up with a few complicated layouts.

Personally, I rarely use the EPG tab. I've always just used recording rules to find programmes in which I might be interested, such as "find new comedy films rated highly" or "find movies starring favourite people". That reduces the 70k programmes to around thirty, which is far more manageable, and then I reduce that to the few things actually worth recording; and then spare time reduces that to the even fewer shows actually worth watching...

But, I'm certainly not against anyone who can add a new epg tab to the ui, or can help improve the ui in any way. Too many things seem difficult for users to find, but there seems no easy way to simplify it.

Em Smith wrote:

..
Too many things seem difficult for users to find, but there seems no easy way to simplify it.

One word.. Tags!

Many people forget the current EPG grid can be filtered using tags.
Perhaps this could be made more prominent? If a user has a specific tag, for example "Favorites", an option to make that/a tag the default-selected tag filter in the EPG grid.

I agree. And if your xmltv supplies categories (such as SchedulesDirect) then tvh4.3 gives you a second toolbar to filter the epg even more.

TBH, I was thinking UI in general. So recent issues I have seen raised include "how do I avoid my HD tuner recording SD programmes", or "how do I enable epg on Freeview HD".

Settings such as "prefer to record UHD/HD programmes" are probably never found by many people.

We probably need to push more common config settings in to the wizard and make things more discoverable, perhaps another tab of "easy config", but I fear that would then become a complicated mishmash tab...