(OLD) Unofficial Kodi PVR Client for HDHomeRun DVR subscribers

[rahduke]

Just wanted to say thanks to DJP for this addon. I've been wanting to switch to HDHomeRun for years and I've finally done it Thanks to this incredible addon I have all the same functionality I'm used to plus a ton more features and I'm no longer saddled by the yoke of big cable and their onerous box rental fees. HDHomeRun + KODI is a big win!

I do have one question, anyone have any suggestions for a remote control that I can use with ShieldTV and MiBoxes that has numbers on it? Trying to make this as easy as possible for the wife.

This remote works with the Shield among other devices. You have to be careful though as the new non pro shields no longer have IR... If you have a 2015 Shield you should be alright with IR remotes.

https://www.amazon.com/Inteset-Universa ... eld+remote

Thanks, yea I have a new shieldTV without IR and I really don't like that the remote uses watch batteries instead of standard batteries or rechargables. I assume it's using BT, the remote you linked looks cool but I think I need a BT or RF version

[NYPlayer]

Just wanted to say thanks to DJP for this addon. I've been wanting to switch to HDHomeRun for years and I've finally done it Thanks to this incredible addon I have all the same functionality I'm used to plus a ton more features and I'm no longer saddled by the yoke of big cable and their onerous box rental fees. HDHomeRun + KODI is a big win!

I do have one question, anyone have any suggestions for a remote control that I can use with ShieldTV and MiBoxes that has numbers on it? Trying to make this as easy as possible for the wife.

This remote works with the Shield among other devices. You have to be careful though as the new non pro shields no longer have IR... If you have a 2015 Shield you should be alright with IR remotes.

https://www.amazon.com/Inteset-Universa ... eld+remote

Thanks, yea I have a new shieldTV without IR and I really don't like that the remote uses watch batteries instead of standard batteries or rechargables. I assume it's using BT, the remote you linked looks cool but I think I need a BT or RF version

Correct that remote is IR... So it is no use to you.

[Ken.F]

Thanks, yea I have a new shieldTV without IR and I really don't like that the remote uses watch batteries instead of standard batteries or rechargables. I assume it's using BT, the remote you linked looks cool but I think I need a BT or RF version

You could get a FLIRC for the Shield. The Mi Box has a IR receiver built in.

[rahduke]

Thanks, yea I have a new shieldTV without IR and I really don't like that the remote uses watch batteries instead of standard batteries or rechargables. I assume it's using BT, the remote you linked looks cool but I think I need a BT or RF version

You could get a FLIRC for the Shield. The Mi Box has a IR receiver built in.

Hmm FLIRC that is new to me thanks for the tip. I have two MiBoxes as well, I just need to find a remote that doesn't feel cheap, that's meant for AndroidTV and has number keys. I've been searching and I'm kind of overwhelmed by choice ATM. I've always rocked Rii Mini's on my HTPC's in the past but I don't think I want a keyboard for the shield and Miboxes

[Mediaman]

I saw Harmony 650's for $34 somewhere recently. Might have been via Newegg weekly deals notices or on amazon?

[Ken.F]

I saw Harmony 650's for $34 somewhere recently. Might have been via Newegg weekly deals notices or on amazon?

It was in the AVS Forum newsletter.

[johnny_swindle]

Is anyone else having an issue with Kodi becoming unresponsive when either the TV Recordings, Series, or Movies is attempting to update? What I am attempting to describe is not a library update, but when the PVR client updates the skin display?

Not sure where to begin to attempt to sort this out. I can submit a log file it needed the next time it happens.

[djp952]

Is anyone else having an issue with Kodi becoming unresponsive when either the TV Recordings, Series, or Movies is attempting to update? What I am attempting to describe is not a library update, but when the PVR client updates the skin display?

Not sure where to begin to attempt to sort this out. I can submit a log file it needed the next time it happens.

There is a tricky deadlock/semi-deadlock (<-- not real thing lol) I've seen a lot with the default skin, I have stack traces somewhere to prove it but it's really hard to reproduce reliably. So far I haven't seen the same in Leia, so they may have fixed it. The UI thread and the PVR Manager thread get stuck on each other when accessing channel information. The one I have captured is a deadlock, it wouldn't be recoverable. The long pause/stall I've never been able to track down, once you debug the thing it works differently.

Your best bet would be a bug report, the problem shouldn't be related to any particular PVR client. This is the reason I added the "startup delay" setting (Advanced), it doesn't 100% solve it but it helps, at least during startup. If your main issue is when Kodi is firing up, you might want to try increasing that beyond the default 3 seconds.

It might help to switch to Confluence skin temporarily to see if the problem still manifests, if it does not it will help narrow it down for the Kodi guys. I'm betting Confluence works fine, if I'm thinking of the same thing you are here

[BroDee]

Hi guys, I'm very excited about this client. I thought all hope was lost yesterday until I found this thread.
I'm a very recent WMC > W10/Kodi/HDHR subscriber.

I have a few questions:

1. Can Kodi, and the HDHR Record engine(service) run in the background and record shows even when the Kodi app itself is closed out? I sure hope so as WMC did this 100% reliably (Windows would even warn you if you were trying to reboot while recording a show.)
2. Why does it seem like Kodi can say it's recording a show and it's actually not. I've gotten a few shows successfully recorded this evening, but plenty of others never actually recorded and created a file, despite Kodi telling me they were being recorded.
3. I have yet to see any recorded shows appear in the Recorded Shows section under TV (I'm running Confluence skin.) I can only see the actual file in my Recorded TV folder in explorer.
4. I also don't really seem to see timeshifting working. Or at least quickly like WMC did. It's hard to tell from the progress bar when I'm at in a show and whenever I rewind or skip, things freeze for like 5 seconds and continue, or the sound will be way off. I have yet to really successfully rewind any portion of live tv or active recording.

Thanks!

[djp952]

Hi guys, I'm very excited about this client. I thought all hope was lost yesterday until I found this thread.
I'm a very recent WMC > W10/Kodi/HDHR subscriber.

I have a few questions:

1. Can Kodi, and the HDHR Record engine(service) run in the background and record shows even when the Kodi app itself is closed out? I sure hope so as WMC did this 100% reliably (Windows would even warn you if you were trying to reboot while recording a show.)
2. Why does it seem like Kodi can say it's recording a show and it's actually not. I've gotten a few shows successfully recorded this evening, but plenty of others never actually recorded and created a file, despite Kodi telling me they were being recorded.
3. I have yet to see any recorded shows appear in the Recorded Shows section under TV (I'm running Confluence skin.) I can only see the actual file in my Recorded TV folder in explorer.
4. I also don't really seem to see timeshifting working. Or at least quickly like WMC did. It's hard to tell from the progress bar when I'm at in a show and whenever I rewind or skip, things freeze for like 5 seconds and continue, or the sound will be way off. I have yet to really successfully rewind any portion of live tv or active recording.

Thanks!

1. Yes. The HDHomeRun RECORD engine is a service (Windows) or a daemon (Linux/NAS) and runs all the time. If you shut down the device that's running it, it will of course stop in that case. You should have one and only one device hosting the HDHomeRun RECORD engine on your network. I use my always-on NAS as the host, for example.

2. I try to explain this in the wiki for the project, but what's going on here is that the PVR Client (aka Kodi in this case) has no way to know exactly what will record, the HDHomeRun backend services only provide information about what "might" record. For example, the RECORD engine by default only records a specific episode of a series once. The backend service will flag every episode of the series that matches the Recording Rule as "may record", which is what I can report via Kodi. This takes some getting used to, the trick is setting up the Recording Rules (Kodi: Timer Rules) the way you want to and have faith Read through the wiki on this one, lots of words out there trying to explain it.

3. The Recorded TV area in Kodi will report what the RECORD engine says it has recorded, and it refreshes periodically. There is no direct link between the folder and what you see here, it all depends on what the engine says. You can increase the interval in which the RECORD engine is polled, but it sounds like it may not be reporting it. If you're also not getting the recordings you expect, the RECORD engine may not be working quite right.

4. Now I really think your RECORD engine is not working right or isn't accessible. There is a bug in Kodi Krypton that prevents me from disabling seek (timeshift) when you're hitting a tuner directly, but the behavior will be exactly as you described. When the RECORD engine is working, timeshift is done via that device, it handles the buffering and seeking like you're expecting.

Other than getting used to not knowing exactly what will record, I think everything else is related to a missing RECORD engine. You can check this through Kodi -- go to Settings, PVR & Live TV, Client Specific, then click on Client Specific Settings. You should see an option called "List Discovered Devices". One of the entries should say "HDHomeRun RECORD" followed by a series of hexadecimal digits (this is a UUID, and it's not important at all - lol). If all you see here is tuners, like "HDHomeRun PRIME" then the PVR can't find the RECORD engine.

There are a couple ways to mitigate a missing RECORD engine -- step one is make sure it's installed and running somewhere. If you're sure it's up and running post back, we can try to help you make it visible.

[BroDee]

Awesome reply - thanks so much for the fast help.

FYI, here's a quick run down of my setup.
Brand new July .iso W10 Pro 1703 x64. Krypton 17.3.
7700K, 16GB memory, all Samsung 960 Pro NVMe local storage (2TB) - including the RECORD engine storage.
Extremely fast and snappy. ALWAYS ON
Anyway, this:
"I think everything else is related to a missing RECORD engine. You can check this through Kodi -- go to Settings, PVR & Live TV, Client Specific, then click on Client Specific Settings. You should see an option called "List Discovered Devices". One of the entries should say "HDHomeRun RECORD" followed by a series of hexadecimal digits (this is a UUID, and it's not important at all - lol). If all you see here is tuners, like "HDHomeRun PRIME" then the PVR can't find the RECORD engine."

...showed me my RECORD engine was missing. Thanks!!!
I fixed it by switching to the broadcast discovery method - Voila! Now I see a RECORD engine. I was screwing with this setting all night, which could explain some of my intermittent recording issues. I had no idea where to look at the discovered devices - now I do. I'll play more and report any issues.

Also,

1. Coming back to this question. Since my HTPC is always on, 24/7, and it hosts the RECORD engine, will it record the timers I've set up in Kodi if I've closed Kodi? Or do I always need the Kodi app running, at least minimized in the background? I do a lot of other things on the HTPC and typically would exit out of WMC completely without fear of shows not getting recorded.

5. Within my local HDHomeRun setup app, should I set the BDA compatibility mode to something other than 'Default'? Or is 'Default' the preferred compatibility mode for Kodi?

Thanks!!!!

[djp952]

...showed me my RECORD engine was missing. Thanks!!!
I fixed it by switching to the broadcast discovery method - Voila! Now I see a RECORD engine. I was screwing with this setting all night, which could explain some of my intermittent recording issues. I had no idea where to look at the discovered devices - now I do. I'll play more and report any issues.

Woot! Glad that little option helped!! It's certainly easier than walking through querying the web services manually

Also,

1. Coming back to this question. Since my HTPC is always on, 24/7, and it hosts the RECORD engine, will it record the timers I've set up in Kodi if I've closed Kodi? Or do I always need the Kodi app running, at least minimized in the background? I do a lot of other things on the HTPC and typically would exit out of WMC completely without fear of shows not getting recorded.

5. Within my local HDHomeRun setup app, should I set the BDA compatibility mode to something other than 'Default'? Or is 'Default' the preferred compatibility mode for Kodi?

Thanks!!!!

1. Yes, it's not dependent on Kodi at all. It works a lot like the ehrec service did for Media Center, it just sits there and does it's thing for ya. The Recording Rules are stored in the 'cloud' by SiliconDust, nothing is stored locally in the PVR client. It has a database, but it's effectively just a data cache to facilitate accessing the raw data more easily.

5. That option shouldn't matter anymore since you're now using the HDHomeRun web services to stream the channels over HTTP. The tuners/RECORD engine send an MPEG-TS stream into Kodi, and Kodi decodes it that way using a piece of software called ffmpeg, which doesn't use BDA that I am aware of. You can even uninstall the HDHomeRun Setup software if you want to if Kodi is your only client application now, I don't have it installed on any of my HTPCs anymore. I do have it installed on my desktop PC for firmware updates and stuff, though. Short version: "BDA compatibility set to Default is fine".

SiliconDust has done a really nice job of modernizing their interfaces over the years, having everything accessible via HTTP is awesome, it definitely beats dealing with all of the complexities of the past.

[RockerC]

** Streaming of DRM channels is not supported and will be filtered out by the PVR Client

FYI, just in case you did not know it already, the upcoming Kodi v18 (codename: Leia) will technically have the possibility to support DRM chains (protected streams) "InputStream" (input stream) addons using the new InputStream API which PVR client addons has the ability to use as well and to a part has to move to anyway:

http://kodi.wiki/view/Kodi_v18_(Leia)_changelog

This change to move to "InputStream" (input stream) addons for PVR client addons described here:

https://forum.kodi.tv/showthread.php?tid=259830

As I understand the main "InputStream" (input stream) addon that can be modified to support such this is this "Acaptive InputStream" addon by peak3d (who is also the lead developer behind the new DRM support additions in Kodi v18):

https://github.com/peak3d/inputstream.adaptive

As a proof-of-concept they have already shown that is can be used with play protected video streams from Netflix in Kodi without breaking the DRM stream, as mentioned here:

http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=n ... ix-Support

While it might still be be very hard to add support for DRM protected streams from HDHomeRun in your PVR client addon, this at least should give you (or others) the underlying framwork needed to add such support in the future is you/they wanted to.

@djp952, do you happen to know what encryption standards/methods that SiliconDust is using for its DRM protected streams?

Perhaps you could submit a request for comment to discuss whatever standard they use for peak3d inputstream.adaptive addon?

https://github.com/peak3d/inputstream.adaptive/issues

I know most commonly major content providers either use the "Common Encryption (CENC)" and/or "Encrypted Media Extensions (EME)" standards. Just curious SiliconDust is using one or both of those standards for HDHomeRun and if they would allow streaming of DRM protected content to a remote player like Kodi as long as DRM chain can remain intact, as it could with the mentioned addon?

peak3d also posts updates about DRM related development he is working on in kodi.tv forum and accepts feedback there too:

https://forum.kodi.tv/showthread.php?tid=303609

As I understand it peak3d goal is for his inputstream.adaptive addon to act as a framework or templare that could support all DRM?

I do not actually have any such channels myself (as I currently only recieve free-to-air channels, in Europe so via a DVB-T antenna).

[cvonk]

Thanks all for the replies. Didn't mean to start such a vivid discussion, but it has been very interesting following along.

It wasn't apparent to me that to record video from the tuner, Kodi needs a subscription on the HDHomeRun service. To help future generations of users, it would be nice if the error message was "no recording service found" instead of "unexpected error".

/c

[Hardax]

3. I have yet to see any recorded shows appear in the Recorded Shows section under TV (I'm running Confluence skin.) I can only see the actual file in my Recorded TV folder in explorer.

I believe that Kodi has a bug right now where you have to restart Kodi to see recorded items if Im not mistaken. There is a thread here somewhere talking about it.