OLD: Unofficial Kodi PVR Client for HDHomeRun DVR subscribers

[NYPlayer]

I agree!

This sounds great!

Yeah they had a Godzilla Marathon and someone in my household recorded them all.... I wonder Who ?? ... my list is long.

[otaku]

I have what's probably a stupid question.

Is there a way to only start the guide at the current date and time? Reason is if I want to access the options in the left hand margin I need to scroll an entire day of listings to activate the options.

I must have missed a setting somewhere.

[NYPlayer]

I have what's probably a stupid question.

Is there a way to only start the guide at the current date and time? Reason is if I want to access the options in the left hand margin I need to scroll an entire day of listings to activate the options.

I must have missed a setting somewhere.

Same here ... I see when in the guide I longPress on round button on the Shield (Right Click on Windows) I get a popup with different selections maybe one of them should be Options.

[dski]

I loaded it up and the guides and everything show but everytime I try to select a channel to watch and select switch, nothing happens. Any ideas?

[dski]

I went to delete the plugin and saw that there is an option to 'Allow live TV streaming' which is Off by default when you load the plugin. If I turn this on then I can get live streaming.

Problem is when I turn this on, then the stream shows but you can't timeshift or record. Any thoughts? Another thing that happens is when I have this off, the Importing guide for clients takes minutes to complete rather than a few seconds.

High hopes for this. The one from silicondust is really clunky to navigate. Thanks for the hard work!

[vjr]

Ok here's a debug log illustrating the problem I'm having with Comcast "Music Choice" channels. I also included an audio-only channel at the end for comparison:

https://pastebin.com/nrTqWnyf

And here's a debug log with the streaming directly from the HDHR Prime box:

http://sprunge.us/bZZZ

I get NO response on the MC channels directly from the box. It tries to tune in and just times out. The audio only channel is ok.

[NYPlayer]

I went to delete the plugin and saw that there is an option to 'Allow live TV streaming' which is Off by default when you load the plugin. If I turn this on then I can get live streaming.

Problem is when I turn this on, then the stream shows but you can't timeshift or record. Any thoughts? Another thing that happens is when I have this off, the Importing guide for clients takes minutes to complete rather than a few seconds.

High hopes for this. The one from silicondust is really clunky to navigate. Thanks for the hard work!

viewtopic.php?f=88&t=64143&start=270#p298011

[dski]

Thanks for the reply. I just read through but My problem is a little different though. I am not getting anything. Not a play arrow or anything. If I bring up the context menu and click Play...nothing as well. It is as if the button wasn't clicked.

If I switch to the stream, immediately works.

[Ken.F]

Thanks for the reply. I just read through but My problem is a little different though. I am not getting anything. Not a play arrow or anything. If I bring up the context menu and click Play...nothing as well. It is as if the button wasn't clicked.

If I switch to the stream, immediately works.

Are you a HDHomeRun DVR subscriber?

[dski]

Thanks for the reply. I just read through but My problem is a little different though. I am not getting anything. Not a play arrow or anything. If I bring up the context menu and click Play...nothing as well. It is as if the button wasn't clicked.

If I switch to the stream, immediately works.

Are you a HDHomeRun DVR subscriber?

Yes. If I use the HDHomerun Win10 App, I can record and view just fine.

When in Kodi, it shows the channels in the guide data but does not show any of the recordings or allow Live TV. I also did a fresh install of Win10, Kodi 17.3 and latest HD homerun an hour ago to make sure there wasn't anything old hanging around but have the same behavior.

Also, both the HDHomerun app and the other HDHomerun app under PVR clients will stream the channels. The HDhomerun plugin (doesn't use the native Kodi) will allow me to schedule recordings as well.

Really want this one to work! I have used Kodi for years with Media Center

[djp952]

Yes. If I use the HDHomerun Win10 App, I can record and view just fine.

When in Kodi, it shows the channels in the guide data but does not show any of the recordings or allow Live TV. I also did a fresh install of Win10, Kodi 17.3 and latest HD homerun an hour ago to make sure there wasn't anything old hanging around but have the same behavior.

Also, both the HDHomerun app and the other HDHomerun app under PVR clients will stream the channels. The HDhomerun plugin (doesn't use the native Kodi) will allow me to schedule recordings as well.

Really want this one to work! I have used Kodi for years with Media Center

Hmmmm... it sounds like it can't get any information from the RECORD engine (DVR service), just about everything relies upon that service to be running somewhere and accessible. Time for browser fun!

From your browser (anywhere on your LAN should be OK, but if you can do this from the Kodi box that's ideal):

>> http://my.hdhomerun.com/discover

You should get back a text-based list that has entries for all your tuners and the storage (RECORD) engine. You're looking for one that has a "StorageID" value as opposed to "DeviceID" values. This is the storage engine. If you have no entries with "StorageID", there is the problem right there -- where did you install the DVR Service, and is there something like a software firewall running that might prevent it from getting on your network?

If you do get a "StorageID" value, find the matching "DiscoverURL" and "StorageURL" values. Try browsing to those, do you get data back?

[dski]

Yes. If I use the HDHomerun Win10 App, I can record and view just fine.

When in Kodi, it shows the channels in the guide data but does not show any of the recordings or allow Live TV. I also did a fresh install of Win10, Kodi 17.3 and latest HD homerun an hour ago to make sure there wasn't anything old hanging around but have the same behavior.

Also, both the HDHomerun app and the other HDHomerun app under PVR clients will stream the channels. The HDhomerun plugin (doesn't use the native Kodi) will allow me to schedule recordings as well.

Really want this one to work! I have used Kodi for years with Media Center

Hmmmm... it sounds like it can't get any information from the RECORD engine (DVR service), just about everything relies upon that service to be running somewhere and accessible. Time for browser fun!

From your browser (anywhere on your LAN should be OK, but if you can do this from the Kodi box that's ideal):

>> http://my.hdhomerun.com/discover

You should get back a text-based list that has entries for all your tuners and the storage (RECORD) engine. You're looking for one that has a "StorageID" value as opposed to "DeviceID" values. This is the storage engine. If you have no entries with "StorageID", there is the problem right there -- where did you install the DVR Service, and is there something like a software firewall running that might prevent it from getting on your network?

If you do get a "StorageID" value, find the matching "DiscoverURL" and "StorageURL" values. Try browsing to those, do you get data back?

Here is what I get back.


[
{
"DeviceID": "131B24C7",
"LocalIP": "192.168.1.171",
"ConditionalAccess": 1,
"BaseURL": "http://192.168.1.171:80",
"DiscoverURL": "http://192.168.1.171:80/discover.json",
"LineupURL": "http://192.168.1.171:80/lineup.json"
}
]

If I browse to the DiscoverURL then I get this:

{"FriendlyName":"HDHomeRun PRIME","ModelNumber":"HDHR3-CC","FirmwareName":"hdhomerun3_cablecard","FirmwareVersion":"20170612beta1","DeviceID":"131B24C7","DeviceAuth":"XM8dNnd62tXZlimQe0RqPAgw","TunerCount":3,"ConditionalAccess":1,"BaseURL":"http://192.168.1.171:80","LineupURL":"http://192.168.1.171:80/lineup.json"}




If I open up the Windows 10 HDHomerun app, I can record there and it records to the folder that is configured. I can also playback the recorded items. It is running on the same box (and I did the steps above on that same box) as what I am running Kodi on.

It also shows in the HDhomerun setup as that the DVR service account is active as well.

[djp952]

Ok here's a debug log illustrating the problem I'm having with Comcast "Music Choice" channels. I also included an audio-only channel at the end for comparison:

https://pastebin.com/nrTqWnyf

And here's a debug log with the streaming directly from the HDHR Prime box:

http://sprunge.us/bZZZ

I get NO response on the MC channels directly from the box. It tries to tune in and just times out. The audio only channel is ok.

One thing jumped out at me immediately, not related to your problem (first log):

Code: Select all

12:14:11.127 T:139663201265408   ERROR: AddOnLog: HDHomeRun DVR PVR Client: ADDON_Create failed due to an unhandled exception: SQL logic error or missing database (1): http request on [http://ipv4.my.hdhomerun.com/discover] failed: Couldn't resolve host name

This is kinda bad, it wasn't able to resolve 'ipv4.my.hdhomerun.com' during initialization. Not being able to reliably get there can cause other difficulties, but you should see similar logs if that's the case. If this is a common occurrence you may find things not updating reliably, but has nothing to do whatsoever with streaming in and of itself.

Back to the problem at hand! In the first log I see the tune requests for channel 950, channel 949 and channel 967. But, to my eyes at least everything looks ok? The handoff to Kodi seems OK and it appears to have locked in on the content all three times. I can see that the last channel only has an audio stream, but Kodi/ffmpeg don't seem to be indicating anything is immediately wrong with any of them.

I do see a lot of these:

Code: Select all

DEBUG: ActiveAE::SyncStream - average error of 695.177797, start adjusting

I can't claim to know much about how the audio/video streams are actually processed by Kodi, very very little actually, but these sound kinda like they may relate to your buffering concerns.

Based on the description and the logs, I'm afraid I don't see anything that I would be able to do anything about in the PVR code. The request to the RECORD engine (or tuners) is working, there are no instances of what I was worried about (a message from the PVR saying 'zero-length read'), and when you ran directly against the tuners in the second log, the PVR was only involved to tell Kodi the URL, it did all the work, and you ended up with the same result.

For whatever reason it seems Kodi/ffmpeg just doesn't like your music channels

Have you tried the official Kodi HDHomeRun PVR addon? I expect the end result will be the same, BUT you get the benefit of being able to ask the Kodi peeps if they can help. I think this may be your best option at this point; if there is a problem to solve it really feels like it's inside of Kodi.

Sorry. I hate to pawn you off on Kodi but this one is beyond my level of expertise.

[djp952]

Here is what I get back.


[
{
"DeviceID": "131B24C7",
"LocalIP": "192.168.1.171",
"ConditionalAccess": 1,
"BaseURL": "http://192.168.1.171:80",
"DiscoverURL": "http://192.168.1.171:80/discover.json",
"LineupURL": "http://192.168.1.171:80/lineup.json"
}
]

If I browse to the DiscoverURL then I get this:

{"FriendlyName":"HDHomeRun PRIME","ModelNumber":"HDHR3-CC","FirmwareName":"hdhomerun3_cablecard","FirmwareVersion":"20170612beta1","DeviceID":"131B24C7","DeviceAuth":"XM8dNnd62tXZlimQe0RqPAgw","TunerCount":3,"ConditionalAccess":1,"BaseURL":"http://192.168.1.171:80","LineupURL":"http://192.168.1.171:80/lineup.json"}




If I open up the Windows 10 HDHomerun app, I can record there and it records to the folder that is configured. I can also playback the recorded items. It is running on the same box (and I did the steps above on that same box) as what I am running Kodi on.

This is definitely the root of your concern, at least. The storage engine isn't visible via the HTTP API. I'm not certain if the official application uses the HTTP API or the broadcast API, but the only thing the PVR can see is your one PRIME tuner. Pretty much nothing in this PVR works if it has no RECORD engine available.

One thing you can try is go into the PVR add-on Configuration and toggle "Use network broadcast for device discovery":

https://github.com/djp952/pvr.hdhomerun ... ersion-104

What this option does is bypass my.hdhomerun.com to search for tuners and the storage engine and use the old school method provided by SiliconDust in their library code, it might provide different results. If not then we definitely have to get SiliconDust involved since the RECORD engine isn't showing up on my.hdhomerun.com. I'm betting a sneaky firewall rule in in play, but they would know best.

Let us know if changing to broadcast discovery has any effect for ya.

[djp952]

I just wanted to extend a sincere thank you for the development on this application. It is kind of shocking how rudimentary some of the PVR frontends are and you have been gracious enough to make this add-on. The one issue I had, the main menu not saving my changes, was easily fixed by choosing the power/exit button instead of force closing, and now everything is working very well.

One thing that would be nice would be a faster sync for recorded programs, 5 minutes isn't bad but 30 seconds would be ideal I think. Not sure if that would create too much load though....

I encourage you to post your PayPal info, you spend your time on this and I think you deserve compensation!!

You're very welcome, it's been my pleasure to share. While I sincerely appreciate the offer I actually prefer no compensation, for a few reasons -- one big one is that all this cool stuff is really courtesy of SiliconDust and their hard work, this is nothing more than an unauthorized and glorified front-end to their services - they've even let us fill out 22 pages of posts on their forums without ever complaining!

As for faster syncs, not a problem. I can add 30 second and 1 minute options to all the local network discoveries next time around if you think those are reasonable; jotted down on the "todo" list! The local network discoveries are the devices, channel lineups, and recordings. I don't foresee any ill-effects, if nothing changes from sync to sync it ends up being a no-operation; even over Wifi the network traffic generated by these discoveries is pretty negligible. If 30 seconds is too fast, you can always crank it back up!

Consider it done.