Record Settings Lost

[Bryan]

With the latest version of DVBViewer 3.6.1.2 the record settings held in timers.xml and timers.bak are wiped out and the files are intialised to read

 

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>

<settings/>

 

On several occasions I have entered recordings to be done by DVBViewer and in several of these occasions DVBViewer has deleted all my recording before the jobs were scheduled to be completed.

 

I would imagine that DVBViewer would normally update both the timers.xml and timers.bak files following the completion of a recording to remove that particular recording from the list. I would also imagine that the other occasion when these files are changed is following an update of an existing job, or the inserting of a new recording schedule. Because of the problems I have been having with this I have been taking backups of both these files twice a day. Once at 10am and the other at 3 pm. As you can see from the timers.xml backed up this morning there were several jobs scheduled to take place in the future.

 

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>

<settings>

<section name="VCR">

<entry name="0">Party Animals;1650659460|BBC TWO;21.03.2007;20:57:00;21:53:00;3;-------;0;True;True</entry>

<entry name="1">The Trial of Saddam Hussein;1650659460|BBC TWO;21.03.2007;23:22:00;00:18:00;3;-------;0;True;True</entry>

<entry name="2">The Sopranos;1647386816|Channel 4;19.03.2007;23:02:00;00:18:00;3;-------;0;True;True</entry>

<entry name="3">Desperate Housewives;1647386816|Channel 4;21.03.2007;21:57:00;23:08:00;3;-------;0;True;True</entry>

<entry name="4">Ugly Betty;1647386816|Channel 4;23.03.2007;20:57:00;22:03:00;3;-------;0;True;True</entry>

<entry name="5">Prison Break;2005021250|Five;19.03.2007;21:57:00;23:02:00;3;-------;0;True;True</entry>

<entry name="6">The Gadget Show;2005021250|Five;19.03.2007;19:12:00;20:01:00;3;-------;0;True;True</entry>

</section>

</settings>

 

At 12:30pm today 2.5 hours after the backup, I went into DVBViewer to check my record Settings and found that DVBViewer had removed all of my record settings! During this time no recordings had taken place and no alterations were manually made to the 'Record Settings'. Thus I can see no logical reasons for the files to have been altered in any way.

 

The timers.xml file had been changed by DVBViewer to read

 

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>

<settings/>

 

I was hoping that by backing these files up I would atleast be able to copy them back to the DVBVierer directory and not lose my settings the next time I had a problem. Unfortuantely everytime I try and copy them back to the DVBViewer directory the program initialises them again and removes all the settings.

 

Under what circumstances does DVBViewer initialise or wipes the timers.xml and timers.bak files?

 

How can I get DVBViewer to accept the backups of the record settings so that I do not have to enter them all again into the system each time this happens?

timers_2007_03_19_10_00_29.xml

DVBViewer.zip

[yannfanch]

Hello.

I can testify to the same problem, and almost once on two, if it is not more, I lose my recordings. DvbService is ok (Start), and that I leave DVBViewer closed or open on the good channel, the recordings are not done and disappeared from the timer .

I 'm also waiting an answer...

Regards

[th00]

Hi,

this is getting very troublesome! I too loose all my scheduled recordings in timers.xml every now and then.

 

I haven't found the reason for it, i just notice it when i see that i've (again) missed some recordings i had scheduled.

Dvbservice is running, everything looks good when i close DVBViewer. But then later when i want to check my recordings they are not there and when i open DVBViewer all my scheduled recordings are gone.

 

I then check timers.xml and notice that it've been changed to a file without any scheduled recordings.

 

This is a very serious problem since i only use this program to be able to record things. Perhaps the problem is at the user end, but then someone should help us that reports this by telling us what we're doing wrong.

 

cheers

support.zip

[th00]

Hi again,

any chance of getting some feedback on this problem?

 

kind regards

[Lars_MQ]

Please update to the current version.

[th00]

oops. my mistake for thinking v3.6.1.2 is the same as v3.6.1.20, otherwise i would ofcourse have done that before posting here.

 

thanks for pointing that out. Now I'll keep my fingers crossed that it'll work!

[freud]

ok, i upgraded to newest version as suggested and it worked for a while, but today when i started DVBViewer, all my recording settings were lost and timers.xml was empty...

 

is it just me and the other guys in this thread with this problem??

 

please advice.

 

 

NOTE: something went wrong with my account (th00) so i had to re-register..

[Lars_MQ]

Make sure your antivirus software doesn't interfere. I think I remember a report, where the antivirus software blocked and checked the timers.xml because the service saved it, just when the viewer wanted to load it.

[smayall]

I have the same problem too and I'm using 3.6.1.20. I've found that if either the DVBViewer service is running or DVBViewer itself and the recording list is empty, one of them will write it's memory contents (no entries) to the file timer.xml every so often.

 

Therefore, there is no point in making any changes to this file with either the service or program running. Here's what I did to make a backup which I can use:

 

1) Exit the service by right-clicking on the icon in the system tray and choose exit

2) In DVBViewer, choose file/exit

 

With nothing running, you can make any changes you like to the file and nothing else is interfering. For example, if you delete the last entry, save the file and start DVBViewer, you will find the last entry missing as expected.

 

So here's what I do for a workaround now......

 

1) Start DVBViewer and then EPG.

2) Schedule my programs using right-click and Send To PVR

3) When I've finished, copy the file timer.xml to timerbackup.xml

 

If there's a problem (list cleared GRRRRR!)

 

1) Close the service and DVBViewer program

2) Copy the file timerbackup.xml to timer.xml

3) Start DVBViewer

 

Presto! There it is again!

 

This is one of those irritating intermittent problems and so hard to reproduce and diagnose. My guess it could be a problem with the service active and you start DVBViewer. This disables the service automatically, but I wonder if the timer.xml disk writes in the service are disabled too? Could there be a race condition here, with the program and service competing?

 

After all this it's a flippin' brilliant program. Definately worth the money.

 

Keep Smilin'

 

Steve

[Lars_MQ]

1) Exit the service by right-clicking on the icon in the system tray and choose exit

This does only exit the systemtray program. Use stop and start in the menu to control the service.

 

I never expirenced such behavior. And normaly before any changes to the timers.xml are written a backup of the file is created (timers.bak).