The Crane Has Landed

Here are some other things I’ve learnt you need to do to get MythTV working with a Sky box, Ubuntu Gutsy and a PVR-150:

General

1. Make a directory called /usr/src/mythtv

EPG setup

1. Create and run channelsetup.sh to import the channels into the MythTV database
   
#!/bin/bash
wget http://epg.pvr.geek.nz/epg/listings-sky.xml.gz
gunzip -f listings-sky.xml.gz
mythfilldatabase --file 1 listings-sky.xml --do-channel-updates
2. Create a file called getEPG in /usr/local/bin (and chmod +x to make it executable) to get the channel data. Copy the following code into it:
   
#!/bin/bash
cd /usr/src/mythtv
wget http://epg.pvr.geek.nz/epg/listings-sky.xml.gz /usr/src/mythtv/listings-sky.xml.gz
gunzip -f /usr/src/mythtv/listings-sky.xml.gz /usr/src/mythtv
mythfilldatabase --no-delete --file 1 -1 /usr/src/mythtv/listings-sky.xml --update


   If you have webmin installed, set up a cron job to run this script once a week.

IR Blaster

1. The guide for setting up the PVR-150′s built-in IR blaster working is Mark’s guide from BlushingPenguin. Follow them, and the tip I found for the Gutsy patch, to get it so that your IR blaster is working. Key things to remember:
   • Gutsy comes with it’s own copy of IVTV so you don’t need to download that.
   • Run with the pre-patched version of lirc as Mark directs
   • The firmware goes in /lib/firmware
   • Sky Zenith boxes are code 482 in his master lircd.conf. Specifically, your /etc/lirc/lircd.conf needs to have the following for the blaster to work:
     
begin remote
name blaster
bits 32
flags RAW_CODES
eps 0
aeps 0
plead 0
gap 333333
repeat_bit 0
begin raw_codes
name 0
2179072000
name 1
2179072001
name 2
2179072002
name 3
2179072003
name 4
2179072004
name 5
2179072005
name 6
2179072006
name 7
2179072007
name 8
2179072008
name 9
2179072009
name POWER
2179072010
name CH_UP
2179072015
name CH_DOWN
2179072016
name CH_PREVIOUS
2179072019
end raw_codes
end remote

2. Make sure you have MythWeb installed. Go to the Channel Editor in Mythweb and make sure you have a channel number beside each channel to make them appear in the guide and MythWeb
3. Add a channel number to the freqid field too – otherwise the IR blaster won’t work
4. Create the following change-channel-lirc.pl in the /usr/local/bin folder (chmod +x so it can run):
   
#!/usr/bin/perl# make sure to set this string to
   # the corresponding remote in /etc/lircd.conf
   $remote_name = “blaster”;

   sub change_channel {
   my($channel_digit) = @_;
   system (“irsend SEND_ONCE $remote_name $channel_digit”);
   sleep 1;
   }

   $channel=$ARGV[0];
   sleep 1;
   if (length($channel) > 2) {
   change_channel(substr($channel,0,1));
   change_channel(substr($channel,1,1));
   change_channel(substr($channel,2,1));
   } elsif (length($channel) > 1) {
   change_channel(substr($channel,0,1));
   change_channel(substr($channel,1,1));
   } else {
   change_channel(substr($channel,0,1));
   }

5. Run mythtv-setup and put change_channel_lirc.pl in the external change channel field on the input card.