Network Recorder doesn't work with SSP IPTV

[stefan.becker@…]

I'm trying to configure MythTV for the IPTV offered by my finnish provider SSP. See ticket #7721 for the configuration details.

• if I run "mplayer udp://224.10.1.1:1111" everything works fine -> multicast setup and UDP multicast receiption works correctly on the MythTV box

With "netstat -ulnp" I see:

Proto Recv-Q Send-Q Local Address               Foreign Address             State       PID/Program name   
udp        0      0 224.10.1.1:1111             0.0.0.0:*                               26357/mplayer       

• Now I tune in "Watch Live TV" to channel 601 or create a recording on channel 601 (same UDP stream URL):
  • mythbackend sets up the multicast
  • I can see the UDP multicast data streaming in on the network device with "tcpdump" or a log line in "iptables -t filter -I INPUT"
  • Live TV: black screen, OSD shows "Partial Lock"
  • Recording: creates a small, non MPEG2 TS file

With "netstat -ulnp" I see:

Proto Recv-Q Send-Q Local Address               Foreign Address             State       PID/Program name   
udp   110880      0 224.10.1.1:1111             0.0.0.0:*                               26661/mythbackend   

I interpret this as: data is queueing up on the socket, but is not read by the mythbackend process.

If you need more debugging data, please tell me how to collect it and I will add it to this ticket.

[mark@…]

My network recorder does not work either.

I've tried on an upgraded system that previously worked under .21 and a fresh install of ubuntu 9.10 with version 22594 on it (the nightly auto-build).

The error message I'm receiving is "Error: MythTV is using all inputs, but there are no active recordings?"

In System Information the tuner shows as 'asleep'.

[mark@…]

mythbuntu log grabber file

[mark@…]

Tried again last night with a more up to date version. Now instead of 'asleep' the network card (tuner 1) is reported as having an error. The 'Channel Scan' button also appears not to work (the db is not populated from the .m3u file), so deleting the existing channels in mythconverg from before the upgrade doesn't appear to be an option at this point. I'm attaching a log file.

MythTV Version : 22953 MythTV Branch : trunk Network Protocol : 52 Library API : 0.23.20091201-1 QT Version : 4.5.2 Options compiled in:

linux debug using_oss using_alsa using_pulse using_jack using_pulseoutput using_backend using_dvb using_firewire using_frontend using_glx_proc_addr_arb using_hdhomerun using_hdpvr using_iptv using_ivtv using_joystick_menu using_libfftw3 using_lirc using_mheg using_opengl_video using_opengl_vsync using_qtwebkit using_v4l using_x11 using_xrandr using_xv using_xvmc using_xvmc_vld using_xvmcw using_bindings_perl using_bindings_python using_opengl using_vdpau using_ffmpeg_threads using_libavc_5_3 using_live using_mheg

[Stefan <the_stevee@…>]

I'm having similar problems: after upgrade to ubuntu 9.10 and 0.22 (23230) I cannot use the channel scanner for my Austrian IPTV provider anymore. in the mythbackend logfile:

2010-01-09 20:32:39.376 IPTVChanFetch, Error: Invalid channel list header ()
2010-01-09 20:32:39.399 IPTVChan(1): Loaded 0 channels from /home/stefan/Desktop/test.m3u
2010-01-09 20:32:39.425 MythBackend, Error: No valid capture cards are defined in the database.

i can watch the channels with another .m3u for vlc.

[stefan.becker@…]

Retested with MythTV 0.23-rc2: still the same problem.

[stefan.becker@…]

Retested with MythTV 0.24-rc1 (r26998): still the same problem.

[stefan.becker@…]

I finally sat down and started poking around to find out what might be wrong. I had already figured out that the IPTV recorder is using the live555 libraries. So I started to hack together a test program based on IPTV recorder and live555 test program code.

When I ran the test program on my mediabox I stumbled over the following error message:

$ ./live555-test 
Step 1: inet_aton()
Step 2: scheduler
Step 3: env
Unable to determine our source address: This computer has an invalid IP address: 0x0
Step 4: socket
Step 5: source
Step 6: sink
Beginning receiving multicast stream...

A little search on the Internet found this ​thread in the VLC forum, which pointed me in the right direction: a broken /etc/hosts!

Test for broken /etc/hosts:

$ ping $(hostname)
PING mediabox (127.0.0.1) 56(84) bytes of data.
64 bytes from mediabox (127.0.0.1): icmp_req=1 ttl=64 time=0.042 ms

If you get 127.0.0.1 then your /etc/hosts is broken and live555 will not be able to find the correct IP address for its receiving socket. After fixing /etc/hosts you'll get instead:

$ ping $(hostname)
PING mediabox (192.168.2.3) 56(84) bytes of data.
64 bytes from mediabox (192.168.2.3): icmp_req=1 ttl=64 time=0.042 ms

$ ./live555-test 
Step 1: inet_aton()
Step 2: scheduler
Step 3: env
Step 4: socket
Step 5: source
Step 6: sink
Beginning receiving multicast stream...

After that change MythTV was finally able to record from IPTV streams. Yeah!

Please close this report.

I hope that in the future my description will help others to fix their problem. This might be something for the MythTV wiki.

[robertm]

Thank you for reporting back.