Enigma2 Backend

Overview

With the PVR build of XBMC it is possible to provide PVR- and DVR-like functionalities to the end-user. XBMC itself acts as a frontend and is connected to various backends, like tvheadend, VDR or mediaportal. With the VU+ addon XBMC PVR can be used also with a connected VU+ or any other enigma2 based settop box.

Supported settop boxes

In general all enigma2 based settop boxes should be supported, the following are known to work. If you can confirm that the addon works with a settop box not listed below, please take a moment and post this into the PVR support forum thread for this addon.

Known to work:

• VU+Uno
• VU+Duo
• VU+Ultimo
• DM800 HD (with Gemini image & OpenPLI)
• DM8000 (OpenPLI image)

Configuration

To configure the addon please change into section System->Addons->Installed Addons->PVR clients->VU+ Addon and click on the properties button.

This will open the properties dialog which is divided into three different tabs.

General

Within this tab the mandatory addon options need to be configured before it can be successfully enabled.

• VU+ hostname or IP address: Please enter the IP address or hostname of your enigma2 based settop box.
• Icon Path: In order to have XBMC display channel logos you have to copy the picons from your settop box onto your OpenELEC machine. You then need to specify this path in this property.
• Update Interval in minutes: As the settop box can also be used to modify timers, delete recordings etc. and the settop box does not notify the XBMC installation, the addon needs to regularly check for updates (new channels, new/changed/deletes timers, deleted recordings, etc.) This property defines how often the addon checks for updates.

Channels

Within this tab options that refer to channel data can be set.

• Folder for channeldata: Retrieving the channel data from the backend can take quite long. To avoid that the user has to wait a long time before the addon starts it stores the information about the available channels in a separate XML file. Instead of quering the backend the addon then tries to load the channels from this XML file during addon startup. This property defines into which directory this XML file will be put. The filename is "channeldata.xml". Also, the last played position of the recordings will be saved into this directory, so that the user can resume the playback of a previously stopped recording. The recording data is stored into the file "recordings.xml".
• Fetch only one TV bouquet: If this option is set than only the channels that are in one specified TV bouquet will be loaded, instead of fetching all available channels in all available bouquets.
• TV-Bouquet: If the previous option has been enabled you need to specify the TV bouquet to be fetched from the settop box. Please not that this is the bouquet-name as shown on the settop box (i.e. "Favourites (TV)"). This setting is case-sensitive.
• Check for bouquet updates: If this option is set the addon will check for bouquet updates after the initial addon startup. If this option is disabled it will only use the bouquets stored in the channeldata.xml file.
• Check for channel updates: If this option is set the addon will check for channel updates after the initial addon startup. If this option is disabled it will only use the channels stored in the channeldata.xml file.
• Zap before channelswitch (i.e. for Single Tuner boxes): When using the addon with a single tuner box it may be necessary that the addon needs to be able to zap to another channel on the settop box. If this option is enabled each channel switch in XBMC will also result in a channel switch on the settop box. Please note that "allow channel switching" needs to be enabled in the webinterface on the settop box.

Advanced

Within this tab more uncommon and advanced options can be configured.

• Streaming Port: This option defines the streaming port the settop box uses to stream live tv. The default is 8001 which should be fine if the user did not define a custom port within the webinterface.
• Webinterface Port: This option defines the port that should be used to access the webinterface of the settop box.
• Username: If the webinterface of the settop box is protected with a username / password combination this needs to be set in this option.
• Password: If the webinterface of the settop box is protected with a username / password combination this needs to be set in this option.
• Recording folder on receiver: Per default the addon does not specify the recording folder in newly created timers, so the default set in the settop box will be used. If you want to specify a different folder (i.e. because you want all recordings scheduled via XBMC to be stored in a separate folder), then you need to set this option.
• Use only the DVB boxes' current recording path: If this option is not set the addon will fetch all available recordings from all configured pathes from the settop box. If this option is set then it will only list recordings that are stored within the "current recording path" on the settop box.
• Automatic Timerlist Cleanup: If this option is set then the addon will send the command to delete completed timers from the settop box after each update interval.
• Send DeepStandby-Command: If this option is set then the addon will send the DeepStandby-Command to the settop box when XBMC will be closed (or the addon will be deactivated), causing the settop box to shutdown into DeepStandby.

Support

If you have problems using this addon you should try and contact the author via the XBMC PVR support forum.

Changelog

0.3.3:

• add: support for storing the last played positions for recordings. These will be stored in the file recordings.xml
• fix: if the webinterface cannot be loaded, deactivate the addon

0.3.2:

• fix: continue to load channels even if we do not have any radio channels

0.3.1:

• change: remove XMLParser- change: add enigma2 to the displayname

0.3.0:

• change: remove curl dependancy
• change: adjust to new PVR API

0.2.8:

• add: option to only fetch one TV bouquet which can be specified via the addon settings

0.2.7:

• fix: fix incorrect escape character for & (use '&' instead of '"'). Thx to 'hani' for pointing this out.

0.2.6:

• cosmetic: remove unnecessary '/' in recording-stream url
• cosmetic: inprove log output- change: get the proper device info from the reveiver box instead of just setting dummy values
• change: change the buildzip.bat to include version string in the name of the zip-file
• change: introduce a version string for the channeldata xml file so that we can invalidate old channeldata files if necessary

0.2.5:

• fix: cleanup the service reference in the streaming url

0.2.4

• fix: put username & password into the streaming url0.2.3
• fix: put username & password into recording-url

0.2.2:

• fix: escape xml entities in the stream-url before saving to channeldata.xml
• fix: fetch the version string from configure.in not the ChangeLog (thanks to 'trans')
• fix: rename changelog in addon-directory to changelog.txt

0.2.1:

• fix: encode the stream-url properly. Please remove your channeldata.xml file after updating
• change: add proper version string to the addon.xml generated by buildzip.bat (thanks to 'trans')

0.2.0:

• change: Complete rework of timer handling. Now it will only show notifications for changed items
• fix: Update / Add / Delete Timers. Note that the timer names in the XBMC are sometimes not updated properly (in the dialog it is OK)
• fix: Instant Recordings do now work again- fix: timer status is now shown correctly (completed, recording, disabled)
• fix: enabling / disabling timers do now work- change: removed "show completed timers" option (they are now always be shown)
• add: added buildzip.bat & xbmc-addon-vuplus.sln (thanks to 'trans')
• fix: Channel numbering / incorrect picons due to the change introduced in 0.1.15

0.1.15

• fix: when using the channeldata-store option not all channel groups (bouquets) were loaded due to a nulled counter variable

0.1.14

• change: change .gitignores and copy current changelog into the addon folder. This will enable the user to view the changelog in the addon settings window

0.1.13

• add: option to set deepstandby powerstate on the DVB box on PVR-addon shutdown
• fix: error in settings.xml, causing crashes on linux

0.1.12

• add: support to specify the folder for storing recordings

0.1.11

• fix: some unicode string errors in german language file
• change: add categories to addon settings0.1.10
• add: support for using only the recording path currently active on the DVB box

0.1.9

• change: add addon icon (copyied from the openelec guys, thanks!)
• fix: win32 release target (thanks to 'trans' for patch)

0.1.8

• change: fetch the recording locations and use these locations when querying the recordings
• fix: Stop update thread when destroying the PVR addon - fixes shutdown issues

0.1.7

• fix: Copy & Paste error

0.1.6

• fix: Change the logic to determine the picon file name from the service reference.

0.1.5

• fix: Fix access violation errors on windows (thanks to 'trans' for finding the correct compiler / linker settings)
• fix: do not return out of scope local variable for the streaming URL
• fix: remove the last '_' character from the filename (if applicable). Should finally fix the picon path errors.

0.1.4

• fix: limit length of the service reference part of the Icon-Path to 30 characters.
• fix: Escape "&", "<" and ">" characters in XML channeldata file.
• add: support to disable all bouquet or channel updates

0.1.3

• fix: order of timerlist cleanup and timerlist updates

0.1.2

• add: support for storing channel data into a file

0.1.1

• fix: URLEncode the service reference when fetching EPG

0.1.0

• Iniital Version