# A Request to the R15 Development Team



## Wolffpack (Jul 29, 2003)

Would you please fix the continuous problem R15 users are having with the Search, and Autorecord function displaying/recording results on channels we do not receive? Please Please Please.

Our Access Card knows the channels we receive. Why oh why cannot the Search and Autorecord function on the R15 also use this same logic/information? I can't watch these channels, why does the R15 want to record them or even show me matches on those channels? Unless, of course, that's a "feature". Which I would see as a :icon_lame answer.

I'm not expecting a response, just something that REALLY should be addressed. IMO.


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## klwillis (Apr 11, 2006)

I was having the same problem with the local channels.
My local PBS channel is 9. I create a Auto Record for Keyword "Charlie Rose".
It would record Charlie Rose on channel 384 which I do not have.
But about a month back for some reason it started to record channel 9 which is correct.

I also had a AutoRecord for Keyword "PGA Golf" because you cannot create a series link for more than one channel for the same title name.
And when PGA would come on ABC it always recorded on the wrong channel 386 instead of my local ABC channel 7.

But I have to say its actually been working correctly for awhile now.

I wonder how many people its actually working for?

Keith



Wolffpack said:


> Would you please fix the continuous problem R15 users are having with the Search, and Autorecord function displaying/recording results on channels we do not receive? Please Please Please.
> 
> Our Access Card knows the channels we receive. Why oh why cannot the Search and Autorecord function on the R15 also use this same logic/information? I can't watch these channels, why does the R15 want to record them or even show me matches on those channels? Unless, of course, that's a "feature". Which I would see as a :icon_lame answer.
> 
> I'm not expecting a response, just something that REALLY should be addressed. IMO.


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## saleen351 (Mar 28, 2006)

I agree, this is the dumbest thing i've seen about this box, some one dropped the ball... 

Hopefully would speed up the procees of searching..


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## walters (Nov 18, 2005)

The funny thing is it doesn't even need to be that sophisticated. Simply favoring lower channel numbers over higher channel numbers (natural from a programming point-of-view and almost always correct for the end user) would do it.


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## Upstream (Jul 4, 2006)

favoring lower channel numbers would not solve the problem if a sporting event is on a RSN I don't get and a higher numbered sports PPV channel I do get.


Or in my case, I want to record NY Mets games. If I set up an autorecord for Mets, I get about 65 items (which would quickly overflow my TDL --- but that is a separate, though related, issue).

Todays Mets-Cubs game is on 206 ESPN, 625 SNY, 640 CSNC, and 734 MLB.

In my market, the game would be blacked out on 206 ESPN, and I would see it on 625 SNY. I don't subscribe to the other channels. If it tried to record the game on both tuners, I would be OK since I would get a blank 206 ESPN recording and the valid 625 SNY recording.

If I lived in Chicago, and it recorded the two lowest number channels, I would get two blank recordings from 206 ESPN and 625 SNY. I would need to record 640 CSNC.


The system needs to recognize which channels are in your subscription package plus recognize if the channel is blacked out.

(And it also needs to have more than a 100 limit on the ToDo list so I can set up autorecords for the Mets + Yankees + Giants + Jets + college basketball + other shows I want to record.)


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## walters (Nov 18, 2005)

My fault for not being a sports fan, although I did say "almost always correct". I was thinking mostly of the LiL versus national network feeds problem.


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## ChrisWyso (Nov 16, 2005)

I also asked about this in the forum, if anyone knew what "list" it looks at to know what to record from. Previous TiVo owners know the first thing to do with a new unit it to set your "Channels You Receive" list.

"Channels I Get"

-Chris


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## Earl Bonovich (Nov 15, 2005)

As most of you know..

This "feature" was disabled, probably about 4 months ago. Due to an issue with accurately reflecting RSN's and enabled "free views"

About two weeks ago, I asked about the feature.
At the time, I was told that it "WILL" be renabled, but probably not for a few months.


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## ad301 (Mar 30, 2004)

Earl Bonovich said:


> As most of you know..
> 
> This "feature" was disabled, probably about 4 months ago. Due to an issue with accurately reflecting RSN's and enabled "free views"
> 
> ...


Earl, which feature are you referring to? Finds have always, since the first release, returned matches on all channels, including channels you don't receive, such as unsubscribed premium sports subscriptions. What Wolffpack is requesting in the original post would be a new capability, one that is sorely needed. Even better would be the ability to limit searches to favorite channel lists defined by the user.


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## Earl Bonovich (Nov 15, 2005)

It woudl be the one where "Channels You Receive" is properly populated for the channels you actually receive.

Those are used for the "Auto-Record", but not for the Search (that woudl be new)


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## Wolffpack (Jul 29, 2003)

So when you pull up a search it will list list all channels and when you convert that to an autorecord it R15 will be smart enough to not schedule shows on channels you do not receive? Is that correct?


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## ad301 (Mar 30, 2004)

Earl Bonovich said:


> It woudl be the one where "Channels You Receive" is properly populated for the channels you actually receive.
> 
> Those are used for the "Auto-Record", but not for the Search (that woudl be new)


I'm sorry Earl, but that is just wrong. Auto-Record, since the first release, has never recorded only from the "Channels You Receive". It has always recorded from any channel. It was one of the first things I tested for, and it was one of the first things I reported on back in November. See this thread, for example: http://www.dbstalk.com/showthread.php?p=475770#post475770

And I have pointed this out, time after time, whenever this erroneous premise is raised. I have even posted screenshots from November demonstrating it. Populating the "Channels You Receive" properly and automatically, by itself, will NOT cure the problem. The Find function has NEVER used the Channels You Receive list. And, after all, auto-records are simply Finds (or Searches) set to record, are they not?


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## Earl Bonovich (Nov 15, 2005)

My apologizes, but I thought that is how a lot of people had setup their Olympics to record in February.

And mid-olympics is when they flipped off the auto-detect.
And people then started having the unit record on channels they didn't have.

Thank you for the corrections.


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## ad301 (Mar 30, 2004)

No problem, that's a piece of misinformation that the developers don't need confusing them. Whether or not an Olympics AR was working prior to a certain time may just have been lucky. The poster of that theory has ducked out of numerous requests to try to clarify what he was seeing. But there is no question that ARs have never paid attention the the channels you receive, and if they are to fix the Search function, they need to be aware of that.


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## Wolffpack (Jul 29, 2003)

There are many issues remaining, however the Search functionality....or lack of....is quickly appearing as an issue that could be causing many other problems.

What if the process that fills the TDL also uses the faulty search logic that we have access to. It would seem logical that when I create a SL for Stargate the R15 calls the same search routine that the Search Function calls to determine which shows should be added to the TDL. If that same search routine is flawed, the results in the TDL will also be flawed.


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## ad301 (Mar 30, 2004)

I agree. I've tried running the Find/Search issue up the flagpole many times, starting back when I first got an r15, and there haven't been too many salutes!


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## Sammy2368 (Jul 12, 2006)

I had that issue tonight. I have CSI at a higher priority than MASH, and it was going to record CSI on a channel I didn't receive instead of recording MASH on a channel I do receive.

Come on DirecTV. If Dish Network can do it, so can you.


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## FLWingNut (Nov 19, 2005)

Like others have said, this is a major issue -- and the major reason (along with no useable "history") I haven't bumped the R15 to my main viewing room. We use the wishlist feature on our D*Tivo a lot. I know the AR isn't exactly the same thing, but if it would just use channels we actually get, that would be close enough for me.


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## irmolars (Mar 12, 2006)

Good luck.
They can't even get this machine to run stable yet.
And you want extras.
Lets just get it to do what it is supposed to do first, and that is to record.


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## Wolffpack (Jul 29, 2003)

My underlying thoughts here are that properly coded search logic may indeed help the R15 record properly. I don't consider having the search function work correctly asking for any extras.


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## zortapa (Nov 16, 2005)

Earl Bonovich said:


> My apologizes, but I thought that is how a lot of people had setup their Olympics to record in February.
> 
> And mid-olympics is when they flipped off the auto-detect.
> And people then started having the unit record on channels they didn't have.
> ...


Earl -- sorry for the delayed reply!

Yes, you are correct. At least you are being consistent with your explanation to me last February..... http://www.dbstalk.com/showthread.php?p=536248#post536248

I'm not exactly sure what is causing the problem that ad310 has, but before the middle of February my autorecords worked exactly as I had expected them to work. That is, they only recorded on the channels that I had defined in my favorites. Specifically, I did this by defining a set of channels for my favorites by first selecting the channels that I receive and then deleting a dozen or so channels that I did not want to be used for my autorecordings, and then I assigned this list of channels to CUSTOM 1 which I selected to be used for my programming (i.e., my favorites). This worked for me, but I cannot attest to whether it worked for anyone else.

From what I have read about ad301's comments, it seems that he simply tried to select the CHANNELS THAT I GET to be his favorites rather than defining these channels in CUSTOM 1 and then selecting CUSTOM 1 to be his favorites. Perhaps this little difference is why it worked for me but not for him.

Nevertheless, you are correct that on or about 2/19/2006, D* changed something in the data stream that overrode the function of favorites, which killed the functionality of autorecord (at least on my machine if not on ad301's machine!) but which also enabled others to see for the RSN channels as well as free previews.

I will also note that the results of my FINDs were not affected by this change in mid-February. Thus, it seems clear to me that FIND and AUTORECORD are not the same thing since one simply lists whats scheduled to air while the other decides on which channel and at which time it should be recorded.


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## Earl Bonovich (Nov 15, 2005)

Thank you for at least helping my sanity... I thought that was the case...


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## ad301 (Mar 30, 2004)

zortapa said:


> ...before the middle of February my autorecords worked exactly as I had expected them to work. That is, they only recorded on the channels that I had defined in my favorites. Specifically, I did this by defining a set of channels for my favorites by first selecting the channels that I receive and then deleting a dozen or so channels that I did not want to be used for my autorecordings, and then I assigned this list of channels to CUSTOM 1 which I selected to be used for my programming (i.e., my favorites). This worked for me, but I cannot attest to whether it worked for anyone else....


Before the middle of February, how many autorecords were you running? What, exactly, were the autorecords looking for? What channels were they recording on?


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## zortapa (Nov 16, 2005)

ad301 said:


> Before the middle of February, how many autorecords were you running? What, exactly, were the autorecords looking for? What channels were they recording on?


I had four autorecords defined:

1. "BALLET"
2. "LIBERIA"
3. "MINNESOTA"
4. "XX OLYMPICS"

Prior to mid-February, these were only recording on the channels that I had defined in CUSTOM 1 , one of two places where a user can define his/her favorite channels. That means that NEVER were any of the programs that matched these selection criteria recorded on any channels that I did not receive. For example, the first two ARs regularly selected programs on PBS. Prior to mid-Feb, only the programs that aired on my local PBS station were recorded, but after the change by D* these ARs often recorded programs on the national feed that I do not get. The same happened for my ARs 3 and 4, but those resulted in much more acute problems, the latter of which really pi$$ed me off because if happend right in the middle of the Olympics and caused me to miss several days of events.


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## ad301 (Mar 30, 2004)

If you had seen one of those four ARs record, just ONCE, from a channel you had excluded from your custom1 list, would you then have concluded that the r15 would, on occasion, incorrectly schedule a recording from an unwanted channel?


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## Wolffpack (Jul 29, 2003)

zortapa said:


> I had four autorecords defined:
> 
> 1. "BALLET"
> 2. "LIBERIA"
> ...


Work with me on this. You're saying that prior to mid-Fedruary (when DTV changed the guide/channel data stream to show everyone received everything) your R15 based the FIND (now SEARCH) function and AutoRecords on your Custom 1 channel list? Is that correct?

Did you have Custom 1 set as your favorites?

As I understand the change that took place in February it involved flagging every R15 as receiving every channel and relying on the access card to prevent access to those channels and had something to do with RSNs.

If all of this is correct, how could the change in February to the guide data effect the FIND/SEARCH/AR function logic? If the R15 performed FINDs and returned results based on your Custom 1 list before this guide data change how would the result be different now? I don't see a relationship between the guide data and your Favorites or Custom 1 channel lists.

I may be missing something here as I received my first R15 with the DVR4ME offer so I really wasn't around much before those changes....plus I usually miss stuff anyway. :grin:


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## zortapa (Nov 16, 2005)

ad301 said:


> If you had seen one of those four ARs record, just ONCE, from a channel you had excluded from your custom1 list, would you then have concluded that the r15 would, on occasion, incorrectly schedule a recording from an unwanted channel?


Yes, I would reach that conclusion. Indeed, that is precisely what happened in mid February. (Well, not exactly "precisely" because nearly all of the olympics were suddenly being scheduled to record on the national CBS feed.) After discussions on this list with Earl, he explained that this was due to the change that D* made to override my channel selection on custom 1.


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## zortapa (Nov 16, 2005)

Wolffpack said:


> Work with me on this. You're saying that prior to mid-Fedruary (when DTV changed the guide/channel data stream to show everyone received everything) your R15 based the FIND (now SEARCH) function and AutoRecords on your Custom 1 channel list? Is that correct?
> 
> Did you have Custom 1 set as your favorites?
> 
> ...


No SEARCH here, yet.... 

Actually, the way that you have spelled this out is not the same as my experience with the FIND and AR functions.

The FIND BY utility has always returned all hits across all channels (including premium and PPV channels). This allows one to individually select programs to record from any channel. However, the AR utility had, prior to mid-Feb, only recorded the selected programs on the channels that I had defined in custom 1 and set as my favorites.

Based on my experience, the AR is not a naive autorecording function. Rather, it (1) determines which programs meet the selection criteria and then (2) record it/them ONLY IF it is on a valid channel. This had prevented AR from recording programs on channels that I do not receive (which I had excluded using custom 1). The second part of this algorithm is what D* neutered in mid-Feb in order to allow people to view RSNs and free preview weekends.

For example, my AR for "BALLET" had scheduled FLASHDANCE to be recorded earlier this morning. Unfortunately, FLASHDANCE aired on 502. Since I do not subscribe to HBO, I do not get channel 502. Prior to mid-Feb, I did not ever see an AR program scheduled to record on a channel that I did not receive. But since that time, I have had to babysit my TODO list and remove the ARs that were scheduled to record on those channels. This is what I had to do with FLASHDANCE to prevent my R15 from eating up a 2 hr block of my HD.


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## cabanaboy1977 (Nov 16, 2005)

zortapa said:


> I have had to babysit my TODO list and remove the ARs that were scheduled to record on those channels. This is what I had to do with FLASHDANCE to prevent my R15 from eating up a 2 hr block of my HD.


Does it really record a 2hr block of nothing? I thought the R15 wouldn't record it at all?


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## Wolffpack (Jul 29, 2003)

On 10C8 when it started recording on a channel I didn't receive it had a small convulsion, displayed the 721 error quickly and returned to another channel I receive. Nothing was recorded and nothing was in history.


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## cabanaboy1977 (Nov 16, 2005)

Wolffpack said:


> small convulsion


LOL, That's what I thought it would do. It clutters the todo list but doesn't record. Once they remove/increase the limits and give us mark and delete that won't be an issue. I miss the days of me looking at the todo list on my UTV once every two weeks. I find it nice that I can do that on my HD Tivo, at least it's one out of 3 that I don't have to babysit.


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## zortapa (Nov 16, 2005)

Good point. I just assumed that it would waste disk space, but I have always deleted the ARs on channels that I do not get. I guess I've worried about this needlessly. But I probably should still monitor it to ensure that it does not result in a conflict that prevents something else from being only partially recorded or not recorded at all.


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## cabanaboy1977 (Nov 16, 2005)

That's what I do. I take them off just so they won't cause issues and so I can see further out on the todo list. So I'm deleting them daily and reminded daily that there is no mark and delete. I've kind of made it part of my bedtime routine.


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## ad301 (Mar 30, 2004)

zortapa said:


> The FIND BY utility has always returned all hits across all channels (including premium and PPV channels). This allows one to individually select programs to record from any channel. However, the AR utility had, prior to mid-Feb, only recorded the selected programs on the channels that I had defined in custom 1 and set as my favorites.


That may have worked FOR YOU (still an open question, BTW), but what about the evidence which has been presented, on this board, that shows ARs recording on channels specifically excluded from one's custom1 list? Do you just ignore that evidence when you devise your theories? Does it not give you even the slightest pause? Or does something not happen if YOU don't see it?



zortapa said:


> Based on my experience.....


Exactly. You CANNOT generalize what you think you see on your machine, and say that it applies to all machines, because you are talking about a non-event. That is, the non occurence of a particular recording. As you agreed above, even just one occurence on your machine would cause you to rethink your basic premise. And yet you steadfastly refuse to acknowledge that such events WERE reported and documented by other users. Come on, it's simple logic, or in your case, the lack of it. Look again at the screenshots I posted for you in a previous discussion on this subject. Explain to me, if you can, how my r15, back in November, could possibly have had an AR schedule a recording on a channel I had excluded from my custom 1 (which I had named MY CHANS), if r15s never did that prior to February.

I'm sorry you had a problem with your Olympics AR. Whatever they did in mid February probably did make the problem worse. But you cannot, and should not, somehow make the inference that ARs were working correctly up to that point. It's just not true, there is clear evidence to the contrary.


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## zortapa (Nov 16, 2005)

I'll ignore the attitude and simply respond by saying that I have reported *my experience* with *my ARs* on *my R15*. However, I can make one general statement about the R15 -- it is very clear that many problems have been experienced by some but not by others. Perhaps this is just another one of those problems that happens to fall in this category......


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## ad301 (Mar 30, 2004)

I apologize for any attitude that you perceive in my messages to you. I truly do not mean to personally offend anyone. As I've mentioned many times, probably to the point of nauseating everyone reading along, the Find/Search function, and the accompanying auto-record, is my biggest gripe with the r15. If they'd fix this function to bring it up to the capability of tivo WLs, then I could live with all the other little quirks. So I'm just trying to help, by pointing out what my experiences were. And I completely agree that one of the most vexing issues is the differing experiences users have with this box.

Anyway, it'll soon be moot, as the hr20 will soon become the major topic of discussion. Hopefully, the developers have learned a lot from this 8+ months long process, and the hr20 will reap the benefits. If not, I, for one, will be gone from here and from D*, as cable offers me a very viable alternative, and the tivo series3 will fill the bill very nicely for me. I realize that many others can't make that same choice.


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