pyTivo Discussion Forum

[dlfl]

Windows (only) program pyTivoMetaGen.exe generates pyTivo metadata files when a .tivo file containing the metadata is available. It will be useful for people who transfer .tivo files to their PC and encode them to other video formats for storage and later serve them back to their TiVo.

It generates metadata files using a TivoDecode com object to read the metadata from .tivo files -- thanks to FrooBrar, TiVo Decode author. It processes one or multiple files selected in a file browser. You can select the video file extension of your choice. The generated metadata file has the name <video file name>.<ext>.txt, where <.ext> is the extension you select, e.g., ".avi" or ".mp4", etc. This naming convention is required by pyTivo and the metadata file must be located in the same folder as the video file it is paired with (which is done).

The program is free; just download Ver. 0.41 from ***here*** and run the installer. Uninstall any previous version first. A desktop icon is created (which you can delete if you want). Operation is self-explanatory.

The installer is needed because the tivoDecode COM dll must be installed and registered, which is done automatically. Don't worry, it's painless and harmless!

Note: this is a Windows program and requires .NET framework 2.0 or higher installed. Most windows computers already have this but it is easily downloaded and installed from Microsoft. Just google .NET framework to find the download site.

Has a checkbox to set whether episode # and episode title are incorporated in title meta item.

Changes from Ver. 0.37 to current version (0.41):
1. Will query for MAK and remember it if you start it on a machine that doesn't have TiVoDesktop installed.

2. Will run from command line invocation if you provide correct arguments. Run with argument '?' to get help for command line arguments. This mode can process either one single .TiVo file or all in a specified folder depending on arguments.

3. Handles parsing of call sign from file name for different formatting used by TiVoPlaylist.

[msteinkoenig]

I haven't downloaded .33 yet but any chance you could add the .tivo file extension?

Thanks,
Mike.

[dlfl]

[dlfl]

Added .TiVo extension choice.

***download***.
Remember to uninstall old version first.

[wgw]

I just ran accross an output where displayMajorNumber : was blank instead of 0 and it seems to prevent the rest of the metadata from appearing on the Tivo. The callsign is also blank on these metadata files. This occured on about 6 of the 12 files I just tested. Very strange. Not sure why callsign is blank unless VideoReDo removed the callsign when I cut the commercials and wrote the output back to a .tivo file.

[dlfl]

[wgw]

Oh OK, the callsign must have come up blank because I renamed the files and removed everything in the parentheses except the callsign.

v.35 seems to be working perfectly. I'll go back and insert a comma in my file names so it can read the callsign.

Thanks.

[dlfl]

[rjmitche]

Hi dlfl -

I've been using pyTivoMetaGen for a while now to create metadata files from downloaded TiVo files. It works great but, I edit every resulting metadata file to revert 'title' back to be equal to 'seriesTitle'**. I understand why you've chosen to modify this field to be '<seriesTitle> - (<episodeNumber>) episodeTitle' but, with some of the more recent changes to the way pyTivo displays things, I don't find it to be necessary any longer.

Any chance you could make the modification of 'title' optional?

I'm also adjusting the 'displayMajorNumber' every time and adding an 'episodeNumber' field more often than not but, I get the impression that the data for these items is simply not available in the .TiVo file so, I doubt there is much that can be done about that.

**I know there has been a lot of discussion of what the values of title/seriesTitle/episodeTitle should be but, it appears to me that title and seriesTitle are/should be identical in most all cases.

[dlfl]

[lrhorer]

It's been a couple of weeks since I looked at the parameters in the metadata files, so I'm fuzzy on the impact of this. What would be the diffeence in the end result on the Tivo, both in pyTivo's group and in the NPL once the program has transferred?

[dlfl]

I've added a check box to set whether the episode # and episode name are incorporated into the title item for series episodes.

I confess I use old versions of pyTivo and process mainly movies, so I can't say much about the effect of this on grouping or tne NPL.

Go to the link in my signature or the first post to download the new version, and be sure to uninstall any previous version first.

[wgw]

Thanks dlfl.

I'm all for keeping the metadata unmodified so that all metadata files have the same data in the same place. Anyone wanting to combine the episode number in the title can create a custom template for pytivo to merge the fields to their hearts content. In fact, it might not be a bad idea to start a thread in the Hacks forum where people can post their modified pytivo templates. Maybe then all the metadata generator developers would start creating consistant metadata files that would never have to be edited again. All you'd have to do is drop your favorite template in the pytivo template folder when you decide to change the way your metadata is displayed on the tivo.

[dlfl]

Now includes partCount and partIndex meta items if both are in the TiVo file metadata.

[Anomaly]

Needing a bit of assistance if possible; After selecting/opening a .tivo file in the 'select file' dialog, the next thing I see is a pop-up stating "0 of 1 files processed", and there is no .txt file generated.

- ver 0.37
- XP sp3, DotNet 3
- I'm pulling the .tivo's using pyTivo, as well as trying ones pulled using the S3's http NPL - no luck with either.

Lil help?