runvdr extreme


Written by:               Udo Richter <udo_richter(a)gmx.de>
Project's homepage:       http://www.richter-udo.de/vdr/scripts.en.html#runvdr
See the file COPYING for license information.



About
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runvdr extreme is a runvdr script, just like the runvdr script included in
the VDR distribution. Its just roughly 17 times bigger.

Some of the features of runvdr extreme:

- Loads default configuration from runvdr.conf
- All configuration accessible and overrideable from command line
- All VDR options handled
- Handles runvdr.pid file, acts on signals
- Restarts VDR in case of errors
- Commands to restart VDR and reload DVB
- Configuration file re-read on VDR restart
- Avoids endless loops if VDR crashes instantly
- Resets terminal to defaults after VDR terminated
- Add wrapper commands to VDR for debugging
- Waiting for the VDR process to be killed completey,
  hard killing after timeout
- Command line help
- Can switch console terminal
- Can set locale for VDR daemon
- Optionally supports pluginsetup-plugin



Quick-start
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- Copy runvdr to /usr/local/bin/ or whereever you like
- Copy runvdr.conf.example to /etc/runvdr.conf
- Edit /etc/runvdr.conf to match your needs

The runvdr.conf is pretty much self-explaining. All options are also available
on command line, just take a look at runvdr --help.



Dependencies
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Unix commands, that runvdr uses:

Command       Debian packet
 pgrep         procps
 ps            procps
 kill          procps
 sleep         coreutils
 date          coreutils
 chvt          console-tools
 getopt        util-linux
 setterm       util-linux



Examples
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Assuming you've set up your defaults in /etc/runvdr.conf, here are some
cool things you can do now:


Start VDR in background (for example with TERMINAL=/dev/tty8 in conf file):

  runvdr &

Stop VDR and the runvdr script:

  runvdr --terminate

Dito, but wait until VDR is killed:

  runvdr --terminate --wait

Restart the already running VDR process because it is hanging, or because
the runvdr.conf has changed:

  runvdr --restart

Dito, but also reload the DVB drivers:

  runvdr --dvb-restart

Use the new fresh compiled VDR for the first time:

  runvdr --vdr=/usr/src/vdr-1.4.3/vdr --lib=/usr/src/vdr-1.4.3/PLUGINS/lib

For debugging, start VDR with no terminal redirection:

  runvdr --terminal="" --switchterminal=""

Load all plugins and also the hello plugin:

  runvdr -P hello

Load only the hello plugin:

  runvdr -P- -P hello

Do a dry-run of runvdr:

  runvdr --wrapper=echo
  
Do a debugging session:

  runvdr --wrapper="gdb --args"
  
Start with a completely different setup:

  runvdr --runvdr-conf="/etc/runvdr-debugging.conf"