path: root/UPDATE-2.2.0

This is a summary of the changes in VDR 2.2.0 since the last stable
version 2.0.0. It only contains things that are of actual importance
to the user and doesn't mention the many fixes and improvements that
have been made "behind the scenes".

See the file HISTORY for a detailed list of all changes.

Support for steerable satellite dishes:

- Added basic support for positioners to control steerable satellite dishes.
  + Supports GotoN (aka "DiSEqC 1.2") and GotoX (aka "USALS").
  + The new DiSEqC command code 'P' can be used to instruct a positioner to move the
    dish to the required satellite position. When a 'P' code is processed, further
    execution of the remaining DiSEqC sequence (if any) is postponed until the positioner
    has reached the new satellite position.
  + The new special source value of "S360E" can be used in diseqc.conf to indicate that
    an entry using a positioner can move the dish to any requested position within its
    range. Think of it as "full circle".
  + The devices a particular cDiseqc or cScr applies to are now stored directly in each
    cDiseqc or cScr, respectively.
  + A plugin can implement a custom positioner control (see PLUGINS.html, section "Positioners").
  + The new function cSkinDisplayChannel::SetPositioner() can be implemented by skins to
    show the user a progress display when the dish is being moved. The default implementation
    calls SetMessage() with a string indicating the new position the dish is being moved to.
    The LCARS skin shows a progress bar indicating the movement of the dish.
  + The new parameters "Site latitude", "Site longitude", "Positioner speed", and
    "Positioner swing" in the "Setup/LNB" menu can be used to configure the necessary
    values for a steerable dish.
  + The cDvbTuner now has a new status tsPositioning, in which it waits until a steerable
    dish has reached its target position. Parsing SI data is paused until the target
    position has been reached.
- Changed the sign of the satellite position value in cSource to reflect the standard
  of western values being negative. The new member function cSource::Position() can be
  used to retrieve the orbital position of a satellite.

Conditional Access:

- The new function cCamSlot::Decrypt() can be used by derived classes to implement a
  CAM slot that can be freely assigned to any device, without being directly inserted
  into the full TS data stream in hardware. A derived class that implements Decrypt()
  will also need to set the new parameter WantsTsData in the call to the cCamSlot
  base class constructor to true, in order to receive all the TS packets that
  contain data necessary for decrypting.
- Many member functions of cCamSlot have been made virtual to allow for easier
  implementation of derived classes.
- cDvbDevice::GetTSPacket() now calls CamSlot()->Decrypt() in order to allow CAM slots
  that can be freely assigned to any device access to the TS data stream.
- Improved locking for CAM slots and made the pure functions of cCiAdapter have
  default implementations, to fix a possible crash with CI adapters and CAM slots
  that are implemented in a plugin.
- Added logging the supported system ids of a CAM.
- Now waiting explicitly until all CAM slots are ready before switching to the
  initial channel when VDR is started. This is necessary in case CI adapters are
  used that are not physically connected to a dedicated device. The respective checks
  in cDvbDevice have been removed to avoid redundancy.
- Now unassigning CAMs from their devices when they are no longer used.
- Now making sure the primary device goes into transfer mode for live viewing if the
  CAM wants to receive the TS data.
- Added a log message in case a receiver is detached from its device because the
  assigned CAM can't decrypt the channel.
- The pid of the PMT in which the CA descriptors of a given channel are broadcast
  is now stored together with the CA descriptors and can be retrieved by calling
  GetPmtPid() (this information is only required to receive encrypted channels
  with the OctopusNet receiver via the 'satip' plugin).
- Modified the CAM API so that it is possible to implement CAMs that can be freely
  assigned to any devices.
- The Yellow button in the "Setup/CAM" menu can now be used to put the selected
  CAM into a mode where it remains assigned to a device that is tuned to the current
  channel until the smart card it contains is activated and the CAM thus starts to
  descramble (see MANUAL, section "Setup/CAM" for details).
- Fixed cCamSlot::Assign(), so that it actually ignores the value of Query if Device
  is NULL (as described in the header file).

Satellite Channel Routing:

- Added support for "Satellite Channel Routing" (SCR) according to EN50607, also
  known as "JESS".

Subtitles:

- Improved displaying DVB subtitles.
- The debug output now goes into an HTML file named dbg-log.htm and shows the actual
  bitmaps (dbg-nnn.jpg) used to display the subtitles. That way it is much easier to
  see what's actually going on.
- The new function cOsd::DrawScaledBitmap() is now used for drawing subtitles.
  This function can be reimplemented by high level OSDs which may be able to do
  the scaling in hardware or otherwise more efficiently.
- Fixed (well, actually worked around) a problem with subtitles not being displayed
  because the broadcaster doesn't set the data's version numbers as required by the
  DVB standard.
- Added support for PGS subtitles.

Plugins:

- A plugin can implement a custom positioner control (see PLUGINS.html, section "Positioners").
- The new menu category mcRecordingEdit is now used to mark menus that edit recording
  properties.
- The Recordings menu can now be called with a cRecordingFilter, which allows the
  caller to have it display only a certain subset of the recordings.
- cDevice::TrickSpeed() now has an additional parameter named Forward, which indicates
  the direction in which replay is being done. This information may be necessary for
  some output devices in order to properly implement trick modes. Authors of plugins
  that implement output devices will need to add this parameter to their derived cDevice
  class, regardless of whether they will make use of it or not.
- Avoiding unnecessary pkg-config warnings in plugin Makefiles.
  Plugin authors may want to apply the following change to their Makefile:
  -PKGCFG = $(if $(VDRDIR),$(shell pkg-config --variable=$(1) $(VDRDIR)/vdr.pc),$(shell pkg-config --variable=$(1) vdr || pkg-config --variable=$(1) ../../../vdr.pc))
  +PKGCFG = $(if $(VDRDIR),$(shell pkg-config --variable=$(1) $(VDRDIR)/vdr.pc),$(shell PKG_CONFIG_PATH="$$PKG_CONFIG_PATH:../../.." pkg-config --variable=$(1) vdr))
- The new function cStatus::ChannelChange() can be implemented by plugins to be
  informed about changes to the parameters of a channel that may require a retune.
  This may, for instance, be useful for plugins that implement live streaming, so that
  they can react on changes to a channel's PIDs or CA descriptors.
- The new function cOsd::DrawScaledBitmap() is now used for drawing subtitles.
  This function can be reimplemented by high level OSDs which may be able to do
  the scaling in hardware or otherwise more efficiently.
- Use of the function cOsd::GetBitmap() outside of derived classes is now deprecated,
  and it may be made 'protected' in a future version, since it doesn't work with
  TrueColor OSDs. Plugin authors may want to modify their code so that it
  works without this function.
- Modified the descriptions of several threads, so that the important information
  (like device or frontend numbers) is within the first 15 characters of the
  string, because only these are displayed in thread listings. Plugin authors may
  want to do the same.
- Plugins can now implement the function SetMenuSortMode() in their skin objects
  derived from cSkinDisplayMenu, to get informed about the currently used sort
  mode, if applicable.
- Added cOsdProvider::OsdSizeChanged(), which plugins that implement an output device
  can call to signal a change in the OSD that requires a redraw of the currently
  displayed object.
- cOsd::RenderPixmaps() now returns a pointer to cPixmap instead of cPixmapMemory
  This is necessary to allow plugins with derived cPixmap implementations to use this
  function. Plugins that use this function with cPixmapMemory now need to add
  a dynamic cast to the call, as in

    cPixmapMemory *pm = dynamic_cast<cPixmapMemory *>(RenderPixmaps()));

  They also need to call DestroyPixmap(pm) instead of "delete pm" to properly release
  the resulting pixmap after use.

Skins:

- The new function cSkinDisplayChannel::SetPositioner() can be implemented by skins to
  show the user a progress display when the dish is being moved. The default implementation
  calls SetMessage() with a string indicating the new position the dish is being moved to.
  The LCARS skin shows a progress bar indicating the movement of the dish.
- The LCARS skin now shows the source value of the current channel in its channel display.
- Plugins can now implement the function SetMenuSortMode() in their skin objects
  derived from cSkinDisplayMenu, to get informed about the currently used sort
  mode, if applicable.

Remote control:

- Revised the section on "Learning the remote control keys" in the INSTALL file to
  avoid the impression that there actually is a default remote.conf file, and to
  not use any alphabetic keys for special functions, so that they remain available
  for textual input.
- The LIRC remote control now connects to the socket even if it doesn't yet exist when
  VDR is started.
- Added handling UTF-8 'umlaut' characters to cKbdRemote.

Devices:

- The cDvbTuner now has a new status tsPositioning, in which it waits until a steerable
  dish has reached its target position. Parsing SI data is paused until the target
  position has been reached.
- cDevice::IsPrimaryDevice() now also checks whether the primary device actually has
  a decoder and returns false otherwise. This should improve device allocation on
  systems that are only used as a receiver and don't actually display anything.
- All bonded devices (except for the master) now turn off their LNB power completely
  to avoid problems when receiving vertically polarized transponders.
- cDevice::TrickSpeed() now has an additional parameter named Forward, which indicates
  the direction in which replay is being done. This information may be necessary for
  some output devices in order to properly implement trick modes. Authors of plugins
  that implement output devices will need to add this parameter to their derived cDevice
  class, regardless of whether they will make use of it or not.
- Now checking whether the primary device actually has a decoder before retuning the
  current channel after a change in its parameters. This fixes broken recordings on
  the primary device on "headless" systems.
- Refactored setup parameter handling for output devices:
  + The function cDevice::GetVideoSystem() has been deprecated and will be removed
    in a future version. In order to check whether a particular plugin needs to be
    modified if this function is removed, you can comment out the line
    #define DEPRECATED_VIDEOSYSTEM
    in device.h.
  + Handling the "video (display) format" (things like 16:9, 4:3, pan&scan, letterbox
    etc) shall now be done by the individual output devices, because the types and
    numbers of parameters are too device specific. The Setup/DVB parameters
    "Video format" and "Video display format" are still there for now and can be used
    by SD devices. HD devices, however, shall not use these parameters (any more),
    but rather implement their own setup menu with the necessary parameters for
    controlling output.
  + The dvbhdffdevice plugin has been modified accordingly.
  + Made it clear that cDevice::SetDigitalAudioDevice() merely tells the output device
    that the current audio track is Dolby Digital. This function was only used by the
    original "full featured" DVB cards - do not use it for new developments!
    If an output device has several ways of replaying audio (like HDMI or analog jack)
    it shall implement the proper options in its plugin's SetupMenu() function.
- Added support for "Pilot", "T2-System-Id" and "SISO/MISO" parameters.
- Added subsystem id support for DVB devices connected via USB.

DiSEqC:

- The new DiSEqC command code 'P' can be used to instruct a positioner to move the
  dish to the required satellite position. When a 'P' code is processed, further
  execution of the remaining DiSEqC sequence (if any) is postponed until the positioner
  has reached the new satellite position.

EPG:

- Added Begin/EndSegmentTransfer() to the EPG handler interface.

OSD:

- In the "Select folder" menu pressing Ok now selects the folder, even if this is a
  folder that contains sub folders (marked with "..."). To open such a folder you
  can press the Red key.
- The Recordings menu now remembers the last recording the cursor was positioned on,
  independent of the last replayed recording. When a replay ends, however, the cursor
  will initially be positioned to the last replayed recording again when the menu
  is opened.
- Added cOsdProvider::OsdSizeChanged(), which plugins that implement an output device
  can call to signal a change in the OSD that requires a redraw of the currently
  displayed object.
- The "Select folder" menu now adds the folder names of all existing recordings to
  any names that have been predefined in "folders.conf".
- Fixed an inconsistent behavior between opening the Recordings menu manually via the
  main menu and by pressing the Recordings key. In the latter case it automatically
  opened all sub folders to position the cursor to the last replayed recording, which
  is unexpected at this point. You can still navigate to
  the last replayed recording (if any) by pressing Ok repeatedly in the Recordings
  menu.
- cOsd::RenderPixmaps() now returns a pointer to cPixmap instead of cPixmapMemory
  This is necessary to allow plugins with derived cPixmap implementations to use this
  function. Plugins that use this function with cPixmapMemory now need to add
  a dynamic cast to the call, as in

    cPixmapMemory *pm = dynamic_cast<cPixmapMemory *>(RenderPixmaps()));

  They also need to call DestroyPixmap(pm) instead of "delete pm" to properly release
  the resulting pixmap after use.

Channels:

- Channels that are no longer contained in the current SDT of a transponder are now
  marked with the keyword OBSOLETE in their name and provider fields. That way you can
  identify obsolete channels when you switch to them, and you can get the complete
  overview of all obsolete channels by sorting the Channels list by provider (by
  pressing the 0 key twice). Automatic deletion of obsolete channels may follow later.
- Added support for LCN (Logical Channel Numbers), which plugins may use to sort
  channels.
- Added "NORDIG" to the list of "DVB/Standard compliance" options and using it to
  restrict the LCN (Logical Channel Numbers) parsing to networks that actually use
  this non-standard feature.

Recordings:

- The code for distributing recordings over several video directories has been
  removed. VDR now by default assumes that the video directory is one big disk.
  Distributing the video directory over several disks was a useful feature in times
  when disks were still relatively small, but it also caused serious problems in case
  one of the disks failed. Nowadays hard disks come in sizes measured in terabytes,
  and tools like "mhddfs" can be used to combine several disks to form one large volume.
  A recommended method for a relatively safe disk setup in a VDR system is to use two
  1TB (or larger) disks and use them as a RAID-1 (mirrored). That way, if one disk
  fails, you can replace it without data loss.
- If you absolutely need to use several separate disks to store recordings, you can
  write a plugin that uses the new cVideoDirectory API to implement the necessary
  functionality (see PLUGINS.html, section "The video directory"). You can copy the
  respective code from previous versions of videodir.c.
  IMPORTANT NOTE: If you write a plugin that implements a distributed video directory,
  =============== be sure to make cVideoDirectory::Rename() follow symbolic links!
                  This functionality was never implemented in VDR and it therefore
                  used a workaround in cutter.c. See the section marked with
                  // XXX this can be removed once RenameVideoFile() follows symlinks
                  in previous versions of cutter.c.
  + CloseVideoFile() is obsolete and has been removed.
  + The functions OpenVideoFile(), RenameVideoFile(), RemoveVideoFile(), VideoFileSpaceAvailable(),
    VideoDiskSpace(), RemoveEmptyVideoDirectories(), IsOnVideoDirectoryFileSystem() and
    PrefixVideoFileName() are now static members of cVideoDirectory and need to be called
    with the proper prefix.
  + The name of the video directory is now available through cVideoDirectory::Name().
- Added renaming and moving recordings and folders, editing a recording's priority and
  lifetime, and queueing cutting jobs.
  + The "Recording info" menu now has a new Blue button named "Edit", which opens a
    dialog in which several properties of the selected recording can be changed. It can
    be renamed or moved into another folder and its priority and lifetime can be
    modified.
    The new blue "Edit" button in the "Recordings" menu opens a dialog in which a folder
    can be renamed or moved. See MANUAL, section "Managing folders".
  + In the "Edit recording" menu the Yellow button ("Delete marks") allows you to delete
    all editing marks of the selected recording.
  + cCutter is no longer a static class. Cutting requests should now be invoked by
    calling RecordingsHandler.Add(ruCut, FileName). See the new cRecordingsHandler
    class in recording.h.
  + Cutting jobs are now placed in a queue (together with any move or copy jobs) and
    are processed one by one.
  + The new SVDRP command MOVR can be used to rename a recording
  + Note that in several places in the source code a "copy" operation is mentioned,
    however there is no user interface for this, yet.
- The function cRecordings::MBperMinute() now only takes into account recordings with
  less than 5 seconds per megabyte, in an attempt to filter out radio recordings
  The result of this function was way off any realistic
  value in case there are many radio recordings in the video directory.
- When cutting a recording it is now checked whether there is already an edited
  version of this recording (with the same name, but starting with '%'), and the
  user is prompted for confirmation to overwrite it.
- Fixed numbering frames. Previously they were numbered starting from 1, while it
  is apparently standard to number them from 0. Any existing recordings with editing
  marks (which will now be off by one) can still be cut with all VDR versions from
  1.7.32, because these will automatically adjust editing marks to I-frames.
  Users of stable releases shouldn't notice any problems.
- Now returning from removing deleted recordings after at most 10 seconds, or if the
  user presses a remote control key, to keep the system from getting unresponsive
  when removing a huge number of files.
- Fixed generating the index file of an existing recording in case at the end of a TS file
  there is less data in the buffer than needed by the frame detector. In such a case
  it was possible that frames were missed, and there was most likely a distortion
  when replaying that part of a recording. This is mostly a problem for recordings that
  consist of more than one *.ts file. Single file recordings could only lose some
  frames at their very end, which probably doesn't matter. At any rate, if you have
  generated an index file with VDR version 2.0.6, 2.1.5 or 2.1.6, you may want to
  do so again with this version to make sure the index is OK.
- Added the new command line option --updindex, which can be used to update an
  incomplete index of a recording.
- In the "Edit recording" menu the '0' key can now be used on the "Name:" field to
  remove the name of the recording and replace it with the last element of the
  recording's folder path name. See MANUAL, section "Managing folders" for details.

Replay:

- The new option "Setup/Replay/Pause replay when jumping to a mark" can be used to
  turn off pausing replay when jumping to an editing mark with the '9' key.
- The new option "Setup/Replay/Skip edited parts" can be used to automatically skip
  the edited parts of a recording during replay, without the need to actually cut
  the recording.
- The new option "Setup/Replay/Pause replay at last mark" can be used to make replay
  go into Pause mode when it has reached the last "end" mark.
- The '8' key for testing an edited sequence now also jumps to the next *end*
  mark if "Setup/Replay/Skip edited parts" is active. This allows for testing edits
  in recordings that have actually been cut, as well as recordings that have not
  been cut, in case "Skip edited parts" is enabled.
- A recording is now still considered unviewed when stopping replay within 10 seconds
  of the first mark.
- The keys '1' and '3' can now be used in replay mode to position an editing mark
  in "adaptive" mode. See MANUAL, section "Editing a Recording".
- The new option "Setup/Replay/Alternate behavior for adaptive skipping" can be used
  to make adaptive skipping only halve the skip distance when the direction changes.
  That way you can reach the desired point in a recording even if you make one too
  many skips in a certain direction (see MANUAL for details).
- The new options "Setup/Replay/Skip distance with Green/Yellow keys" and
  "Setup/Replay/Skip distance with Green/Yellow keys in repeat" can be used to
  configure the number of seconds to skip when pressing these keys once or pressing
  and holding them.
- The new option "Setup/Replay/Use Prev/Next keys for adaptive skipping" can be used
  to change the behavior of these keys during replay. They normally jump between
  editing marks, but with this option set to 'yes' they will do adaptive skipping.

SVDRP:

- The new SVDRP command MOVR can be used to rename a recording

Audio:

- Added the new parameters "Setup/Miscellaneous/Volume steps" and
  ".../Volume linearize". See the MANUAL for details.
- Added handling for DTS audio tracks to cPatPmtParser::ParsePmt().

Misc:

- Reverted the change from version 1.5.7 that made all logging go to LOG_ERR.
- The Yellow button in the main menu no longer acts as "Pause" if "Pause key handling"
  is set to "do not pause live video".
- Added code for parsing LCN and AVC descriptors to libsi.
- Changes in the teletext PID no longer cause retuning (and thus interrupting a
  recording).
- Made it clear that the Data parameter in cDevice::StillPicture() may point to a
  series of packets, not just a single one.
- Changed '%a' to the POSIX compliant '%m' in all scanf() calls.
- cTSBuffer now provides the number of available bytes in its Get() function.
- The script given to VDR with the '-r' option is now also called after the recording
  process has actually started.
- Updated 'sources.conf'.
- Increased MIN_TS_PACKETS_FOR_FRAME_DETECTOR to 100 and introduced counting the number
  of actual video TS packets in cTsPayload in order to be able to record channels that
  sometimes need many TS packets for detecting frame borders.
- Improved PAT/PMT scanning to speed up initial tuning to encrypted channels on
  transponders with many PAT entries.
- The SDT is now only parsed *after* the NIT has been read, and it explicitly uses
  the source value derived from the NIT. This should prevent new channels from being
  created with the wrong source.
- Added support for systemd. To activate this you need to add "SDNOTIFY=1" to the
  'make' call.
- No longer logging an error message in DirSizeMB() if the given directory doesn't
  exist. This avoids lots of log entries in case several VDRs use the same video
  directory and one of them has already physically removed a recording directory,
  while the others still have it in their list of deleted recordings.
- VDR now reads command line options from *.conf files in /etc/vdr/conf.d.
  See vdr.1 and vdr.5 for details.
- Added the functions IndexOf(), InsertUnique(), AppendUnique() and RemoveElement()
  to the cVector class.
- Added functions to set and retrieve the priority of a cReceiver.
- Changed the German weekday names from "MonDieMitDonFreSamSon" to
  "Mo.Di.Mi.Do.Fr.Sa.So.".
- Added the channel name to log messages that reference a channel.
- Added ARGSDIR to the ONEDIR section of Make.config.template.
- Added SDNOTIFY, NO_KBD, BIDI and REMOTE to Make.config.template.
- Modified runvdr.template to improve compatibility with the "bash" and "dash" shells.
- Updated sources.conf to reflect the fact that Astra 4A and SES5 are actually in
  two separate positions.
- Fixed cMarks::GetNextBegin() and cMarks::GetNextEnd(). The behavior of these two
  functions is now exacly as described in the header file. Editing marks that are
  placed at exactly the same offset in a recording are now preserved in the cutting
  process.
- The new command line option --chartab can be used to set the default character
  table to use for strings in the DVB data stream that don't begin with a proper
  character table indicator. The old mechanism of using the environment variable
  VDR_CHARSET_OVERRIDE still works, but is now deprecated and may be removed in a
  future version. The value given in the --chartab option takes precedence over
  that in VDR_CHARSET_OVERRIDE.