[vdr] Re: Distributed VDR

[Klaus Schmidinger <Klaus.Schmidinger@cadsoft.de>]

Rene Bartsch wrote:
> 
> Schilcher Guido wrote:
> > Hi everybody,
> >
> > is it possible to build a vdr with 2 machines. one as server maybe a
> > file-server and an internet-router too with one or more dvb-cards and enough
> > hd-space and one or more diskless viewing stations with one full dvb-s card
> > for watching tv and records from the server. both are connected to lan.
> >
> > my problem is, how can i programm the server with the on screen menu from
> > the viewing station.
> >
> > thanks for your answers
> >
> > guido
> >
> > p.s.
> > sorry about my bad english
> >
> >
> 
> You need to provide the video- and config-files/-directories by nfs.
> 
> Then you can run VDR on every machine (server, clients) and they use the
> same video-directory and config-files.
> 
> The only problem is that the client machines will try to record parallel
> to the server. But there was a patch around to disable the
> recording-function (look at the ML-archive).
> 
> TO KLAUS SCHMIDINGER:
> 
> Could you implement a command-line-option like "-no-dvb-out" for
> disabling the need of a full-featured DVB-X in a server and another
> command-line-option like "no-recording" for a client, which simply
> suppresses recording?
> 
> This way it would be possible to determine client/server by
> command-line-option without recompiling.
> 
> Would be great to the great VDR! :o)
> 
> Rene

It's not just about command line options to disable recording or replaying.
There's a lot more to this. Each client will want to create/modify/delete
timers, and will want to delete recordings. What if one client is just replaying
a recording, while another one decides to delete it? What if one client programs
a timer, and another one decides to cancel that timer because he/she wants to
record something else?

I know, there have been postings suggesting to use a database for all this.
But this is definitely not the direction I want to go. I don't want to have
to run an SQL database just for my VDR box.

One rather simple solution might be to allow modifications to the configuration
only from one particular client, so the other clients would simply be "viewers"
without the right to modify anything. But even then a "viewer" might be replaying
a recording and the "main" client could decide to delete that recording. So there
would probably have to be several locking mechanisms to manage all these situations.

I'm currently busy with implementing the plugin interface, so I won't be doing
anything in that direction. Also, please note that several core VDR code areas
will be heavily modified to allow plugins, so in case you decide to do any modifications
in the core VDR code, you may have to redo them after the plugin interface has been
fully implemented.

Klaus
-- 
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Klaus Schmidinger                       Phone: +49-8635-6989-10
CadSoft Computer GmbH                   Fax:   +49-8635-6989-40
Hofmark 2                               Email:   kls@cadsoft.de
D-84568 Pleiskirchen, Germany           URL:     www.cadsoft.de
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