Folder monitor tab broken :)

neo_x

06-10-2008 07:38:54

Well... not actually broken, but not as automated as it used to be.

Previously i was able to add my tv series folder to the monitor tab, click on check, and then tvrename will match the new series i added with the relevant tv.com codes. Most of the time, i was then able to click on done, without having to do anything else.

On the new TVRename2.1.0a7, i have to manually select each show, and click on search in order to find a matching code on thetvdb.com.

Can you look at a way to automate this again? I am really not feeling like doing the manual method for my 512 shows. :)

Thank you

sstteevvee

06-10-2008 12:09:04

Yeah.. I'm unable to download in advance the entire database of show-to-code, so wasn't able to easily do this. However, I'll make it so that it automates the click->search->click procedure, so does a best guess for everything to start with. It'll be a bit slower, since it has to search for everything on thetvdb.com, but it will be automatic.

sstteevvee

06-10-2008 23:41:46

Give the latest version a go. Put in the folder to monitor, hit check, then hit "Full Auto" in the bottom-left.

ScoopD

07-10-2008 21:24:33

I'm unable to download in advance the entire database

You may actually be able to kind of do this. The guys at TheTVDB have been know to make the whole database available to download for developer types (such as yourself), so you may be able to pre-populate all the series titles and their series ID in a "Search" table in your app. Obviously this would only be complete at the time of download, but it would make the initial search/match faster, then give the user the option to search the live database if none of the returned series are the right one?

Definitely worth asking the question, as I know they've done it before. It saves load on their servers anyway, and if all you need are those two fields ....

sstteevvee

07-10-2008 23:48:44

There was a question on the thetvdb forums a few months ago, with someone else asking for pretty much the same thing. The answer was "we don't have that, and aren't likely to.. why would you want that anyway?!??". Even though the original requester explained what they were doing (which was also a renaming app :) ), it never came about. Searching for each episode at the moment doesn't seem to take too long anyway (at least for me) - it seems to do 5 to 10 shows a second, which isn't too bad for something you'd do very infrequently.

I'll try raising the question at thetvdb.com again. Their main concern was lots of clients trying to download "a lot" of data "often", though I didn't think it would be anywhere near as much load as downloading the full episode guide for something like 20 seasons of The Simpsons, which seems to happen every 2 days for me. I'd definitely make it a once-per-installation event, or host the data on my own site.

Also, if I had that data, it'd make things like finding the show codes, etc., much nicer since I wouldn't be forced to use their search which requires exact, full word, matches.

So, yes.. I'm convinced. :) I'll make a post on their forums soon, and see what they say.

ScoopD

08-10-2008 00:08:55

I just read the post you probably read & saw their response.

Maybe the making database available to dev's was before they implemented the API call? It would make sense that it was much less necessary now. I don't really understand their reaction to the request though. Their response about constant changes etc, while understandable, don't take into account that the series ID remains constant. While you have that hook, the rest can be updated around it. Anyway, it's theirs to say yes or no I guess.

sstteevvee

08-10-2008 00:47:32

Yeah.. Their response/attitude struck me as a bit weird, too. You'd download the data, and you would know when you downloaded it, so as soon as any series was updated on their site it would come through on the "daily updates" list. You could then discard, re-fetch, or mark as un-trustworthy that series as appropriate for what you were using it for. You'd maintain your local copy as you did 'normal' series searches, which is what I do anyway. If you look in thetvdb.xml file I'm saving, you'll see a bunch of empty series placeholders for search results, with just the code and name. Its enough for searching on, but as soon as you need any more info (e.g. series overview, episode data), it downloads the full set of data for it.

Some of their reluctance may be because they perhaps see themselves as a lookup service only for episodes you have. i.e. why would you want a big list of shows you don't have episodes for? (of course, the answer is obvious to us :))

I'll definitely make a post on their forums and outline my cunning plans to avoid overwhelming their server, but not right now as its past my bedtime!