Re: Automated xmltv retrieval?

Hi Clint,

Clint Weslager wrote:

> FreeGuide looks great! It's the program I've been
> looking around for quite some time.
>  
Glad you like it :)

> Before finding FreeGuide, I had run across xmltv, and
> ran it from a cmd prompt (I'm using windows xp). But I
> hadn't figured out how to view those listings...
>
> Now I'm wondering if there's a way I could
> automatically download listings (while I'm at work)
> and then later use FreeGuide to decide what to watch
> (while I'm at home).
>
> As far as I can tell, when FreeGuide downloads
> listings it's running multiple instances of an xmltv
> batch file, to pull down one .xmltv file for each day.
>  
Yes, that's right.

> Question #1: Could I set FreeGuide to look at an
> .xmltv file that spans multiple days? This file would
> be the result of the "vanilla" output listings that
> xmltv creates.
>  
Yes, it can do this if you remove all the files with dates as names, and 
place a file in C:\Program Files\data that is called 
tv-unprocessed.xmltv which contains all your XMLTV data.

> Question #2: Alternatively, could I create a DOS batch
> file that steps through the FreeGuide xmltv batch
> file, and creates the "one file for each day" process.
>  
Yes, you can do this using the tv_split command that comes with XMTLV, 
and run it on the already-downloaded data.

> Again, my intention here is to automate the process.
> I'm hoping to create a "download.bat" file to click on
> (maybe run automatically) without having to start
> FreeGuide up and download manually.
>  
This should be possible.

If you can't make it work, get back in touch, and if you succeed, please 
send back detailed instructions (e.g. your "download.bat" file) and I'll 
add it to the FAQ.

Thanks,

Andy


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