Smart Home Blog

A few days ago new version of XMLTV was released. The changes of v. 0.5.52 are following:

• tv_grab_uk_rt: lots of improvements.. should upgrade
• tv_grab_re: better season/episode number handling
• tv_grab_be: responding to source site changes
• tv_grab_fr: better title detection
• tv_grab_huro: now generates stop times
• tv_grab_na_dtv: responding to source site changes
• tv_grab_pt: responding to source site changes
• tv_grab_za: improve episode tags
• not working, removed: tv_grab_il, tv_grab_nl_wolf
• some bugfixes and polish.

XMLTV is used in the PVR software such VDR or MythTV to get and parse EPG data.

[via MythTV News]

Here is a free service offered Electronic Program Guide (EPG) for media centers which based on Video Disk Recorder (VDR). Its interface is available in three languages: English, German and Russian. Just register a new account and follow by instruction to setup it in your VDR.

As I already mentioned the service is free but it has a small limitations. There is a possibility to take VIP account but it isn’t clear how to do it (it isn’t sold for money). But I suspect that free options should be quite enough.

As you may know the free service which offered electronic programming guides (EPG) for many of the popular freeware PVR applications like MythTV, was discontinued by Tribune Media. So, basically owners of PVRs have two possibility. One is pay for EPG to Schedules Direct or CT TV or wait when some big guys like Google or Yahoo! offer similar service for free. The reason why EPG is not free is the license of its data.

Schedules Direct offers 3 months for $15 and plans to give a $20-30 per year in the near future. CTpvr asks $3.50 per month or $30 flat for a year. So, actually it isn’t so expensive to have possibility schedule favorite TV shows.

[via TV Squad]