Additional Info, tips, tricks, etc.
This page will explain how to do some additional setup stuff that was a little too longwinded to put into the first howto. Most of this information has been and will continue to be provided by new users, Ie NOT me!. Thankyou for everyone who has provided info so far! Grant especially for providing alot of this info.
Setting up a Cron job for LoadGuide Setting the TimeSync Up for New Zealand Adjusting EndPad Ghosting/Oversaturation Securing TivoWeb Setting IR channel numbers for Saturn Decoders Streaming Using your Tivo remote to control your TV
Setting up a Cron job for LoadGuide
Rather than having to manually run a loadguide to pick up new slices, let’s set up a task under crontab to do it for us.
I’ve set mine up to run every morning at 1:10am and check for new guide data. If there’s no new data it won’t do anything but if there is an updated slice it will download it and sort it into the TiVo.
Here’s how to do it.
Telnet into your TiVo
cd /hack/etc/
cp crontab crontab.bak (make a backup of your original file.. just in case ;) )
nano crontab
This will open your crontab file in the nano editor. Scroll down to the bottom where you will see something like the following.
- m h dom mon dow command
- /10 * * * * touch /hack/touch.test
10 02 * * * fixtime.cron 59 04 * * 1 backup_hack
- 0 8 * * 1-5 dailymail.tcl &
If you look at the above, you can see that the command fixtime.cron is set to run at 02:10am each day.
We want to add a line before that line to read the following.
10 01 * * * LOADGUIDE
So, your crontab file will now read as follows…
- m h dom mon dow command
- /10 * * * * touch /hack/touch.test
10 01 * * * LOADGUIDE 10 02 * * * fixtime.cron 59 04 * * 1 backup_hack
- 0 8 * * 1-5 dailymail.tcl &
This will make the TiVo connect to the website and attempt to load the slice each morning at 01:10am. You can of course change the frequency of this to whatever you like. For full information on cron jobs, visit this website:
http://www.unixgeeks.org/security/newbie/unix/cron-1.html
Ok, we’ve edited the file. Now you need to save it, Ctrl-X, Y
Press Enter (to save as same filename)
Reboot
That’s it. Now your TiVo should automatically check for new data/load the data each morning at 1:10am (or whatever day/time you set it to). Setting the TimeSync Up for New Zealand
cd /var/hack/bin
timezoneadj30.tcl
At the prompt enter ‘7′ and press enter.
cd /etc
rw
Look for a file called postcodezones
cp postcodezones postcodezones.bak
(this will make a backup)
FTP this timezone file (postcodezones) to /etc with the Pacific/Auckland timezone in it
(this will overwrite the old version)
chmod 777 postcodezones
cd /var/hack/zoneinfo/
mkdir Pacific
FTP this file (Auckland) to the /var/hack/zoneinfo/Pacific directory
chmod 777 Auckland
ro
fixtivotime Adjusting EndPad
A script is running on the OzTivo image as standard which makes the TiVo record earlier and longer than the time specified (providing another show isn’t back-to-back). It’s actually a very useful feature although you might want to adjust the default times a little bit.
For example:
Time Set for 8pm start and 8:30pm finish will start recording at 7:55pm and finish at 8:40pm. (5 mins early and 10 mins longer). This is to avoid cutting off the beginning or end if the programme is running early or late.
To adjust this do the following…
cd /etc/rc.d/
rw
cp rc.sysinit.author rc.sysinit.author.bak
nano rc.sysinit.author
Scroll down and edit the line which will read something like /var/hack/endpadplus.tcl 5 10 –auto
To disable endpad (not really recommended) put a # in front of the line.
If you want to adjust it, change the 5 and the 10
Ie: 5 = 5 mins early and 10 = 10 mins late end time
So if you want to change it to be 1 min early and 5 mins late, adjust it to read
/var/hack/endpadplus.tcl 1 5 –auto
ctrl-x
select yes to save
press enter to save under the same name
reboot
Your changes should be effective once TiVo has rebooted. Ghosting/Oversaturation
Your first impressions may be the quality is very poor, but its just the colour is grossly oversaturated by the Tivo. Either drastically lower your tv’s colour setting from what you’re used to, or better you can change the Tivo’s settings. Create “/etc/palmod.conf”. In this I have:
avsaturation=55 avbrightness=80 avcontrast=140
Values range from 1-255, try values to see what suits you. BE VERY CAREFUL WITH THIS FILE!! Any typos will likely stop your tivo from booting, forcing you to copy the image onto the hdd again. But just copy the above and you’ll be fine. Reboot for change to take effect.
Note if your having trouble creating the file you might need to type “rw” in order to put the file system into read/write mode.
Securing TivoWeb
The Tivo comes with its own web server. You can use this to control your tivo from anywhere on the planet, though securing it is obviously a good idea.
Edit /hack/tivoweb.cfg to add a username/pass, or change the port it uses. Ideally add more security on your firewall like only allowing access from certain ips etc. The web site is mostly self-explanitory, but can click the link to the tivoweb homepage for more info. Setting IR channel numbers for Saturn Decoders
The Saturn decoders only need the minimum digits.
This will adjust the TiVo for this so it doesn’t send any unecessary leading zeros.
cd /var/hack/guide
Then issue the command
./lssources
You’ll see something like the following….
Listing source 2274/12 SignalSource 2274/12 { CableBoxCodeNum = 10006 Channel = 2274/13 2274/14 2274/15 2274/16 2274/17 2274/18 2274/19 2274/ 20 2274/21 2274/22 2274/23 2274/24 2274/25 2274/26 2274/27 2274/28 2274/29 2274/ 30 2274/31 2274/32 2274/33 2274/34 2274/35 2274/36 2274/37 2274/38 2274/39 2274/ 40 2274/41 2274/42 2274/43 2274/44 2274/45 2274/46 2274/47 2274/48 2274/49 2274/ 50 2274/51 2274/52
Connector = 3 DBSRemoteMethod = 2 ProviderName = {TiVo A/V In} RecieverNumDigits = 3 SignalType = 5 TunerDigitDelay = 350 UnattendedTunerDigitDelay = 700 VariableBitrate = 1 }
What we need is the SignalSource number, which is this case is 2274/12
Issue the following command:
dbsetx 2274/12 RecieverNumDigits 2
(where 2274/12 is replaced by whatever your SignalSource is listed as in the ‘lssources’ listing). You’ll then get the following message.
2274/12 RecieverNumDigits val was: 3 2274/12 RecieverNumDigits set to : 2
Once back at the prompt, type the following
reboot Streaming
You can stream video straight from the Tivo. The server for this is included in the OzTivo image, you only need the client software. Other tools like TyTools, msftp will let you extract video from the Tivo to your pc. Using your Tivo remote to control your TV
Your Tivo remote’s tv on, mute and volume buttons are programmable. See here:
http://oztivo.net/twiki/pub/Hintsortips/ProgramTiVoRemoteControl/tivotv.pdf
http://oztivo.net/twiki/pub/Hintsortips/ProgramTiVoRemoteControl/tivostereo.pdf
