Stream Tivo’d Programs to you PC
So you are sitting at your PC, and feel like viewing a little Tivo well, it’s easier than you think. I now through Juice or J2 on in the background (sorta live, but I’ll get to that).
First I will assume you are running the latest OzTivo image. If you are, then you can skip this paragraph, if not you may need to also install ‘vserver’ ” download from SourceForge – in this archive you will find quite a few files. Look for a file called ”vserver-ppc-s1-exec”. Move and rename the file to /var/hack/bin/vserver on your TiVo. Then run vserver:
“bash-2.02# ./vserver”
“waiting for connections on port 8074″
If you get “Listen Failed” (or similar) them most likely vserver is already running.
Assuming you are using the OzTivo image or vserver is already running somehow, then download http://prdownloads.sourceforge.net/tivo-mplayer/MPlayer-0.90rc4-tivo-0.16-windowsinstaller.exe?download and install on your Windows PC.
This will create a directory, most likely ”’c:\Program Files\mplayer-tivo”’ and place several files on your machine.
Find this directory and edit the file named ”mplayerlist.bat”
As standard this has a single line:
”cmd /K mplayer tivo://tivo/list”
Replace the ”’//tivo/”’ with ”’//yourIPaddress/”’ – eg, if your IP address is 192.168.1.3, then the line would read:
”cmd /K mplayer tivo://192.168.1.3/list”
Close and save the file.
Now doubleclick the ”mplayerlist.bat” file. You should see a dos box open with something that looks a little like this:
C:\Program Files\mplayer-tivo>cmd /K mplayer tivo://192.168.1.3/list
Using GNU internationalization
Original domain: messages
Original dirname: /usr/share/locale
Current domain: mplayer
Current dirname: /usr/local/share/locale
MPlayer 0.90rc4-3.2 (C) 2000-2003 Arpad Gereoffy (see DOCS)<font color=black>
”’etc etc – then a list like the following:”’<font color=red>
Playing tivo://192.168.1.3/list
[ 740637][ 8][Live ][(null) ]
[ 731460][ 4][Arrested Development][ ]
[ 731319][ 3][Click Online ][ ]
[ 426076][ 6][Coke In Concert: Pin][(null) ]
[ 564705][ 4][Cops ][ ]
[ 710764][ 4][The Daily Show: Jon ][(null) ]
[ 710760][ 2][Gamer TV ][ ]
[ 720141][ 5][Mythbusters ][Poppy Seed Drug Test ]
[ 731316][ 6][One News ][ ]
[ 731483][ 4][Waking The Dead Thin][(null) ]
[ 720129][ 2][Will And Grace ][ ]
ty_streaming_start failed
Unable to open URL: tivo://192.168.1.3/list
Exiting… (End of file)
The only really important part (feel free to disagree with this) is the number on the left of the playing lists program – eg 731319 on the line
[ 731319][ 3][Click Online ][ ]
This is Tivo’s filesystem ID (FSID) Tivo’s way of identifying the recordings. This is the number you use to select the program to view.
For example, to watch that episode of “Click Online” you would type the following at dos prompt:
C:\Program Files\mplayer> mplayer tivo://192.168.1.3/731319
And hey presto, your video begins playing.
A manual for mPlayer is available if you want to experiment with its features – view this here.
And to stop it ? Just close the video box, or hit CTRL-C in the dos box.
You can even watch ‘live’ TV – sort of. Note that at the top of the list is a line similar to:
[ 740637][ 8][Live ][(null) ]
This is the current live buffer. It will start at the beginning of the ‘live’ buffer so unless you have recently changed channels may be some way behind, but a quick channel change (using TivoWeb – why get up…) will bring you pretty close to current.
Interestingly, if Tivo begins recording a show, the old live buffer remains as it last was, with the new program appearing as a new FSID.
Neil B
4 February 2005
