EPG Grabbers

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ICN EDIT GREEN.PNG If the information for the EPG Grabber you use is incomplete or missing from this article, please feel free to add it.

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ICN INFO.PNG Please refer also to our Wiki-Article ICN WIKI INLINE.PNG EPG Grabbing


Contents

About

There are two main sources of EPG (Electronic Program Guide) data, the broadcast stream and the internet. There are several options for grabbing your EPG from each of these sources. This page will hopefully outline several of these options.

Unfortunately, there is no one soloution to suit all situations.

ICN ATTN.PNG Attention:
Some of the products listed on this page, are third party products, and ARGUS TV is in no way responsible for the performance or quality of the products. They are listed here for convenience. Although many have been used and recommended by our users, there is no guarantee they will continue to work. Any issues with third party products, should be taken up with the software author or supplier.

ARGUS TV EPG Grabber

Temporary description

Currently able to grab standard EIT and Freesat.

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ARGUS TV TV Guide Importer

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EPG Collector

About

EPG Collector is a Windows package for collecting the EPG data from DVB or ATSC streams in EIT, MHEG5, OpenTV, MediaHighway 1 and 2, FreeSat and PSIP formats and creating an XMLTV file. It can also import the data to 7MC or DVBViewer. The full set of features makes it an excellent option.

ICN INFO.PNG MHEG5:

MHEG5 is used for Freeview EPG data in Australia and New Zealand, and possibly in the UK, Ireland and Hong Kong, . EPG Collector is (or was) the only grabber capable of collecting and converting MHEG5 data. This makes EPG Collector an excellent choice in these locations.


EPG Collector is relatively easy to set up. It can find a free card, pull data of your choice and place it directly into the ARGUS TV XMLTV folder.

ICN WEB INLINE.PNG EPG Collector is available here.

Features

  • EPG grabber for DVB and ATSC broadcast data
  • Processes EIT, MHEG5, OpenTV, MHW1, MHW2, FreeSat, PSIP, Dish Network and Bell TV Extended EPG
  • Supports DVB-S, DVB-T, DVB-C, ATSC terrestrial or cable and Clear QAM
  • DiSEqC support for 2 - 16 port switches plus custom commands.
  • EPG Centre GUI for setting up parameters with comprehensive tuning files
  • Creates XMLTV compliant file or imports to 7MC and DVBViewer
  • DVBLogic TVSource plugin for seamless collection
  • Metadata lookup to enhance broadcast data

Use

EPG Collector consists of two parts.

  • EPG Centre is used to create the parameter files needed for your particular location and needs.
  • EPG Collector uses a parameter file and grabs EPG data from a broadcast stream.

The ReadMe file included with EPG Collector is extensive, and answers most questions. This page will not go into the finer details of setup, instead it will outline the steps for effective use.

Follow these steps to make best use of EPG Collector.

  1. Use "EPG Centre" to create a parameter file.
  2. Use the "Collect Data" button to test your settings work as required.
  3. Create a scheduled task to run collection as often as needed, at a time when it will not impact normal operation. Usually daily, either during the day or late at night.

jxmltv (not free!)

ICN WEB INLINE.PNG http://www.argus-tv.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=53http://users.skynet.be/jxmltv/index.html

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PyTVGrab

ICN WEB INLINE.PNG http://www.argus-tv.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=53http://pytvgrab.sourceforge.net/

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WebGrab+Plus

WebGrab+Plus pulls EPG data from the internet. It can use various websites like directv.com and tvguide.com, to get data.

At the time of writing (March 2013), WebGrab+Plus could grab some or all EPG data for the following countries. Australia, Austria, Belgium, Bosnia, Brazil, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hong Kong, Hungary, Iceland, , Ireland, Israel, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Netherlands, , New Zealand, Norway, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Romania, , Russia, Serbia, Singapore, Slovakia, Slovenia, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, UK, Ukraine, USA.

See ICN WEB INLINE.PNG the supported sites/countries

WebGrab+Plus has some great features, including incremental grabbing, which only grabs changes since the last time and makes it considerably fast. It also supports post-processing of the created XML file and may lookup additional databases like IMDb.

See ICN WEB INLINE.PNG WebGrab+Plus for more details and to download.

ICN INFO.PNG Information:
If the website you use to grab from changes, or is offline, you may not be able to get guide data. This problem is not limited to WebGrab+Plus, and is not the fault of the grabbing software. There is little that can be done to prevent this, but developers are usually fairly quick fix the issue (if they can).

XMLTV

ICN WEB INLINE.PNG http://xmltv.org/

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XMLTV Gui

XMLTVGUI is a freeware Dos/Linux based UK application with a windows gui. It can be ICN WEB INLINE.PNG downloaded from here and has links to UK, North American, Danish and Israel schedule sources.

Documentation can be found at ICN WEB INLINE.PNG The XMLTVGUI Wiki page .

In the UK there are links to RadioTimes, Bleb.org as well as Digiguide listings. But the later needs Digiguide to be installed and the user requires a Digiguide account. Multiple listing sources can be deployed as often single sites do not contain all the users channels or the required depth of schedule information. The programme can be configured to save the .xml schedule listing directly into the required ARGUS TV directory and does have a number of user selectable Post Processors that can format the text prior to importing into ARGUS TV.

Once set up the application can be run as a scheduled background task.

Please note that there is a bug with with XMLTV GUI North American Schedules Direct grabber that causes every show to be marked as a repeat. You can download an updated Schedules Direct grabber from the XMLTV GUI forum. Note that the forum post discusses only a correction for airdate not being included, but it also fixes the repeat issue. Once you've downloaded the file go to C:\Program Files\XMLTV GUI\scripts\na_sd and replace the existing na_sd.lua file with the one you downloaded. If XMLTV GUI was running when you replaced the file, simply restart XMLTV GUI and all should be fine.

ICN INFO.PNG Information:
If the website you use to grab from changes, or is offline, you may not be able to get guide data. This problem is not limited to XMLTV Gui, and is not the fault of the grabbing software. There is little that can be done to prevent this, but developers are usually fairly quick fix the issue (if they can).
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