mc2xml on ubuntu

I recently switched to mc2xml for grabbing TV listings from TitanTV. The service doesn't always respond in a timely manner and so I needed a script to retry a couple of times in case it failed the first time. Here is the bash script that I wrote to retry every 60 seconds for 15 minutes. I hope that it helps someone else.

#!/bin/bash

servicebusy=2
repeats=0
maxrepeats=15

cd /home/user/mc2xml
./mc2xml
errorcode=$?

echo Error Code == $errorcode

while [[ $errorcode -eq $servicebusy ]]; do
if [[ $repeats -ge $maxrepeats ]]; then
exit -1
fi
let "repeats += 1"
echo repeating in 60 seconds \( try $repeats of $maxrepeats \)
sleep 60
./mc2xml
errorcode=$?
done

mythfilldatabase --refresh-all --file 1 xmltv.xml

I run it every night with the following command in my crontab

39 2 * * 1-7 bash /home/user/mc2xml/do_mythfill_fixed.sh

inadyn, opendns, and Ubuntu

I have been using DNS services from OpenDNS.org for a little while now, and I am very happy with some of the features that they provide such as URL shortcuts and finely grained internet filtering. However, in order to use the features, I have to keep my dynamic IP address up to date with their DNS-O-Matic service. Their list of clients includes inadyn, which is available through Ubuntu but doesn't include DNS-O-Matics ssl extensions and so I compiled my own version and installed it.

Here are the steps I followed:

1. Download modified inadyn source code from OpenDNS -- wget http://www.opendns.com/support/ddns_files/inadyn.source.v1.99.zip
   
2. Unzip the source code -- unzip inadyn.source.v1.99.zip
3. sudo apt-get build-dep inadyn
4. sudo apt-get install libcurl4-openssl-dev
5. cd inadyn.source.v1.99
6. make
7. sudo cp -p bin/linux/inadyn /usr/local/sbin/.
8. Create a script named inadyn in /etc/init.d so that it will launch automatically on startup.
   

   #! /bin/sh
   
   ### BEGIN INIT INFO
   # Provides:          inadyn
   # Required-Start:    $network
   # Required-Stop:     $syslog
   # Should-Start:      $named $syslog
   # Should-Stop:       $syslog $network
   # Default-Start:     2 3 4 5
   # Default-Stop:      0 1 6
   # Short-Description: Dynamic IP Adress updater
   # Description:       inadyn is a program that updates services such as
   #                    dyndns.org and dnsomatic.com when the host's external
   #                    external IP address changes.
   ### END INIT INFO
   
   set -e
   
   # /etc/init.d/inadyn: start and stop the inadyn daemon
   
   DAEMON=/usr/local/sbin/inadyn
   INADYN_ENABLE=true
   INADYN_OPTS=''
   INADYN_CONFIG_FILE=/etc/inadyn.conf
   
   test -x $DAEMON || exit 0
   
   . /lib/lsb/init-functions
   . /etc/default/rcS
   
   export PATH="${PATH:+$PATH:}/usr/sbin:/sbin:/usr/local/sbin"
   
   case "$1" in
   start)
        if "$INADYN_ENABLE"; then
            log_daemon_msg "Starting inadyn daemon" "inadyn"
            if [ ! -s "$INADYN_CONFIG_FILE" ]; then
                log_failure_msg "missing or empty config file $INADYN_CONFIG_FILE"
                log_end_msg 1
                exit 1
            fi
            if start-stop-daemon --start --quiet \
                --pidfile /var/run/inadyn.pid --make-pidfile\
                --exec $DAEMON
            then
                rc=0
            else
                rc=1
            fi
            if [ $rc -eq 0 ]; then
                log_end_msg 0
            else
                log_end_msg 1
            fi
        else
            if [ -s "$INADYN_CONFIG_FILE" ]; then
                [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_warning_msg "inadyn daemon not enabled in /etc/init.d/inadyn, not starting..."
            fi
        fi
        ;;
   stop)
        log_daemon_msg "Stopping inadyn daemon" "inadyn"
        start-stop-daemon --stop --quiet --oknodo --exec $DAEMON
        log_end_msg $?
        ;;
   restart)
        set +e
        if $INADYN_ENABLE; then
            log_daemon_msg "Restarting inadyn daemon" "inadyn"
            start-stop-daemon --stop --quiet --oknodo --exec $DAEMON || true
            sleep 1
            if start-stop-daemon --start --quiet \
                --pidfile /var/run/inadyn.pid --make-pidfile \
                --exec $DAEMON
            then
                rc=0
            else
                rc=1
            fi
            if [ $rc -eq 0 ]; then
                log_end_msg 0
            else
                log_end_msg 1
            fi
        else
            [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_warning_msg "inadyn daemon not enabled in /etc/default/inadyn, not starting..."
        fi
        ;;
   
   *)
        echo "Usage: /etc/init.d/inadyn {start|stop|restart}"
        exit 1
   esac
   
   exit 0

9. sudo update-rc.d -f inadyn defaults
10. Create an inadyn.conf file in /etc
    

    background
    syslog
    
    update_period_sec 600 # Check for a new IP every 600 seconds
    secure
    
    # Enter your DynDNS username and password here
    username <USERNAME GOES HERE>
    password <PASSWORD GOES HERE>
    
    # What kind of host is being updated? Choices are dyndns@dyndns.org, statdns@dyndns.org, custom@dyndns.org
    dyndns_server_name updates.dnsomatic.com
    dyndns_server_url /nic/update?
    alias <DNS-O-Matic SERVICE 1 GOES HERE>
    alias <DNS-O-Matic SERVICE 2 GOES HERE>
    



11. /etc/init.d/inadyn start


12. all done inadyn is now installed and will keep DNS-o-Matic apprised of you IP address.

New MythTV Box

I just put together a new MythTV box with an Intel Core2 Duo E7200 processor and a Gigabyte GA-73PVM-S2H. My build was based on one I found on another blog, and so far I am very pleased with the results. I used MythBuntu 8.04 for the OS, and despite the fairly minimal install MythBuntu provides, I have gotten everything working rather quickly. I intend to document a couple of the tweaks that I have to make in order to get everything working just right.

Here is a list of the additional packages that I have installed so far with apt-get:

• unzip
• nvidia-glx-new
• nvidia-settings
• sysvconfig (I like to use the Fedora/RH style 'service' script to stop and restart services)
• hdhomerun-config