07.24.2005 - TiVo To Go Support + New UI - Download

New features:

• Can now queue shows and view queue status in a Window instead of only through EtiVoWeb.

• Fixes to TiVo To Go fetching and handling.

• Easier access to some of TiVo To Go setup.

• Bunch of other small fixes and tweaks.

06.20.2005 - Full support for TiVo To Go - Download

[Update: The 1820.1 version contains some stability fixes]

New features:

• TiVo To Go Support - EtiVo will now also transcode EtiVo files. Note that you have to put in your windows user name and password in the TiVo To Go configuration for that to work.

• Meta-Data: WMVs created will now have metadata written in them - that means that you can see information about them when playing in Windows Media Player (r) and Windows Media Center (r).

• Bad-shows detection: EtiVo now finds bad shows, marks them and allows you to easily delete them.

• Few other fixes and small features.

06.06.2005 - TiVo To Go, UI and bug fixes

New features are:

• TiVo To Go Support - Allows you to download and catalog shows from your TiVos supporting TiVo To Go. Note that transcoding these does not currently work - they are downloaded and stored as .TiVo files.

• New Tray-Icon support - See EtiVo's status from the tray, run the configuration and other tools from this guy (see screen shots)

• New tests in the Configuration Utility - You can now test EtiVo by running it. Better diagnostic information is supplied when problems occur.

• Video Formats configuration - You can now configure what Video Formats (wmv, tivo, mp2 etc) EtiVo will search for. EtiVo also now allows you to test a video format to see if it's possible to generate images out of it.

02.26.2005 - Major upgrade

Many new things now, among them:

• Multiple TiVo Supprt - Connect as many TiVos as you want to EtiVo.

• Configuration Utility - No more mucking around with XML files, almost everything is configurable from a UI now (Program files/EtiVo)

• Search - Free-text search is now available in EtiVo.

• Setup Wizard - After installing you will get a wizard that will allow you to set up some basic functionality.

• EtiVo over EtiVo - You can now connect EtiVo to another EtiVo over the web and sync the two machines.

• Details in Manual Encoding - There are better details in Manual Encoding screen now. You can also see details about shows.

• Clickable names - When seeing show information, you now have links to IMDB.

• Better failed shows - You can now tell EtiVo not to encode failed shows anymore, clear the failed show list etc.

11.02.2004 - Lots of new features - 0.1.1101

Minor to no Configuration impact. Note that you can remove your Include list with this release - the AutoTiVo feature is a much better version of that.

There is a slew of new features - amongst them:

• Deletion:  You can choose from three types of deletion – hover with your mouse over the buttons to better understand what each one does.

• Control AutoTivo: You can now control what shows AutoTiVo decides to record. Go to Settings/AutoTiVo and add shows that you want it to record. Note that if you want the old behavior of encoding everything, you need to set it up in the AutoTiVo setting screen – select “Encode everything by default” in there.

• EtiVo now allows you to encode using more than one WME file. You can do this both from the Manual Encode screen AND in the AutoTiVo setting.
• Manual Encoding now allows basic search capabilities. Note that you can also encode more than one file in one go.
• EtiVo now distinguishes between Movies and TV Shows. Scroll to the bottom of the catalog to see more.
• Personalization: Added a Personalization feature for some of the forms. Click “Personalize” on the top to set your options.
• Preview images in lists: Added a preview image at some of the Show lists.
• There’s a new Recent Shows screen available.
• Added a status saying how much free space you have.
• Added a file-size to the list of shows.
• The EtiVo Service starts much faster now. While it’s initializing, it will show you a “Initializing screen” on the web.
• Startup and Encoding can be done on an idle thread now.
• Added the ability to Restart from the Web application. Go to the Settings screen to see this option.

Enjoy them! See the Installation screen for more info on how to configure the new features. To see how to use these new features in telnet, see the How to use page. New stuff is marked in green.

10.16.2004 - More bug fixes 0.1.919.10

A few minor fixes.

1. The title bug – The shows-by-title screen could not display shows that have special characters in them.
2. CEtiVo download bug – There was a bug in CEtiVo that would cause it to fail downloading shows. This has been fixed.
3. Some fixes to the command-line help – There were some inaccuracies in the help screen (EtiVoSrv.exe -?)
4. Support for MfsFtp in multithreaded mode – if your MfsFtp works in Multithreaded mode, you would get errors when trying to fetch files.

10.03.2004 - bug fixes version 0.1.919.5

Fixes, additional logging and potential fixes:

1. EtiVo is now (hopefully) system-settings agnostic. This means that the problems some people have been seeing with CEtiVo failing on weird exceptions and where EtiVoWeb could potentially fail when installed on two different systems has been fixed.

2. Added some extra code to try and detect Encoders failing silently.

3. Some global fixes may help people who have been having problems with their MfsFtp connections failing to download shows.
 

09.22.2004 - CEtiVo version 0.1.0919.1

A couple of minor bug fixes and a small addition.

09.19.2004 - version 0.01.0919

You should download this version only if you are affected by one of the bugs or if you have a lot of encoded files and want to take advantage of the new catalog option or if you want the new Compact EtiVo.

Note: To have CEtiVo working, you need to install the compact framework on your Pocket device.

New to this version:

• CEtiVo - Compact EtiVo - this product will give you the ability to sync your Pocket PC device with EtiVo. Note that this is just the initial offering and there is a lot of space for improvements. Read more about this in the Compact EtiVo section.

• New Catalog - For users who have a lot of shows encoded, this is a must - large number of available shows are much easier to use with this new screen. You still have access to the old screens at the bottom right part of the EtiVo catalog.

• Remote encoders addition - You can now tell a remote encoder to only run when the system is stressed. See the EtiVo.Exe.New.Config for more info.

• Added two new commands - ULR allows you to have a list of ready shows filtered by various methods. LT allows you to get the list of all the show titles that exist.

• EtiVo will now check for new version on the web - EtiVo will automatically check for new versions on the web. You can turn that off by going to your config file and changing the checkVersion value.

Fixes:

• Fixed Exclude/Include files that were not working.

• Fixed the command line for manual mass-encoding. (-t:, -s:)

26.08.2004 - version 0.01.0826

This one is a big change... Hold on to your hats and be ready for a big read.

Note: Your old config files will not be sufficient - you need to recreate them from EtiVoSrv.Exe.New.Config!!!

Main new features

• Distributed encoding: Added the ability to use other machines in your home network as encoders for shows. This means that, overall, you can get the work of encoding done much much faster. To do that, you will need to install EtiVo on each and every machine that you want as a remote encoder. Once you have it up and running, you can determine when a machine will be used for encoding (so you can use machines only at night so that you do not interrupt anybody who works on them during the day).

• Multiple Storage Locations: If you have more than one hard drive, and you want EtiVo to use it, you can now set up more than one place for it to save data into.

• Preview Images: EtiVo now knows how to generate preview images for shows. To generate images for old shows, run EtiVoSrv -m:p from the command-line. See EtiVoSrv -? for more information.

• Protocols: EtiVo now supports the file://, http:// and mms:// protocols. File and HTTP are useful for just about anyone. mms:// is useful if you have Windows Media Server installed.

• Customizing show signatures: Some shows don't have enough information in them (missing episode and air date, or wrong ones) to make EtiVo encode them each and every time. You can now set up how EtiVo determines a signature of a show, and have such shows appear as unique, so they are not ignored.

Other small features and bug fixes

• Delete encoded shows: EtiVo now knows how to delete shows off your TiVo. See the deleteAfterEncode config setting. !!!MAKE SURE YOU KNOW WHAT YOU ARE DOING WITH THIS OPTION. DELETED SHOWS CANNOT BE BROUGHT BE BACK TO LIFE!!!

• Newest config file: Added a new file to the installation - it's called EtiVoServer.Exe.New.Config - it contains all of the new configuration settings for each release.

• User control over Bridges: If you have multiple machines being used as encoders, you can tell them via telnet to be unresponsive to calls from the main tivo. See the How to use section for more info.

• Show info in EtiVo Server: EtiVo server is now responsible for the show information. This should make listing shows generally faster.

• Removed "The" from the beginning of show names in grouped view.

• Solved (hopefully) the "missing shows" bug.

06.05.2004 - version 0.01.0529.01

Added the ability to run encodings from the command line. You can now grab a bunch of TY files you have already fetched, and reencode them into WMV by using the command line.

The command to do so (you can see it by running etivosrv.exe -?):

EtiVoSrv.exe -sc:\temp\*.ty -tc:\MyWMVFiles

This will take all TY files from c:\temp and reencode them into c:\MyWMVFiles.

Note that this version did not go through any sort of serious testing.

06.02.2004 - version 0.01.0529

Many small things:

• Fixes for new shows with "&" in their info: Show information with "&" in it will now be automatically fixed - no more [Error, cannot parse...] in EtiVoWeb.

• Fixes for old shows with "&" in their info: Added a command-line option called -m. This will go into maintainance mode and check for invalid XMLs, fixing them.

• Failed shows: Can now enqueue shows that are failed. This is true for both EtiVoWeb (from the Failed table) and from EtiVoServer (via the enq command).

• Start/Stop the service from the web: If EtiVoWeb is unable to connect to EtiVoServer, it will now move you to a page that will allow you to start the service. Note that the user you use to connect needs admin rights for this to work.

• Percent bar only in IE: Percent bar will only work when an Internet Explorer browser connects to the server.

• Shutdown: The Server now shuts down properly when you stop the service.

• Service start-up option during setup: Added the option to either have the service start automatically on startup of the computer or to have it as manual in the EtiVoServer installation.

• EULA: Added a End User License Agreement to the setup - sorry.

• Show count: Added a count to the Grouped page - you can now see how many shows you have of each.

• Estimated time: You can now see the "Estimated time" left on operations that have a progress bar. This is a simple calculation and might have nothing to do with reality.

• View show as it's encoding: You can now start viewing a show as it's encoding. I did not check this feature much - I dont know what the exact behavior is. This might not behave as you expect it to!

• Autorefresh: Added a refresh option to EtiVoWeb Status page. You can now ask it to refresh every 1 sec, 5 sec, 30 sec, 1 min or 15 min. (Corey)

• Shows with special chars in MfsFtp: EtiVoServer will not choke on shows that have the "<" and ">" chararcters in their MfsFtp (poissony).

• Dead encoder: If there is no reply at all from the encoder for 2 hours, the show will fail itself. You can always start a-new by hitting it in the failed show list. This means that if your computer is incredibly busy for 2 hours, shows will fail for you. (Corey)

• New Media Player window in Web: In the screen where you can see information about a show, you can now also open a browser with an embedded Windows Media Player and watch the movie in there.

05.20.2004 - version 0.01.0511

Lots of changes:

• Notifications - You can now use the ln, cn and sn commands to create email notifications. Whenever a file is encoded, it's checked against the notifications and if it fits, EtiVo will send an email to whatever the email field is set to be. You can also control the email that is sent, complete with some (very) basic tokens. Take a look at ReadyMail.txt and ReadyMail.htm to see how it works.
• Grouped Ready Shows - If you choose this link (just at the top with the rest of the main screens), you can view the shows grouped by show Title. This is great when you have a lot of episodes of the same show. You can sort the shows by Episode name, Air date or encoding complete date.
• Sorting - You can now sort shows by their Title, Episode name, Air date or encoding completeness date.
• Password protection - You can now protect EtiVoServer with a password. The password appears in clear text in the config file. Failure to enter the correct password only results in a 2 second pause. EtiVo will not lock up nor disconnect you if you mis-enter a password. No commands will work while the password has not been entered. If your EtiVo is password protected, use the password commend to unlock it. Note that this cannot be considered real protection. Opening your EtiVo to the internet can be dangerous even with the password.
• Keep TY Files - I added an option in the config file of EtiVo that will instruct EtiVo to keep TY Files and not delete them once encoding is done. Note that this can potentially kill your storage space - TY files are huge.
• Added an IncludeList/ExcludeList that will make EtiVo blind to shows.
• Version information - EtiVo server will now report it's version when it starts a new session.
• Some other Misc changes.

Some of these new features require Config file changes. If you are installing over an old version of EtiVo, your old Config file will be kept - and the new options not added. Check out the Installation section of EtiVoWeb and EtiVoServer to see how to activate them.

05.09.2004 - version 0.01.0501.11

Very minor fixes - take only if you really need:

• Some MfsFtps seem to have different settings of how to return a file list than the one I am using. This should fix any such problems.

• Special MfsFtp shows, specifically ones like {Refresh Remote Now Playing items}{2032-05-01}{}{REMOTE_TIVO} and {Delete Remote Now Playing items}{2032-05-01}{}{REMOTE_TIVO} will now be ignored by EtiVo.

• I had a small bug where items that were autotivoed would get a higher priority than they should have. Oops.

05.06.2004 - version 0.01.0501

New things:

• Mainly stabilization issues. A lot of fixes for the web front end and a few to the server.
• Better logging.
• Slightly better error handling.
• The OutOfProc encoder should now work much better when your system is under load - hopefuly, no more failed encoding there. Note: Do know that if your system is usually under a lot of stress, it might be better to use the inproc encoder. This will make sure encoding goes faster, but it will also make your system slower because the encoder will try to be as aggressive about taking CPU time as any other process in your system. To use the inproc encoder, change the line in the EtiVoSrv.exe.config that says:
  <add key="encoderClass" value="EtiVo.Service.OutOfProcEncoder"/> <!-- -->
  to:
  <add key="encoderClass" value="EtiVo.Service.WM9Encoder"/> <!-- -->
• You can now change priority of shows that are queued by pressing the ugly arrow to the left of them. If you click that arrow, the show clicked will get higher priority and will be fetched and encoded before other shows (note that this will not cancel current encodings).

04.28.2004 - 0.01.0428

New things:

• Encoder - The encoder can run in a separate process, at lower priority so that the system will have good response time.
• File storage - Reworked the way I stored files on the disk. No more ugly folder names - now the only folder names you will see are ones that look similar to how MfsFtp stores them, but w/o illegal characters that are replaced by "_".
• Resuming - Also, EtiVo now knows how to resume from the disk. So if you have files fetched and you closed it, or it crashed, it will resume and know not to re-download those files.
• File storage - Files that are fetched now retain their name - without the recording time. So files (and directories) will now follow this calling convention: {Show Name}{Date}{Episode Name}{Channel}.
• Added progress to FTP.
• Added logging capabilities.
• EtiVo now knows how to run as a service. To run it in the console, use -c.
• Added information in various parts of the interface.
• Errors/success results are now returned as XML as well.
• EtiVo now keeps track of the files it has encoded in the past. Needed this for the web front end.
• New commands:

        stat - stats about the current run of the system.
        lr - list the ready items (those that are currently ready on the disk).
        prompt - changes the prompt (i.e. prompt EtiVo> will change it to "EtiVo>".) Prompt with no parameters has a null prompt.
        autotivo {on|off} - turns autotivo on or off. Autotivo with no parameters shows the current state of AutoTivo.

0.01a

New things:

• Reworked the Queue management. EtiVo will now fetch files while it's enoding, greatly increasing performance. EtiVo will also fetch up to 4 files while encoding.
• AutoTivo now seems to be working better.

Known issues:

• AutoTivo seems to insist on requeuing shows it already processed. I am looking into that.

0.01

Initial offering.

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Last modified: 06/13/05