[Fixed in v7.0] TV episode playback

[Bairman]

Hi Paul,

For various reasons, I'm giving Chameleon Media Center another shot as my HTPC software of choice. I've read all the documentation and so far mostly everything works well, although CMC does understandably have differences from WMC that will take some getting used to. The only actual problem I'm encountering so far involves TV series, and it may be a problem of my own making, but I want to make sure I understand how things are intended to work before I decide if I'll have to return to WMC.

I'm going to use The Handmaid's Tale to illustrate the issue I have. As you can see in the following diagrams, I have seasons 1-4 on DVD. Each DVD season has a disc profile and all episodes are mapped, so there is a child season profile for each disc title as well. The individual episodes have all been ripped to MKV files. I also have season 5 but it consists of digital downloads only, so there is also a root-level TV series profile to accomodate those. This is expected My Movies behavior.

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You'll notice on the discs dialog above that I have them listed as offline discs with empty location fields. This is because I don't use disc images, but instead rip episodes to individual files. The file paths for these are in the individual episode profiles as illustrated below. Season 5 is mapped the same way, but because they are not disc-sourced, they can only appear under the root series profile. This is also expected behavior.

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The problem I'm encountering is that all season 5 episodes will play just fine, but all season 1-4 episodes will not and generate the following error. I can only presume that this is because I mark the discs as offline, although since the episode profiles still show a file path to the individual MKVs and this is the same field that would be used to play the non disc-sourced episodes, it makes no sense to me why the disc-sourced ones won't play.

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FWIW, everything plays just fine in WMC. It's only CMC that has a problem with the file paths. Can you offer any insight?

Regards,
Barry

[Pauven]

Hey Barry,

Your setup looks okay, though a bit odd. I don't think I've encountered anyone else that has episodes mapped on offline discs plus file paths on the individual episodes. I would expect that since the file path is set at the episode level, that value would override the disc values (that's the intended behavior), but since your combo is seemingly unique, you might have found a gap in CMC's logic.

I'll have to do some testing on my end, to see if I can recreate this setup so I can develop a solution.

Paul

[Bairman]

Hmm... not sure what's unusual about it. I wouldn't know how to play individual episode files otherwise.

But I'm not terribly surprised to discover something I think is normal is actually not.

[Pauven]

Typical would be either only having episodes pointing directly at encoded files (your season 5), or having online ripped discs (ISO or folder) with mapped episodes, and possibly even a combination of both.

But you have mapped episodes for offline discs, which serves zero purpose. Why map an episode on a disc if the disc is offline? All the work for no benefit, especially if you are using converted media.

I do have The Big Bang Theory in both online DVD folders with mapped episodes and converted media files, but in this case since it's all online there's really no wrong way to CMC to play it back, it literally doesn't matter, and I might have gravitated towards using the original non-converted media on playback when CMC is presented with options, since that usually will be the highest quality.

That could be where CMC is failing you, if it is choosing to try and play the original disc since you have the episodes mapped, and isn't paying attention to the offline flag. Honestly, it never occurred to me that someone would have offline disc episodes mapped, but I guess sometimes that data comes along for the ride when you import data from Binnerup's online service, so now that I think about it, it doesn't seem all that odd. I just failed to consider this.

I'm sure you already realize this, but I'll mention it just in case: CMC can easily play back your episodes directly from the original discs (ISO or folder rip) if you use the free player MPC. So, you can skip the media conversion step if you wanted.

[Pauven]

Do me a favor, please.

Enable Debug Logging, then try to play an episode from Season 1, and also play an episode from Season 5. Then post here or email me the PlayClick debug log file(s) that you'll find in the Logs folder.

Thanks.

[Bairman]

That could be where CMC is failing you, if it is choosing to try and play the original disc since you have the episodes mapped, and isn't paying attention to the offline flag. Honestly, it never occurred to me that someone would have offline disc episodes mapped, but I guess sometimes that data comes along for the ride when you import data from Binnerup's online service, so now that I think about it, it doesn't seem all that odd. I just failed to consider this.

I think we're on the same page now. When I buy a new title and add it to MMCM, if it already exists on the webservice, it downloads what's there which may or may not include disc mappings. If the title doesn't already exist, I contribute my title with disc mappings included because others may need them to play discs or disc images. The fact that I don't need the mappings is irrelevant. As often as possible I like to contribute completed titles for the benefit of all.

But on to the troubleshooting...

I did more thorough testing and think I've discovered a pattern that may help you track down the problem. It turns out that some disc-sourcced episodes DO play. The ones that don't are always the first mapped episode on a disc. They indicate "Location is NULL - exiting" in the logs. I've tested every episode and zipped up all the logs; CMC generated several. You'll see the episodes that failed to play, without exception, are the first mapped episodes. I'm including the disc mappings here as well for reference.

Season 1
Disc 1 = Episodes 1-4
Disc 2 = Episodes 5-8
Disc 3 = Episodes 9-10

Season 2
Disc 1 = Episodes 1-4
Disc 2 = Episodes 5-8
Disc 3 = Episodes 9-11
Disc 4 = Episodes 12-13

Season 3
Disc 1 = Episodes 1-4
Disc 2 = Episodes 5-8
Disc 3 = Episodes 9-11
Disc 4 = Episodes 12-13

Season 4
Disc 1 = Episodes 1-3
Disc 2 = Episodes 4-7
Disc 3 = Episodes 8-10

Season 5 = not disc-sourced; all play

I hope this helps. Let me know if you need anything else.

--

[Pauven]

Thanks so much for identifying that pattern, and for providing all the logs, that's extremely helpful!

Since it's just the first episode per disc that fails, this sounds like a simple logic bug. Perhaps I have a >0 instead of >=0 as a qualifier, or something like that. This certainly gives me some logic routines to be on the lookout for in my code.

One more thing that will be very helpful is your CMC_MovieDB.xml file, which gets created when you have Debug Logging enabled and make any kind of change to your collection. Can you see if that file exists and is dated today? If it isn't, then with Debug Logging enabled, simply toggle the Watched status on any title, and it will be written. Then zip and email that XML file to me. Thanks!

[Bairman]

Pardon me for being dense but I can't seem to figure out how to add an attachment to an email or a PM and it's too large to attach here (18 MB+).

[Pauven]

Make sure to zip it to minimize the size.

In Gmail, click the paperclip icon on the bottom menu row to attach a file. Or alternatively, just drag and drop the zip file from your file explorer window onto the email.

[Bairman]

LOL sorry I wasn't more clear. I was trying to use the email option in your profile here in the forum. I don't know your address to use Gmail directly.

Oh, and the file is 18MB zipped... 70MB unzipped. I have a large collection.