21 replies to this topic

[doglover]

I have already posted your info on one of polish tvsat forum. I hope people read this and change download time.

 

Thanks.  Hopefully people are reading it, and acting on it.

 

I will prepare something to be posted on the Polish Kodi websites too.

We are not against Kodi using our data.  Only they should do it in a proper way.  And there is a way.  But I need to gather some data.

 

Willy

[doglover]

When one configures Kodi - IPTV Simple Client to read the EPG directly from our servers he creates a tremendous server overload of our servers.

This configuration is found in Settings - EPG Settings tab

When you now fill in the location a webpath (or a shortened URL) the EPG is read directly form our servers.  In itself it is not a problem.  The same applies when fill this in after XMLTV path

However IPTV Simple Client checks every 5 minutes the XMLTV file.  And thus downloads this file every 5 minutes.  If a thousand users (which is a very conservative estimate) have IPTV Simple Client switched on, this creates on one of our servers a download of 4.72 MB x 1000 of 4.72 GB every 5 minutes.

We do no have the bandwidth to accommodate this.

 

Furthermore, this download of the XMLTV happens for every channel you have in your playlist, for which EPG is enabled.  Yes, it downloads the same file again every 5 minutes

So if you have 50 channels, the download every 5 minutes will be: 4.72 MB x 1000 x 5 = 23.6 GB

 

You could limit the amount of times IPTV Simple Client checks the XMLTV file by changing the values in the advancedsettings.xml file.  If this file does not exist you have to create it.

Furthermore, you should keep the cache of the data enabled.

 

It looks like this section has to be changed.  These are the default values

<epg>
  <lingertime>1440</lingertime>  <!-- keep X minutes of past epg data (default: 24h) -->
  <updatecheckinterval>300</updatecheckinterval>  <!-- check if tables need to be updated every X minutes -->
  <cleanupinterval>900</cleanupinterval>  <!-- remove old entries from the EPG every X minutes -->
  <activetagcheckinterval>60</activetagcheckinterval>  <!-- check for updated active tags every X minute -->
  <retryinterruptedupdateinterval>30</retryinterruptedupdateinterval>  <!-- retry an interrupted epg update after X seconds -->
  <updateemptytagsinterval>60</updateemptytagsinterval>  <!-- override user selectable EPG update interval (minutes) for empty EPG tags -->
  <displayupdatepopup>true</displayupdatepopup>  <!-- display a progress popup while updating EPG data from clients -->
  <displayincrementalupdatepopup>false</displayincrementalupdatepopup>  <!-- also display a progress popup while doing incremental EPG updates -->
</epg>

But you could still have an old version of the plugin (IPTV) which uses the following settings:  (in seconds)

<advancedsettings>
  <epg>
    <updateemptytagsinterval>10800</updateemptytagsinterval>
    <updatecheckinterval>10800</updatecheckinterval>
    <activetagcheckinterval>10800</activetagcheckinterval>
  </epg>
</advancedsettings>

So if you use still the old plug-in and use the newer settings, you will aggravate the problem.  And it does not solve the problem of downloading the same file for every channel in your playlist.  So you will still download f.i. the Polish file let see 50 times (if you have 50 channels in the playlist) every time.

 

So, I would recommend not to try this route.

 

Recommended solution

 

There is a better alternative. This described here:

http://www.iptvsaga.com/kodi-new-live-tv-pvr-addon-with-auto-epg/

This EPG plug-in downloads the XMLTV files in a proper way.  And you will never to hunt the location of the EPG files down again.  This because of the program loads a small file (which I maintain) which tells the plug-in where it can find the proper XMLTV files.

 

Pls. adapt your Kodi - IPTV Simple Client.  It benefits you.  And you will make sure we do not have result in drastic measure as to block every Kodi user.

 

Be warned however that the author does not support this anymore.  Reason:  It is used mainly by people watching illegally streamed channels.  So he will not answer questions.

 

Willy

Edited by doglover, 8 December 2015 - 14:35.