Pay theTVDB

[Tom Snyder]

Well, the rumors appear to be true.  theTVDB is going to a subscription model - theTVDB Subscription with API v4 (or maybe even before).  It's nice to know that they took free volunteer labor from over the years and are now going to profit from it.  I, for one, have stopped updating a few shows I was updating after getting some moderator abuse over a few questions I asked in their forum about one of the shows.  Now, they've shut down the forums as well so that you can't see all the problems people are having.

Any thoughts on this, Sparky?  

[Sparky53]

Hi,

I had not seen that.

Lets see how the Kodi team deal with it as they will have the same issue (but at a vastly larger scale)

To be honest the API has been a PITA for a while. TV Maze is (mainly) implemented alternative and TMDB looks like it's a good alternative too (with an API)  https://www.themoviedb.org/tv 

Cheers

[Tom Snyder]

There's no doubt that this is going to shake up the video viewing/management software community.  I honestly didn't know up to about 6 months ago or so that theTVDB wasn't an open source project.  When I found out it wasn't I had a sneaking suspicion that there would be trouble ahead.

For the most part my video collection is probably near complete with series from the past.  My focus now is mainly the currently on-air shows and future shows.  For me, that show information could easily be provided by an EPG provider such as Schedules Direct if the JSON or XMLTV could be imported into TV Rename.  I already pay $25 per year for the EPG for my WMC setup (using EPG123) and prior with Emby (before they came out with their own EPG).  I always thought that the TV Rename Schedule section would be better served by using an actual EPG rather than theTVDB.  There have been many times that episodes have not appeared in the Schedule because some volunteer failed to enter the data in a timely manner or the other problem where the entry has been made on theTVDB.com website but for some reason it sits there for a day or two before it gets released to the API.  With Schedules Direct's EPG I have 14 days worth of data with the accuracy getting better with each day.  I've seen schedules change hours before broadcast and the EPG makes the change.

Here's an oddball idea that I haven't heard anyone mention (maybe for good reason) with regards to old series - Is it possible to scrape Wikipedia?  Heck, if I could get rid of theTVDB I'd enter it manually.

Barring all that, TV Maze and TMDB are looking pretty good.

[Jürgen Schwarz]

I think also TMDB would be a good alternative. TV Maze is already implemented, but it has only texts in english language, so when you want another language that is not an alternative.

[Pirivan]

Just wanted to put in another vote for TMDB.  That is the 'default source' for Kodi scraping information for TV shows and movies and I know that's what many Kodi users now use.  It would be wonderful if it was supported by TVRename so that I could move away from using TVDB entirely within Kodi.

[Vincent Bellitto]

I'm all for moving away from tvdb.  The last couple times I have tried to make updates with well documents data and sources I've been rejected with them siting their own site's past version as the source.  TV maze is great after that i'm down for whatever.

[Michael Hurwood]

Hi all,

Once-upon-a-time contributor to TVRename here. Been away from the group for a few months as work just got too crazy and something had to give, but when I heard through the grapevine about TheTVDB's new subscription model thought I'd better drop by and check things out.

TMDB gets my vote too. I actually looked into this a couple of years ago when I got particularly pissed off in TheTVDB forums after they unilaterally deleted the whole show entries for QI XL, Have I Got A Bit More News For You, 8 out of 10 Cats Uncut, etc. just to prove a point with me, deleting hours of work by many volunteers. Since then I've done few updates in TheTVDB. (And strangely, now QI XL and some of the others are back in their database. Reckon I'll get an apology?)

So yeah, the API for TMDB looked good, and the data actually looked cleaner too. But it was all a bit too much effort at the time. Now that we already have TVMaze support, possibly adding a third source might not be so bad.

I note there are even C# wrappers for the API already available: https://www.themoviedb.org/documentation/api/wrappers-libraries

Anyway, with the summer holidays coming up (I'm an antipodean) I might just have some spare time for contributing some code changes again. I don't think I'd want to take the lead with it, as I'll be a bit rusty with the code, but I see if I can help out around the edges.

@Tom: "Scraping" Wikipedia is likely to be quite tricky, and probably not worth the time investment required. What might be possible is a "mass tagging" interface (a bit like foobar2000 if you're familiar with that) that would make cutting and pasting from sources like Wikipedia a bit easier.

Cheers

Michael

[Steven K]

KODI switched over to TMDB as their default scraper several versions back.

On Wednesday, September 23, 2020 at 10:37:35 PM UTC-4 Sparky53 wrote:

[Steven K]

I also received an email from them indicating they are switching to a subscription model and all of the advantages and features from doing so.

[Tom Snyder]

Michael,

I know nothing about C# or any of the modernly used programming languages.  I'm an old fart that was schooled in Basic, Fortran, COBOL, and IBM 360 Assembler language.  But based on what I can decypher from TV Rename's source code on Github it looks like Sparky is already working on incorporating TMDB in and adding a movie database as well.  It looks like exciting times ahead.

[Michael Hurwood]

G'day,

On Saturday, 14 November 2020 at 13:40:36 UTC+11 Steven K wrote:

KODI switched over to TMDB as their default scraper several versions back.

The surprising thing is I believe Plex has *not* changed over, but they are also negotiating their own licence fee with TheTVDB (and possibly have the size and presence  to be able to do that and get themselves a bargain.)

But with Kodi and a few other packages having switched I'm going to cross my fingers that where TheTVDB currently beats TMDB by having more information on more shows (though possibly TMDB has "cleaner/better" data for the shows they do have), this will rapidly change as people choose to enter missing data on TMDB, rather than working-for-nothing on the TheTVDB database.

Cheers,

Michael

[Hoss Astaraki]

Hi Tom, in reading your comments on the forum you seem to have lot of knowledge about TV Rename. 

I have large library of TV shows and movies (a few thousand movies and TV shows). I need someone's help with organizing what I currently have, downloading what I am missing, and creating accurate json files for my library? 

Would you be interested on a small contract job to get the task done?

[Tom Snyder]

Sorry, I'll have to pass on that.  TV Rename is easy enough to use.  Although the manual is currently a bit outdated, what is there is more than enough to get you started.  If you have any specific questions or problems, feel free to ask here and someone will be able to help you.  

[Sparky53]

Hi,

TV Rename  should do must of the work for you. I can help and then you made a donation depending on how long it takes?

Cheers

[Hoss Astaraki]

Hi Sparky53. Happy New Year. 

I am not that technical and I have a large project. 

I will make it worth your while. 

Please email me at hoss...@gmail.com.

we can discuss the project off line.