Why is my scheduled recording not being recorded? And EPG Refresh gets stuck

Force manual guide download after posting the above.

Stuck at 10% no change to above guide photo.

@Smokindog said:
Here, there’s guide data missing, recordings missing from my list that should be there and I personally saw the guide was updating about an hour ago. I checked and the debug log is checked as shown in the previously provided screenshot, as it was for all those times you told me it was not. Sorry but it seems all I’ve been doing since the last update is babysit my Plex setup. There are serious issues. I’m trying to help but it’s getting a little frustrating. Given all the issues, could you see fit to extend my trial another 30 days?

Thanks for getting logs with debug logging enabled this time.

The logs do not show any EPG Refresh issue for you. 100% was achieved at 18:54

Apr 06, 2018 18:54:57.914 [6672] DEBUG - Activity: updated activity 5f9ddc0e-d743-41bf-9900-9bd70472846c - completed 100% - Refreshing EPG

I am sorry but you have joined this thread when the evidence does not show you have an EPG Refresh issue - at least not this time

There are two aspects

  1. You are having recordings purged because of the retention policy. You have policy of Keep episodes from the Past 30 days - this setting may be confusing. It is explained on this support article under heading Keep
    https://support.plex.tv/articles/226074728-setting-up-recordings/
    It is explained as follows

ā€œEpisodes from the past X daysā€ refers to when an episode first aired. So, if you record the nightly news and choose ā€œEpisodes from the past 7 daysā€, then after the 7th day, older unwatched episodes would start being removed. Conversely, if you have that setting chosen and you record a repeat airing of an episode that initially premiered a year ago, the episode would not be retained at all (since it was first aired more than 7 days ago).

  1. There have been issues with TheTVDB service for past day or so. This impacts the metadata downloads and episode matching. Your logs do highlight the issue
2018-04-06 11:00:06,055 (3374) :  DEBUG (networking:166) - Requesting 'https://tvdb2.plex.tv/series/71697/episodes?page=1'
2018-04-06 11:00:37,036 (3374) :  ERROR (networking:219) - Error opening URL 'https://tvdb2.plex.tv/series/71697/episodes?page=1'
2018-04-06 11:00:37,036 (3374) :  INFO (logkit:16) - HTTPError 522: 

You can find some discussion on this on TheTVDB own forums here
https://forums.thetvdb.com/viewtopic.php?f=17&t=46729&sid=1e772734ad792a4ed17a4db2f346bad7&start=10

@Smokindog you have now provided debug logs from the server - my response in the follwoing post may be relevant to the issue you raised here

Note that the Retention Policy may result in recordings being purged on completion

@Smokindog said:
Multiple people have been mentioning this for days in this thread and others and you’ve commented on them.

I know there are more comments in THIS thread but here are a couple other thread…

https://forums.plex.tv/discussion/315849/why-is-my-scheduled-recording-not-being-recorded#latest

https://forums.plex.tv/discussion/315768/stability-issues-with-version-1-12-1-4885#latest

https://forums.plex.tv/discussion/316378/dvr-failed-to-record-the-last-2-weeks#latest

In a brief review I see a user in IL sent logs on April 1.

Here are logs I’ve saved for other problems I reported. Perhaps one of them will give you more information

Please do not edit previous posts to add logs - better to add new post with the extra info. At this moment my response to your post does not look right because i responded when you did not attach logs. Also there is no forum notification that an existing post was edited and it may not get spotted

I will have a look to see if there is anything further beyond https://forums.plex.tv/discussion/comment/1648475/#Comment_1648475

@Smokindog said:
Force manual guide download after posting the above.

Stuck at 10% no change to above guide photo.

Thanks - looking at this now

@sa2000 said:

The logs do not show any EPG Refresh issue for you. 100% was achieved at 18:54

Apr 06, 2018 18:54:57.914 [6672] DEBUG - Activity: updated activity 5f9ddc0e-d743-41bf-9900-9bd70472846c - completed 100% - Refreshing EPG

I am sorry but you have joined this thread when the evidence does not show you have an EPG Refresh issue - at least not this time

There are two aspects

  1. You are having recordings purged because of the retention policy. You have policy of Keep episodes from the Past 30 days - this setting may be confusing. It is explained on this support article under heading Keep

I think I’ll just bow out here. We’re either talking past one another or I’m just not comprehending… It’s probably me.

As I said, one update finished as you acknowledge above but guide data was missing. I provided a picture of my client screen and the logs.

I then forced a download of the guide and it hung at 10%. I posted a screen shot and the logs.

I also informed you that shows which should be recording were not recording (new episode). I never said anything about retention policy not working. I have multiple retention policies set based on the series. I’ve reported this in multiple threads.

I’ll wait to see if things get fixed.

Can you extend my trial another 30 days?

If not I’ll probably have to try something else. I’m really trying to make this work and if it does, buy a lifetime Pass.

@Smokindog said:

@sa2000 said:

The logs do not show any EPG Refresh issue for you. 100% was achieved at 18:54

Apr 06, 2018 18:54:57.914 [6672] DEBUG - Activity: updated activity 5f9ddc0e-d743-41bf-9900-9bd70472846c - completed 100% - Refreshing EPG

I am sorry but you have joined this thread when the evidence does not show you have an EPG Refresh issue - at least not this time

There are two aspects

  1. You are having recordings purged because of the retention policy. You have policy of Keep episodes from the Past 30 days - this setting may be confusing. It is explained on this support article under heading Keep

I think I’ll just bow out here. We’re either talking past one another or I’m just not comprehending… It’s probably me.

As I said, one update finished as you acknowledge above but guide data was missing. I provided a picture of my client screen and the logs.

I then forced a download of the guide and it hung at 10%. I posted a screen shot and the logs.

I also informed you that shows which should be recording were not recording (new episode). I never said anything about retention policy not working. I have multiple retention policies set based on the series. I’ve reported this in multiple threads.

I’ll wait to see if things get fixed.

Can you extend my trial another 30 days?

If not I’ll probably have to try something else. I’m really trying to make this work and if it does, buy a lifetime Pass.

It is up to you as to whether you continue here and i can help with identifying your issues or you give up

It is almost 3am now so will have to continue another day.

The retention settings of Keep for x days is confusing and it is relevant to your issue of losing recordings

For example - this recording completed but was immediately purged after that.

Apr 06, 2018 18:00:02.137 [8408] DEBUG - DVR:Grabber: Operation for Dogfights - E4 - Guadalcanal completed with status complete (Success)
Apr 06, 2018 18:00:02.137 [8268] DEBUG - Garbage Collector: Deleting expired unwatched content for Dogfights (policy: 5)

Similarly

Apr 06, 2018 19:00:08.573 [3908] DEBUG - Garbage Collector: Deleting expired unwatched content for Modern Marvels (policy: -30 before 2018-03-07)
Apr 06, 2018 19:00:08.573 [8784] DEBUG - DVR:Grabber: Operation for Modern Marvels - E26 - Torture Devices completed with status complete (Success)

What settings do you have for retention ?
I did extract a paragraph for your from the support article
https://support.plex.tv/articles/226074728-setting-up-recordings/ and i will do it again

ā€œEpisodes from the past X daysā€ refers to when an episode first aired. So, if you record the nightly news and choose ā€œEpisodes from the past 7 daysā€, then after the 7th day, older unwatched episodes would start being removed. Conversely, if you have that setting chosen and you record a repeat airing of an episode that initially premiered a year ago, the episode would not be retained at all (since it was first aired more than 7 days ago).
Tip!: You should really only use the ā€œEpisodes from the past X daysā€ options for shows where you’re only interested in retaining current episodes.

@sa2000 said:

@Smokindog said:
Force manual guide download after posting the above.

Stuck at 10% no change to above guide photo.

Thanks - looking at this now

@Smokindog

This does show an issue with EPG refresh not going beyond 10% - I am referring to the development team

It is not the same problem as the Cloudflare one that Ontario, Canada users were having

and also https://forums.plex.tv/discussion/comment/1648490/#Comment_1648490

@Smokindog the missing icons could be the issue fixed in beta 1.12.2.4249

See release notice http://forums.plex.tv/discussion/comment/1645660/#Comment_1645660

  • (DVR) Icons from OnConnect EPG guides shouldn’t disappear (#8366)

This as NOTHING to do with retention policy. NEW episodes are not being recording. It seems to coincide with EPG issues. ALL the issues came to a head in the most recent PMS release.

@Smokindog said:
This as NOTHING to do with retention policy. NEW episodes are not being recording. It seems to coincide with EPG issues. ALL the issues came to a head in the most recent PMS release.

You need to tell me if you expected these two recordings to be deleted after they were recorded and before you watched them Dogfights - E4 - Guadalcanal and Modern Marvels - E26 - Torture Devices

Apr 06, 2018 18:00:02.137 [8408] DEBUG - DVR:Grabber: Operation for Dogfights - E4 - Guadalcanal completed with status complete (Success)
Apr 06, 2018 18:00:02.137 [8268] DEBUG - Garbage Collector: Deleting expired unwatched content for Dogfights (policy: 5)

and

Apr 06, 2018 19:00:08.573 [3908] DEBUG - Garbage Collector: Deleting expired unwatched content for Modern Marvels (policy: -30 before 2018-03-07)
Apr 06, 2018 19:00:08.573 [8784] DEBUG - DVR:Grabber: Operation for Modern Marvels - E26 - Torture Devices completed with status complete (Success)

If you were expecting these to be purged and the new recordings for them not to be retained, then please tell me which recordings were not made? what program/episode/times and I will check the logs provided

PLEASE read my initial two posts. I am not asking about shows being deleted and I provided two of the shows that were not being recorded as they should be.

NOT the first time this has happened and NOT the only show. Problems got massively worse with the most recent PMS update and guide issues.

I am not in Canada.

Simpsons, channel 4.1, Sunday 4/1, new episode. ā€œPā€ drive is a local drive.

Keep all, record all, never delete, did not record.

@Smokindog said:
PLEASE read my initial two posts. I am not asking about shows being deleted and I provided two of the shows that were not being recorded as they should be.

OK will have a look at those - any episodes mentioned in the original post is not relevant now because there were no debug logs then. Now we have debug logs and I can look at those logs in relation to specific expected recordings during the period of time the logs cover.

and will also check out the Simpsons to see if they were scheduled to be recorded during the time period covered by the logs that had debug logging enabled

I will come back to you on these

I still want to emphasize that a user that has a scheduled recording that gets immediately deleted on completion of the recording may look to a user (not necessarily to you - because you know what is happening - but to other users) may look as if the recording never happened. But as you were expecting these 2 recording to be purged immediately - then fine - I can ignore them

Again, my question has NOTHING to do with immediate deletion. The shows that should have been recorded were NOT being recorded while they were live. I miss more recordings than I get since the latest update. Let’s try to focus here.

Can you extend my trial by 30 says? The past two weeks haven’t allowed me any time to actually use Plex. I’ve been doing nothing but rebooting and typing in these blogs.

@Smokindog said:
PLEASE read my initial two posts. I am not asking about shows being deleted and I provided two of the shows that were not being recorded as they should be.

@Smokindog said:
NOT the first time this has happened and NOT the only show. Problems got massively worse with the most recent PMS update and guide issues.

I am not in Canada.

Simpsons, channel 4.1, Sunday 4/1, new episode. ā€œPā€ drive is a local drive.

Keep all, record all, never delete, did not record.

what you are giving me here for missed recordings are 1st April episodes and I have already said, I cannot investigate 1st April issues because I do not have logs from you with debug logging enabled for that period

The logs I have that I can investigate are ones for 6th April 2018
For periods
02.17 am to 02:48 am
03:10 am to 03:30 am
17:31 pm to 19:37 pm

I cannot see any Simpsons scheduled episodes for 6th April
The earliest are episodes for 7th April - Episodes 17 to 20 scheduled for
2018-Apr-07 16:00 and 16:30 and 19:00 and 19:30

Tell me which recordings you expected to happen and did not happen in the periods below for 6th april ?
02.17 am to 02:48 am
03:10 am to 03:30 am
17:31 pm to 19:37 pm

I can only investigate logs that cover the time of a problem arising

Battlestar Galactica set to record all episodes new and old, any channel and keep all recordings.

Currently on channel 21.2, not recording.

Adding information / dialogue that was when I had this thread locked whilst moving posts around bringing into here from http://forums.plex.tv/discussion/299084/epg-fails-to-update

From @Smokindog at 00:21 am GMT - 9 April 2018

It’s happening again for the Simpsons channel 4.1. Even while watching it live in a chrome browser it wouldn’t show me any options to manually record.
Series is set to record all/all/any/forever

From @sa2000 at 00:24 am GMT - 9 April 2018

may be there are no free tuners - just guessing. Would need to investigate - you can collect the logs and screenshots now and once I finish the manipulation of the posts merging

From @Smokindog at 00:27 am GMT - 9 April 2018

I have 8 tuners so that’s not the issue. Also, as I said, I was watching it so it had a tuner.
I rebooted just an hour ago. Guide update seems stuck. I updated to newest beta yesterday.
[Logs Plex Media Server Logs_2018-04-08_19-22-43.zip attached]

From @sa2000 at 01:05 am GMT - 9 April 2018

What time were you watching Simpsons live on channel 4.1 and record button not available?

and was it the hosted plex web app (through https://app.plex.tv) or the bundled Plex Web app through http://127.0.0.1:32400/web on the server?

From @sa2000 at 01:12 am GMT - 9 April 2018

I just tried it and the record button on a show is greyed out until you hover over it and turns red
If it is already playing live then the popup overlay at the bottom of the screen when i hovered on it showed a red record button

From @Smokindog at 01:13 am GMT - 9 April 2018

I was watching it on both the chrome app and a ROKU device with a TV. I tuned in via chrome because the ROKU doesn’t support record requests of live TV. I also tried deleting and re-adding the series. I’ve not captured a Simpsons episode on Sunday (new) since I started my Plex Pass trial. Not sure if that is coincidence or not.

From @Smokindog at 01:15 am GMT - 9 April 2018

I know but the record button did not even show up.

From @sa2000 at 01:16 am GMT - 9 April 2018

Does the problem arise if you only use chrome and not at the same time use the Roku for same show?
I need to know the time so I can check the logs you provided

@Smokindog said

I know but the record button did not even show up.

From @sa2000 at 01:17 am GMT - 9 April 2018

In such cases need screenshot as well

From @Smokindog at 01:23 am GMT - 9 April 2018

Show ended at 7:30 PM CDT. It’s the same scenario I sent you screen shots for in the other posts. I also include log in these messages. The show was on from 7-7:30PM CDT tonight

From @sa2000 at 01:29 am GMT - 9 April 2018

The screenshot that I would be after for this one, is of the live tv streaming overlay on Plex Web in Google Chrome which you say did not have a record button

@Smokindog said:
Battlestar Galactica set to record all episodes new and old, any channel and keep all recordings.

Currently on channel 21.2, not recording.

I have looked at the Battlestar Galactica issue and the recordings were not scheduled because there appeared to be no airings. This may well be because of an EPG issue

To investigate I would need to see the epg database initially after a manual EPG refresh

So please do the following

  1. Ensure Debug Logging is enabled on the server settings
  2. Restart the server to get fresh logs
  3. Do a Manual Refresh of the EPG and wait for its completion
  4. If the EPG Refresh hangs then this may be the same issue that i have already referred to the development team - see my earlier post http://forums.plex.tv/discussion/comment/1648493/#Comment_1648493 - but i would not mind getting more logs and screenshot
  5. If the EPG Refresh completes, then wait 5 minutes and check the Program Guide and also check the recording schedule to see if expected airings are showing or missing
  6. If there are expected airings and they are missing, please get a screenshot to show no airings showing and also collect the server logs
  7. Shut down Plex Media Server and take copies of the EPG database files - they would be in this directory M:\My DVR\Plex Media Server\Plug-in Support\Databases\ and the filenames will start with tv.plex.providers.epg.onconnect- - copy out all these files and zip the copy