# 28 Day Rule: Explain it, please!



## ColinYounger (Aug 9, 2006)

OK - I'm a thickie.

I _thought_ I knew what the 28 day rule was, but reading some old threads signals to me that perhaps I don't. Can someone give me a canonical definition of what the 28 day rule is, and how TiVo uses it?

Thank you in advance, oh Gurus. <bows>


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## ColinYounger (Aug 9, 2006)

*Canonical: "Canonicality depends on context, but it is implicitly defined as the way *hackers* normally expect things to be."


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## OzSat (Feb 15, 2001)

I believe it is:

When the users sets up the rules for the season pass, one option is "new episodes only or all episodes".

If the user selects "new episodes only" that TiVo will only record episodes where the OAD is within the past 28-days and the episode was not already recorded within the past 28-days.

If the user selects "all episodes" then one occurance of each episode_id is recorded - unless it has already been recorded within the past 28-days or it has previously been recorded and the recording is still in 'Now Playing'


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## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

I thought the rule was just that if Tivo has recorded that showing of that episode in the series in the last 28 days then it won't record it again in the following 28 days.

Clearly by definition the 28 day rule cannot work for series that only have generic data as there is no way for Tivo to know that it is precisely the same episode being shown again.


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## jakerock (Dec 9, 2002)

If you drop food on the floor but you don't lose sight of it (it doesn't roll under something) then you can eat it as long as it doesn't sit for more than 28 days.


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## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

jakerock said:


> If you drop food on the floor but you don't lose sight of it (it doesn't roll under something) then you can eat it as long as it doesn't sit for more than 28 days.


Jake its always great to hear from our North American colleagues here in the UK section but perhaps you can tell us exactly what form of medication you are currently taking in order for that rather unusual line of lateral thinking to have occurred to you.


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## Anndra (Oct 12, 2004)

Pete77 said:


> Jake its always great to hear from our North American colleagues here in the UK section but perhaps you can tell us exactly what form of medication you are currently taking in order for that rather unusual line of lateral thinking to have occurred to you.


Yeah! The 28 day rule is; if you wake up from a coma in hospital, after being knocked of your courier bicycle, LOCK THE DOORS!


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## ColinYounger (Aug 9, 2006)

OzSat - that's what I originally thought, so I'll ignore the confusion introduced yesterday. Thanks! :up:

jakerock - no, no, no! That's the FIVE MINUTE rule you're on about there! 

Anndra - The mind boggles.


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## verses (Nov 6, 2002)

Isn't the 28 day rule to shoot on sight any drooling zombie-like creatures that approach you if you wake up from a 28 day coma in a hospital in an apparently deserted London?


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## JudyB (Jan 25, 2006)

Pete77 said:


> I thought the rule was just that if Tivo has recorded that showing of that episode in the series in the last 28 days then it won't record it again in the following 28 days.
> 
> Clearly by definition the 28 day rule cannot work for series that only have generic data as there is no way for Tivo to know that it is precisely the same episode being shown again.


I'm really not sure about what happens to programmes with "generic" data, but I think that you are right about the 28 day rule and Ozsat is wrong (sorry Ozsat).
For example, we have a season pass for Heroes on BBC2 so (normally) it will record the episode shown at 9PM on Wednesday. The "28 day rule" will prevent it from also recording the same episode when it is repeated on Thursday (or Sunday or whenever).

The 28 day rule also works cross channel, so you can have a second Season Pass on another channel and it will avoid recording the episode twice. However there are some odd side effects when it is used cross-channel.
For some things we have had Season Passes on both channels in order to handle overlaps with other things in order to guarantee that the episode gets recorded. For example we did this with Lost on C4/E4: Season Pass #1 on E4 and Season Pass #2 on C4.
The odd effect is that Tivo will always record the episode from the higher priority Season Pass if it can, even if the episode will be shown first on the lower priority channel. I think that this does make sense, but it is counter-intuitive.


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## BrianHughes (Jan 21, 2001)

But what do you do if it was only a 27 day coma? How do you know how many day's it's been if there's nobody left to ask?


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## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

JudyB said:


> For some things we have had Season Passes on both channels in order to handle overlaps with other things in order to guarantee that the episode gets recorded. For example we did this with Lost on C4/E4: Season Pass #1 on E4 and Season Pass #2 on C4.
> 
> The odd effect is that Tivo will always record the episode from the higher priority Season Pass if it can, even if the episode will be shown first on the lower priority channel. I think that this does make sense, but it is counter-intuitive.


Tivo's handling of Season Passes cross channel is obviously very odd and inconsistent in its approach.

For instance selecting View Upcoming Episodes for a Season Pass will show you the episodes that are upcoming across all channels but the Season Pass menus do not give you any options to "record episodes on this channel only" or "record episodes on all channels I receive" or "record episodes only on the following channels." But then why does View Upcoming Episodes show you the episodes on the other channels as well.

As to generic data series the SP simply records every single showing of the program as far as I know. This is why you really don't want to have an SP with Keep Until I Delete for a series with generic data when say National Geographic repeats some programs in some series 3 times in a day. This can only be countered by setting Keep At Most to 1 so you only keep the last episode of the program shown.


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## Anndra (Oct 12, 2004)

verses said:


> Isn't the 28 day rule to shoot on sight any drooling zombie-like creatures that approach you if you wake up from a 28 day coma in a hospital in an apparently deserted London?


SNAP!

Colin: http://uk.imdb.com/title/tt0289043/


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## verses (Nov 6, 2002)

Anndra said:


> SNAP!


Do'h, that'll teach me to refresh my message window before composing a reply...



IanF


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## OzSat (Feb 15, 2001)

JudyB said:


> ... and Ozsat is wrong (sorry Ozsat).


How is my 28-day explaination wrong?


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## JudyB (Jan 25, 2006)

ozsat said:


> How is my 28-day explaination wrong?


I didn't think that the 28-day rule has anything to do with the OAD. Also, as I said there are additional complexities to do with multiple Season Passes which are important to try and understand.


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## OzSat (Feb 15, 2001)

If TiVo doesn't look at the OAD - how does it know if its a first run ????


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## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

ozsat said:


> If TiVo doesn't look at the OAD - how does it know if its a first run ????


But as we know the First Run Only part of a Tivo Season Passes is not a feature anyone should turn on if they don't want to take the risk of missing an episode that Tivo deems as being a repeat but which in fact turns out to be its First Run in the UK.


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## OzSat (Feb 15, 2001)

Because of the OAD is wrong it screws up the 28-day rule!


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## TCM2007 (Dec 25, 2006)

The 28-day rule is usually meant to the sytem whereby no programme is re-recorded within 28 days of it being in Now Playing.

The FRO/All rule also uses a figure of 28 days to decide if something is new or not, but this is not usually referred to as the 28 day rule.


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## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

TCM2007 said:


> The FRO/All rule also uses a figure of 28 days to decide if something is new or not, but this is not usually referred to as the 28 day rule.


I think both I and JudyB are in agreement with your view on this matter.


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## SPR (Nov 28, 2001)

To throw an extra connundrum into the 28 day rule

I've noticed that if I change the Program Name using TiVoWeb, then this seems to cancel any "already in Now Playing aspect of the rule"....

I would have thought it used Object ID's rather than this text?


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## TCM2007 (Dec 25, 2006)

Interesting, never noticed that.

I don't know without looking at the code, but it's entirely possible that TW creates a duplicate Program object to edit it and attaches that to the Recording object, replacing the original.

This would be the sensible way to do it, as otherwise editing the name of something in Now Playing would also edit the title of every showing in the guide data.

If that's what it does, it would divorce the original Program object's link from the recording, and it is the recording which is tracked fro the 28 rule, not the Program object directly.


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## mrtickle (Aug 26, 2001)

Yes that is what happens. I use hacked up extra code which edits the original object (so that the details in every showing change) - I do this on purpose to put episode numbers into episode titles so that the Tracker module has nicer records.

Ozsat I am loath to take issue with your explanation of the 28 day rule but I'd say that the FRO function (whilst needing a good OAD and counting 28 days from OAD to broadcast date to work) is entirely separate from what we know as "the" 28 day rule - which only uses the TmsID. For the 28 day rule to work the OAD doesn't matter at all, so there's no need to mention OAD or FRO in this context. Just whether the Guide Data uses Episodes or not for a given series.


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