MythTV

MythTV is a powerful media center and video recording software system. The distributed architecture allows analog and digital media to be captured, organized, and streamed over the network to other MythTV instances or network attached devices.

Installation
MythTV is a complex and capable system and during the first install can be a little daunting to configure if there is no familiarity with the software. Once the backend has been set up properly and configured with recording devices/sources (DVB or analog capture etc.), there is usually little maintenance here and there in the future.

Kernel
Depending on how MythTV is going to be configured, there may be options in the kernel that need to be enabled. If support is required for recording media from DVB devices or controlling with a remote control, the relevant devices need to be enabled in the kernel before MythTV or any other applications will be able to access them.

USE flags
MythTV has quite a few USE flags to customize configuration according to hardware specification and software requirements.

Configuration
(Explain how to configure the package/software/tool/utility in this section.)

MythTV includes a backend which handles recordings and manages databases of media, this has to be configured and running before the a client, mythfrontend, or other media player can interact with the MythTV system. MythTV also requires a running MySQL compatible database server such as MySQL or MariaDB to function, this is handled through the database modules of Qt.

Database
A database will need to be set up before the MythTV backend can be started. The emerge command should have already pulled in MySQL or MariaDB but the database server may not have been configured yet, if this is the case please refer to MySQL or MariaDB for information. The following command will set up the MythTV database using the emerge config phase, this will require a root user and password for the database.

Mythbackend
At least one backend must be running to use MythTV, this can be on the same host as the frontend or a different host on the network.

Start the MythTV backend on the chosen host(s) and add it to the default runlevel.

Usage
(Explain how to use the package/software/tool/utility in this section.)

Invocation
(Remove this section if not applicable.)

MythTV frontend
The application is the frontend process of MythTV for viewing media on the MythTV system.

Removal
(Explain how to properly remove the software. If this section needs more than an 'emerge -C' command each step should be explained in detail so that no trace of the software remains on the system.)

External resources

 * https://www.mythtv.org/wiki/ - Official MythTV Wiki
 * http://www.linuxtv.org/ - Television with Linux
 * http://www.linuxtv.org/wiki/index.php/Main_Page - The Television with Linux wiki providing lots of information on configuring specific devices