get_iplayer not finding PVR searches when run from cron

[dinkypumpkin]

On 18/04/2013 14:31, mikey wrote:
> Hello,
>
> I'm trying to setup get_iplayer to run under cron overnight. I have it
> set up with a few searches, one of which I know has a matching file
> that has not been downloaded.
>
> I have tried both of these separately (at the appropriate times of day
> and check that they did indeed run)
>
> 47 13 * * * get_iplayer --pvr --output=/var/www/Videos/
> 2>/var/log/get_iplayer.log
> 07 14 * * * get_iplayer --pvr-list >/var/log/get_iplayer.log 2>&1
>
> They both produced exactly the same log:
>
> ------------------------
> get_iplayer v2.80, Copyright (C) 2008-2010 Phil Lewis
>    This program comes with ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY; for details use
> --warranty.
>    This is free software, and you are welcome to redistribute it under
> certain
>    conditions; use --conditions for details.
>
> All PVR Searches:
> -----------------------
>
> And the file that I know is matched by one of the searches is not
> downloaded. The same 2 commands run with "sudo" will run quite appily
> from the command line and will output the 5 or 6 PVR searches I have
> added.
>
> I'm running this on Ubuntu Server 12.04 and get-iplayer is version 2.80-1

Those two commands wouldn't produce exactly the same log.  Run them at a 
prompt and look carefully at the output.  It looks like both commands 
overwrite your log file, so you'll only see output from the last one to run.

The log you showed is from get_iplayer --pvr-list, and it indicates that 
no PVR searches have been defined.  That may be because the cron job is 
running as a different user than the one used to define the searches. 
If you're testing with sudo, then I assume the crontab you listed is for 
root, but perhaps you defined the searches under your own user id.  Or 
vice versa.