[OT] TOTPs not offered in HD (720p)

[Alan Milewczyk]

On 29-Dec-16 09:50, Vangelis forthnet wrote:
> Happy Holidays to one and all!
>
Happy holidays to you my friend!

> I think the subject of this post could be described as
> "English consistency at its... worst!"
>
Strictly speaking, it's "British inconsistency"... as it's the British 
Broadcasting Corporation" (or "British Broadcorping Castration" as a 
continuity announcer famously once announced). Having said that, given 
the fire the BBC has been subjected to north of Hadrian's Wall for being 
too English, maybe you're right first time!
> Last January, I started the following list thread:
>
> http://lists.infradead.org/pipermail/get_iplayer/2016-January/008577.html
>
> (do read so as to know what I'm talking about...).
> The 2014 TOTP shows were never made available as 720p
> encodes on iPlayer; the 2015 ones suddenly became available
> on the iPlayer site as HD versions on the afternoon of
> Monday Jan 11th 2016 (i.e. 17 days after the Christmas
> edition was broadcast...).
>
> Fast forward to this Christmas episode:
> http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b086kmvx
>
> Unsurprisingly for me,
>
> get_iplayer --pid=b086kmvx -i | FindStr "modes" =>
>
> modes:          original: 
> flashvhigh1,flashvhigh2,flashhigh1,flashhigh2,flashstd
> 1,flashstd2,hlsvhigh1,hlshigh1,hlslow1,hvfvhigh1,hvfvhigh2,hvfhigh1,hvfhigh2,hvf 
>
> std1,hvfstd2,hvflow1,hvflow2,subtitles1
>
> so, no signs of  hvfhd (720p50) or hlshd/flashhd (720p25) tvmodes.
> But the programme was actually broadcast on HD;
> the live BBC One TV stream on iPlayer was offering it
> as 720p50 and already TV captures are available on
> torrent sites as 1080p50 and 720p50 recodes...
>
> So, what is special about the TOTP programmes
> in that the iPlayer team can't offer them in a timely
> fashion (if at all) as HD-on-demand will, again,
> remain a mystery...
> FWIW, their "Known Issues" page mentions nothing:
>
> https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/help/programme-availability/programme-issues 
>
>

I think we've mentioned on here in the past the various encoding 
inconsistencies (such as a series being offered in a specific mode with 
the exception of one programme that's different....) but I'm learning to 
stop being an engineer bit by bit. It gets tiring asking "why?" all the 
time! ;-)

> So it'll again be a case of wait-and-see...
> But, sadly, the announced change on the iPlayer site
> will hit us in 2017, so no way to know beforehand
> how that will impact on GiP functions...
>

Hmmm, I think we've all got fingers crossed on that one!

> Festive regards.
>

And to you too! Looking forward to your e-mail! :-)