TV schedule XmlTv updated every day for 11 days

Every night, I generate an XmlTV TV guide for around 300 French channels, and you can plug it into your IPTV player, your set-top box or your script with a single URL.

XmlTV is the format that almost all applications use to display a program guide (the EPG, the grid you see when you press the “Guide” key). The file is compressed in GZIP, weighs around 20 MB, and updates itself once a night. I focus on French channels. Other countries, frankly, I have neither the time nor the inclination.

What changes for free accounts

Well, let's be serious for two minutes. Some people were creating several accounts to download the complete guide without ever contributing. I wasn't born yesterday, so I changed the rules of the game. It can be summed up in one picture: the days in green contain the actual programs.

And since many of you only want the TV guide, without my software, there is now a plan just for that: the XMLTV subscription at €3 per month or €25 per year.

One detail that matters: the free file keeps the same channels and the same schedule throughout the entire period. From the third day onward, each time slot is still there, but its title is replaced by a reminder about the subscription and it no longer has a description. Your application does not crash, it just displays a guide that stops telling you anything the day after tomorrow.

The subscription, XMLTV or PRO, is taken into account from the next download, without changing the URL or key. It renews itself every month or every year, and you can stop it whenever you want from the subscription page: access remains open until the end of the paid period.

Get the file

You need an API key, and it takes a minute: create an account, verify your e-mail address, then copy the key displayed in your account. Then, paste it into one of these URLs in place of VotreCleApi, without brackets or quotation marks.

The first two are the simplest: no parameter, a real file extension, and they work in IPTV applications (iMPlayer, TiviMate and company) that refuse redirects.

Does your receiver not speak HTTPS ? Replace https:// with http://, it works too. It's made for satellite receivers (Enigma2, Dreambox, Vu+).

Once downloaded, the .gz opens with 7-Zip if you want to look inside.

The options

There are two settings, to add at the end of the URL.

Without accents, for old receivers that display hieroglyphics instead of “é”. This variant is reserved for subscribers (XMLTV or PRO), the free file only exists in one version:

https://digital3d.com/api/xmltv/VotreCleApi.xml.gz?noAccent=true

Uncompressed, on the old URL only (on the new ones, the extension decides):

https://digital3d.com/api/xmltv?userId=VotreCleApi&noCompressed=true

Would you rather click? The page https://digital3d.com/XmlTv?Id=VotreCleApi starts the download from a browser.

If you receive a strange file

The service never responds with an error page, it always sends XML, so it doesn't crash the applications. Two cases to know about.

You receive TooManyDownload.xml: the daily limit has been reached, either your 2 downloads, or another free account has already downloaded from the same IP address. The counter starts again at midnight UTC, so at 1 a.m. or 2 a.m. in France depending on the season.

You receive error.xml: the key is not recognized. Check that it is complete and that your account has been validated.

And there's no point downloading ten times a day: the file only changes once per night.

On an Enigma2 receiver (Dreambox, Vu+)

The guide can load itself every day on your box.

1. Install the CrossEPG plugin.
2. Download my configuration file.
3. Open it in a text editor and put your key on this line, keeping http:// exactly as it is :

   epg_url_0=http://digital3d.com/api/xmltv/VotreCleApi.xml.gz

4. Copy the file to the box, into /usr/crossepg/providers.
5. On the box: Settings, System, EPG, CrossEPG. Choose "XmlTV Providers", then "France - Digital3d.com", save and launch "Download Now".

For geeks: the XmlTV API

Downloading 20 MB to find out what's on TF1 tonight is a bit like taking the truck to go get bread. This is where it gets really interesting: I have an XmlTV API that responds in JSON, with the same key as the file.

The list of channels is open to everyone, without a key:

curl https://xmltv.digital3d.com/api/GetChannelIds

And the programs for a channel, with your key in the header:

curl -H "Authorization: Bearer VotreCleApi" "https://xmltv.digital3d.com/api/GetTvPrograms?channelId=TF1.fr"

You can also find what's on right now, search by title, the highest-rated programs and an endpoint to find out your quota. Everything is documented in the Swagger, you can test it from the page.

As for the quota, it's the same logic as for the file. The green bar shows what you can request in one day.

Just want to look at the schedule

You don't have anything to plug in and you only want to know what to watch? I made a small site for that: tv.digital3d.com. The French channels' schedule in the browser, on your phone as well as on your computer, and nothing to install.

Why a subscription?

Because all of this runs on a server that I pay for. Between hosting, bandwidth and maintenance (the sources change, things have to be fixed), the service costs me about €1,200 per year, not counting the evenings spent on it.

Let's be clear about what you are paying for: not the programmes themselves. They come from third-party public sources, they belong to their publishers and I don't sell them. The subscription is a contribution to the server costs and the assembly and maintenance work, with expanded access in return.

The free option is still there for testing and light use. If the guide is useful to you every day, you have two plans:

• The XMLTV subscription at €3 per month or €25 per year: the complete guide for 11 days and the API, nothing else.
• The PRO subscription at €12 per month: the same thing with higher limits, plus all my software.

In both cases, that's what keeps the service alive. Commercial use without a subscription is not allowed.