SMPTE timecode

[k6ccc]

Does, or can an FPP instance operating as a remote read and sync to SMPTE timecode?  If so, how?
The purpose of the question is to use something other than another FPP instance as the master.

[darylc]

Check  out the various plugins and see what they can do?

[k6ccc]

Check  out the various plugins and see what they can do?

Good suggestion.  There are two available plugins that hold possibilities.
Thanks

[k6ccc]

Ding!  Ding!  Ding!  We have a winner.

There is a plugin called ArtNet Advanced Features that does what I needed.  There are a couple minor issue to resolve before November, but last night I was successfully playing a short test show (8 sequences) on my P10 matrix via SMPTE Time Code.

One issue I will have is that as far as I can tell, you must use the Time Code hour to select the sequence in the playlist to play.  That limits you to 24 sequences (although that could actually be a limitation of the sender being used).

The other one is that if I send Time Code hour 1, it plays sequence 2 in the playlist, if you send hour 2 it plays sequence 3, etc.  I had to either increment the Time Code hour by one, or put a dummy sequence as sequence 1 in the playlist (my current solution).  And no, I can't send Time Code hour 0 as that results in FPP playing nothing.

I will be playing more with this in the next few days to see if I can resolve a few of these issues.

Thanks darylc

[MikeKrebs]

Trying to read the source code, it looks like using the hour as an index is optional. Else the time code would be for the whole playlist?

And a zero/zero does indicate stop so that is why the playlist is off by one. If you send 0 hour and 1ms does it play sequence 1?

[k6ccc]

Trying to read the source code, it looks like using the hour as an index is optional. Else the time code would be for the whole playlist?

Yes, the use of hour for the sequence selection is optional, but apparently there is no way to specify which sequence to play other than using the hour.  For example, you can't specify that Time Code 0:10:00 is the start of sequence 1, and Time Code 0:20:00 is the start of sequence 2, etc.  My source can do that.

And a zero/zero does indicate stop so that is why the playlist is off by one. If you send 0 hour and 1ms does it play sequence 1?

Have not tried that yet.  Had to get to bed...  I will try that, but it wont be for a couple days (I shoot a professional fireworks show tomorrow, so a busy next 30 hours followed by SLEEP!

[k6ccc]

I'm essentially down to one issue.  Currently as far as I can tell the only way to specify which sequence in the playlist to play when using timecode via ArtNet is to use the hour to select the sequence.  So for example, I can't tell FPP to start sequence at 0 hour : 20 minutes.  The limitation of using hour is there is only 24 hours.  As I said earlier, that may be a limitation in my source.

The last issue that I had was my internal networking - but I mention it in case it benefits someone else.  In my case my E1.31 devices are on a 192.168.131.0/24 LAN so the broadcast address is 192.168.131.255.  When I specified the Timecode be sent to the IP of one of my FPP instances, that one FPP instance would receive it and work properly, but if I specified the broadcast IP, it would not.  Turns out for my testing that I was sending from a different LAN so therefore the traffic was routed.  Duh!  Broadcast traffic is not normally routed.  Changed my timecode source to be on the same LAN as the FPP instances, and then it worked.

[k6ccc]

OK, apparently the time code standard is limited to 24 hours.  Since the current implementation of the ArtNet plugin and FPP requires using hours for sequence selection, that limits to 23 sequences.  Can FPP and / or the ArtNet plugin be modified to allow something other than hours for sequence selection?