Personal MPG Won't Transfer to TiVo - Copyright Restricted

[saberman]

I have .mpg files on my PC that I have served to a Series 2 TiVo for years via pyTiVo. Yesterday, the TiVo decided that 1 out of over 300 .mpg files in one folder was copyrighted and refused to copy it TO the TiVo FROM the PC. It said "Transferring prohibited by the Copyright Holder". In the Now Playing list it showed it with a red circle with a slash through it. The other 300+ files were shown with a solid green circle and anyone of them could be copied to the TiVo without problems.

The specific file has been copied to the TiVo and deleted from it many times. The file date on the PC is 8/28/2006.

So how do I explain to the TiVo that the .mpg file on the PC is not copy restricted and can be transferred to the TiVo?

More important -- how do I make sure the Series 2 TiVo doesn't classify more of my personal video files this way and refuse to copy them from the PC to the TiVo?

Edit:
I did the following tests:
1. Copied the file to the TiVo Desktop's video folder. File showed with a solid green circle on the TiVo and could be copied to the TiVo.
2. a. Deleted the file from the original folder and went out of Now Playing and back in to verify that the file did not show in the TiVo's listing.
2. b. Moved the file back into the original folder and went into Now Playing on the TiVo and navigated to the original folder and the file showed with the red circle and the slash and was not transferable.
3. Moved the file to another folder served by pyTivo. File showed with a solid green circle on the TiVo and could be copied to the TiVo.
4. Moved the file back to the original folder. File showed with a red circle and a slash.
5. Restarted the TiVo. File still shows with a red circle and a slash.
6. Stopped and started the pyTiVo service. File now shows with a solid green circle.

Conclusions:
1. The file does not contain a Copyright restriction as both TiVo desktop and pyTiVo can serve the file as long as it is not in the original folder.
2. The identification as Copyright restricted appears to be associated with a combination of the folder being used (as that looks like a group on the TiVo) and the file.
3. It appears to be a pyTiVo related problem.

[wmcbrine]

The "copy prohibited" flag is just used for files that, for whatever reason, passed pyTivo's extension test, but are seen as unreadable once it tries the ffmpeg test. It's a long story why it does that... Anyway, to know why it's failing here, I'd have to see the log, with debug turned on. However, it sounds like it's probably just timing out. If you have a recent version of pyTivo, you might try adding "ffmpeg_wait = 20", or some other value (the default is 10, so you want to go higher), to the "Server" section of your pyTivo.conf.

I have a hard time understanding why this limit ever needs to be extended, since ten seconds is already absurdly long, but experience indicates that it sometimes does.

[saberman]

However, it sounds like it's probably just timing out.

It looks like something that pyTivo caches since it was not file dependent but folder/file dependent. I don't think it retried the folder/file after the first time it thought it was bad. Please note that when I moved the file out of the folder and went out of and into Now Playing the file was gone from the list. When I moved the file back in and checked now playing it was back on the list with the red circle and slash before any attempt to transfer it. The .mpg has a companion .txt file with the meta data in it. Is there any reason pyTiVo would do anything to process the file without a transfer request?

The problem went away after stopping and restarting the pyTiVo service. It did not go away when I restarted the TiVo.

pyTiVo is version 2008.05.02.