Your TV Guide schedule can usually be downloaded from the internet in a format called "XMLTV". XMLTV is a very popular XML-based file format for describing TV programme schedules and even includes programme descriptions, categories, ratings and actors!

The XMLTV format and associated "grabbing" tools are developed and maintained by the international xmltv.org group.

Luckily there are individuals and organisations that compile and publish XMLTV data for various regions around the world.

Some commercial organisations will license the EPG data from broadcasters then compile it and make it available for internet download to subscribers for a nominal fee. In some cases these organisations might supply your guide free with the purchase of one of their new Media Center or DVR devices.

In regions where broadcasters refuse to license their EPG data, many organisations or individuals may provide the EPG data for the rest of their community as a free or paid service. This data may be manually compiled (legally tolerated in some regions) or scrapped and reformatted from broadcaster websites (generally illegal).

To download this XMLTV from the internet you must use an XMLTV grabber which is configured specifically for your region. Our XMLTV Download application allows Microsoft Windows users to download data for their region from several XMLTV services around the world.

When paying for a commercially provided EPG service, make sure you are not paying more than AU$50 per year for your subscription. Any more than AU$50 per year could suggest a level of profiteering by the EPG service provider.

Most Windows Media Center™ users around the world are provided with a free EPG that is accessible through their Media Center machines. Unfortunately Microsoft is unable to supply some countries with this free service due to certain regional and broadcast restrictions. These regions include Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and several European countries.

When a free EPG service is not provided by Microsoft for your region, then users will use XMLTV data sources to supply the guide data they need. Unfortunately Windows Media Center™ does not natively load XMLTV data so third-party applications, such as our own Guide Service Proxy, are required to load this EPG data.

There are several ways of sourcing the XMLTV data you need to get your guide service up and running. The three of the most popular ways are through a guide service, screen scraping or Event Information Table (EIT) filtering is a viable option too.

• oztivo.net :: Primarily providing a guide service for older TiVo units in Australia, these guys also do a great job providing XMLTV data to all the Australian EPG communities!
• mceguide.co.za :: MCEGuide provide a native Windows Media Center EPG for South Africa, but they supply XMLTV data as well!
• tvprofil.net :: Based in Europe, TV Profil's Phazer program provides terrestrial, cable and satellite XMLTV data for all of Europe!
• tv.swedb.se :: Specific to Sweden, these guys provide XMLTV data for local services, but don't expect it to be in English!

Check out our XMLTV Download application which is able to connect to several of these guide services from around the world!

In the good 'ole days of computing we used to use screen scraping techniques to push and pull data to ancient IBM mainframes from our mighty Intel 80286 machines. These days much the same logic is used to scrape and format your XMLTV data from your TV Guide websites!

This technique requires the website being scraped to have consistently structured HTML or XML data that a web browser can access. Software is specifically written to parse and extract TV guide data from broadcaster's websites and reformat it as XMLTV. This method may sometimes be employed by Guide Services to provide XMLTV data to their many subscribers.

Most broadcasters may turn a blind eye to users scraping their TV guide websites, but some broadcasters may not allow this practice as they believe they are missing out on revenue from guide data licensing. In the past, Broadcasters in Australia have changed their website layout or even added JavaScript obfuscation to prevent screen scraping applications from mining data.

The xmltv.org website has a comprehensive list of grabber software which can be used to download your XMLTV data. xmltv.org's centralised "grabbing" project covers a good chunk of the northern hemisphere and is written in Python so if perfect for Linux-based systems. There is also a pre-compiled Microsoft Windows version available from xmltv.org, but does not have full support for all the listed countries.

Other popular grabbers that do not originate from xmltv.org are : 

• www.reven.co.nz :: These kiwis from Reven Interactive have a little utility to download your New Zealand guide data!

There has been a lot of clever work done by a lot of clever people to extract the programme guide from Digital TV signals and export it as XMLTV data. this type of non-commercial software is still fairly immature and tend to require a lot of tinkering to get just right! If that's not enough to put you off using EIT, then you have to contend with poorly formatted or non-standard TV programme names and descriptions being sent along with your DVB signal.

Two Windows-based applications worth playing to extract your EIT data are DVBGuide and EPGScan. If you're lucky enough to be a Vista Media Center user, then the September 2008 OEM version is shipped with Vista Media Center TV Pack 2008 and allows users to use EIT data natively!

Windows Media Center has a very closed and proprietary TV guide sub-system. It's always been a messy process to load your XMLTV data into Media Center and definitely not for the easily frustrated. For a long time, BladeRunner Pro was the tool of choice, but was difficult to use and integrate with media center.

Check out our Guide Service Proxy application which is able to load XMLTV data into Windows Media Center by turning your computer into a "mini" Microsoft guide server.

Digital Television (DVB-T) provides home media center users with a brand new multimedia experience that surpasses the long standing analogue television medium. With all this great media experience to watch, why wouldn't you want to click that little red button and record it? 

If you're in a country like Australia and don't have a Microsoft Guide Service available for your area then your easiest option is to find a guide service that acts like a native Microsoft Guide Service. Failing that, the second best option is to find a guide service that provides XMLTV data and load the data yourself!

Check out our XMLTV Guide Pack which has our own custom applications to download your XMLTV data directly from ozTiVo and load it into Windows Media Center! Bundled in the pack is the XMLTV Guide Wizard which will configure your Windows Media Center box in a few simple steps!

If you FOXTEL but don't want to pay the extra for the proprietary FOXTEL iQ box, then Windows Media Center is for you! The only problem is getting the guide data into your media center box!

Check out our XMLTV Guide Pack which has our own custom applications to download your XMLTV data directly from ozTiVo and load it into Windows Media Center! Bundled in the pack is the XMLTV Guide Wizard which will configure your Windows Media Center box in a few simple steps!