Live TV

Home plays the channel you watched last, muted, in a compact preview with what's on it now: the programme, how long it has left and what comes next. Watch opens it full window with sound, on the same stream, so it doesn't start again. The speaker button turns the sound on without leaving Home.

Below the preview, Home starts with Continue watching, local Recommendations and Watchlist, then favourite and recent channels, new movies, new series and your current category. Rows with nothing to show stay out. All opens a full list, and All channels opens every channel.

Watchlist in the top navigation bar opens all saved titles while any are visible under your adult-content setting, even when its Home row is hidden. The entry hides when there are none. Settings > Home lists every row, including empty ones. Use the checkboxes to show or hide rows and the up/down buttons to reorder them. Tab reaches each control; Enter activates a move and Space changes a checkbox. Changes save immediately and survive restart. Reset to defaults restores the order above and shows every row.

Recommendations use up to three available titles from a bounded recent local viewing record and the catalogue already on your computer. Each suggestion names the title you watched and its matching genre, category or name. Without viewing history, Home keeps its ordinary catalogue and channel rows. Titles for adults never appear on Home, even with For adults on.

Until you've watched something, the backdrop shows a channel without playing it.

Your subscription may allow a single connection. Home then uses it as soon as it opens, so if another device is already watching, the backdrop stays still instead of taking the connection over. With several subscriptions, Home plays the channel you watched last, whichever it is from. Minimising Mr. Streamer, hiding it behind other windows, or going to Movies or Series stops the muted backdrop; it starts again when you come back.

Live TV keeps Favourites, Recently watched and All channels, then your own lists, beside nine fixed topics: News, Sports, Kids, Movies, Entertainment, Music, Documentary, Regional and Other. Topics span every subscription you added. They describe the provider's category labels, never a guessed channel identity. A channel can appear in several content topics. Regional is for recognized place-only category labels; uncertain labels stay in Other. All channels and Provider lists always remain available.

Country, Language and Source filter the current selection. Several choices within one filter match any of them; different filters apply together. Each menu counts its alternatives under the other active filters. Unknown country or language stays reachable with Any and through Provider lists. Reset filters clears the session filters. F opens Country; Tab reaches the other filters, and the menus take Up, Down, Enter, Space and Escape. Watch shows the same active filters and Reset.

Provider lists opens your provider's countries and categories in their original order. Open a country to see its categories; Left or Backspace returns. Find searches those country and category names across the catalogue, separately from channel and programme search. Duplicate category names include source context.

The last topic, provider category or custom list is remembered globally. All channels clears that choice, so Home and restart stay on All. Filters reset on a different base selection and at startup, and stay when returning from Watch to the same selection. Favourites and Recently watched are never remembered as discovery choices. A removed provider category falls back to All channels with a message. Home's existing category row follows the same discovery view, including its session filters, and its All action opens exactly that view. While browsing Favourites or Recently watched it uses your last remembered topic, provider category or custom list. Adults never appear on Home.

Under each channel's name, a smaller line tells it apart: the subscription it's from when it reads like a channel of another, then its country and qualities. A name or line that doesn't fit shows in full when you point at it, or choose its row with the keys while its schedule is closed. When a subscription's channels couldn't be fetched, a line above the list says so, with Retry, and the others show as usual. The channels on the right show what's on now, with how long it has left, and what's next. The channel you're watching plays muted at the top.

• Click a channel to watch it. Back, or Escape, returns to the same place in the list.
• The arrow at the end of a row lists the rest of the day. Click a later programme to read about it.
• On a channel whose aired programmes your provider keeps (catch-up), the rest of the day starts with today's programmes that already aired. Click one to watch it from its start. Watch says when it aired, and at its end the channel stops; Watch then plays the channel live. A programme older than your provider keeps says how many days back catch-up goes. Catch-up plays on this computer, not on a TV.
• The star adds a channel to your favourites. A new favourite goes last, and Reorder puts them in the order you want.

Guide, beside Watch at the top, or G, shows the same channels as a grid: channels down the side and time across, with a line at now. It goes ahead as far as your provider's guide reaches, and back a couple of hours, or as many days as the longest catch-up among the list's channels keeps, at most a week; hatched stretches are where the guide has nothing. Left and Right move between programmes, Up and Down between channels at the same time, and Page Up, Page Down, Home and End jump as in the list. Click a programme, or move to it, to see what it is under its channel. Watch live, Enter or a double click watches the channel; click a channel's name to watch it. Channels with catch-up have a clock sign beside their name. A programme that aired and that catch-up keeps plays from its start with Enter, a double click or Play from start, and one on now has Play from start after Watch live. Programmes that aired and can't be played again are dimmed. Wheels and trackpads scroll both ways, and Now comes back to now. List, G again or Escape goes back to the list, and Live TV opens in the view you left it in. A search shows each channel it finds once, as the list's shared rows do.

The field beside the list's name searches the list you're looking at: Favourites, Recently watched, All channels, one of your lists, a topic or one provider category. It finds a channel by its name, also the full name your provider gives it, and by the programmes on now and later today, whatever the capitals and accents. The channels it finds stay in the list's order, with what matched underlined. A later programme that matched stands at the end of its row with its time, and the arrow opens the rest of the day on it. Clicking the row still watches the channel as it is now.

In search results, copies that the catalogue can safely identify as one channel share a row. The count says how many channels and playable streams match. Show copies, or Right, lists each provider's actual copy with its subscription, qualities and category. Individual rows also name their subscription when several are saved. Enter on the shared row prefers a favourite copy, then the saved subscription order. Enter on a copy plays that copy. Left closes its open schedule first, then the copies. Stars and S apply to individual copies.

/ puts the cursor in the field. Down or Enter there moves to the channels found, and Escape clears the search, as picking another list does. When nothing in the list matches, Search all channels looks for the same in every channel. Searching uses what Mr. Streamer already has, so typing asks your provider nothing.

Reorder, beside the field in Favourites, or R, puts your favourites in another order. Every row gets an Up and a Down button: a click moves the channel one place, and a click with Shift moves it to the top or the bottom. On the keyboard, Up and Down choose a row, and with Alt held, Option on a Mac, they move it. Page Up and Page Down move it ten places, Home and End to the top and the bottom. Save, or Enter, keeps the order. Cancel, or Escape, drops it, and so does leaving the list. Nothing plays while you reorder.

A search hides favourites, so Reorder asks you to clear it first and clears nothing by itself. If the order can't be saved, Mr. Streamer says so and keeps what you arranged: Retry saves it again. If your favourites changed in the meantime, Reload starts over from them.

Home, the guide and the channel list while watching show your favourites in that order, and channel up and down follow it. The channel numbers stay your provider's, and so does the quality each channel plays in. A favourite that isn't showing, a channel for adults while those are hidden or one your provider stopped listing, keeps its place and comes back to it. One quality of a channel that your provider stops listing keeps its place too: if you moved the channel further down meanwhile, it goes back up to that place when the quality returns.

Favourites and watch history from all your subscriptions show as one list each. Each entry still belongs to its own subscription: removing a subscription takes its favourites and history out of the lists, and they come back when you add the same account again, unless you chose to delete them.

Providers often list a channel once per quality: "VRT 1 FHD", "VRT 1 HD", "VRT 1 SD". Mr. Streamer shows those as one channel, with its qualities under the name, when they are surely the same channel: same name, same region and language, and the same category or one named only for a quality, such as "BE | 4K". Anything less certain stays a row of its own. A channel you starred, or watched, under one of its qualities is the same favourite and the same history entry.

Channels your provider marks for adults, or files in a category named for adults, stay hidden until you turn on For adults in Settings > Movies and series. Then they show in Live TV's lists and the guide, where the field beside a list's name finds them, but never on Home or in ⌘K's search.

Programme information comes from your provider. Many providers only cover some channels, and some cover none; those channels show their name and category instead. Some providers file unrelated channels under one channel's guide; Mr. Streamer leaves those channels without programmes rather than show the wrong ones. The guide updates every six hours. To add guides from other addresses, or to give a channel the guide channel you pick, see Guides from other addresses.

Your lists

New list, after your lists below All channels, makes a list of your own: type its name and press Enter, and it opens, empty. Escape leaves it. A row's list button, beside its star, shows your lists: tick one to put the channel at its end, clear it to take the channel out, or choose New list to make one that holds the channel. A list holds channels of any of your subscriptions, in your order, and Reorder works as in Favourites. Its … button renames it, moves it up or down among your lists, or deletes it after asking once. Two lists can't share a name, whatever the capitals and accents.

The guide, the channel list while watching and Home's category row show the list you picked, in its order, and channel up and down follow it. A channel your provider stops listing stays at the end, dimmed, with Remove; if your provider lists it again, even under another of its qualities, it's back in its place. Channels of a subscription you removed are counted under the filters and come back when you add the same account again, unless you ticked Also delete, which takes them out of every list. Your lists themselves stay. Channels for adults neither show nor count while those are hidden. If a change can't be saved, Mr. Streamer says so, with Retry.

Your channels

A row's options button, beside its list button, changes how that channel shows for you, in your profile only. Give it your own Name or Number and press Enter or Save: lists, search and channel digits use yours, and the line under the name keeps the provider's name and number. Leave a field empty, or type the provider's own, to go back to it. Hide from lists takes the channel out of every list, Favourites and your own included, and out of search and counts, until you restore it from Changed channels. Restore channel undoes everything you changed for it.

Changed channels, at the foot of the topic rail, lists every channel you changed, hidden ones too, each with Restore. A channel your provider no longer lists says Not listed now and can still be restored. If a change can't be saved, nothing changes: the options say so and keep what you typed, with Retry.

If it doesn't play, try names up to three fallback channels, of any of your subscriptions: Add fallback channel searches your channels, and only one you pick is added, never one that just has the same name. A kids profile has no options and no Changed channels.

A fallback you can't see now, such as an adult channel while adult channels are off, isn't listed or tried, but stays saved for when you can, and counts toward the three. Restore channel forgets it too.

While watching, the channel list opens over the left of the picture with the list button, Enter or the left arrow. Click a channel to switch; its title switches to another category, with the same countries and Find as Live TV. Clicking the picture shows the controls, and a double click toggles full screen. Scroll over the picture to switch channel, once per gesture.

The bar keeps Channels, Favourite, Stop or Watch, CC when available, volume, full screen and More. More holds channel up, channel down, the previous channel, Sound, Quality, Play on and Mini player.

• Sound, in More, shows when a channel has more than one sound track. Picking another starts the channel again with it, which takes a moment. An HLS channel, as most of a playlist's are, switches without starting again.
• CC lists the channel's subtitles: DVB subtitles, teletext subtitle pages and closed captions, and on an HLS channel the subtitles its stream offers. C turns the last ones you picked on and off.
• CC also has Timing, which moves teletext subtitles and captions earlier or later until you switch channel, and the rows that set how subtitles look, as for movies and series. Live channels play at their own speed.
• Quality, in More, shows on a channel with several qualities. Its page says which one plays. Q opens it directly.
• Mini player, in More, or P, shrinks the window into a small picture on top of other windows, as for movies and series. Up and Down still switch channel; opening the list puts the window back.
• The keyboard's media keys and the system's own controls show the programme, the channel and its logo. Pause or stop there stops the channel, and Watch starts it again. Next and previous do nothing, so a tap on your headphones never changes channel. On a TV, a channel paused with the TV's own remote shows as paused, and play there plays it on.

The languages you pick carry over to other channels, and to movies and series. A channel in another language starts with subtitles in yours when it has them. Subtitles a stream marks as its own default don't come on by themselves.

In desktop 0.0.24 development, the sound and subtitles you pick on a channel are also kept for that channel in your profile, and its options show them with Forget. Opening the channel restores its saved sound; saved subtitles and Off apply on this computer, including HLS. Sound matches the saved id only in its saved language, then that language, then your profile's language, then the stream's first sound. HLS on this computer tries its default sound before the first sound. When a saved track is absent, its menu says so and the choice stays for when it returns. HLS can apply a saved track when it arrives later. Restoration leaves your profile's languages unchanged. Receivers restore sound through the same matching rule; live subtitles remain on this computer. A kids profile applies no per-channel choices; its picks set the languages only.

Live CC appears once subtitle data arrives. A teletext page that sends only filler or an empty DVB page stays hidden. An HLS channel needs at least one subtitle cue before CC appears, then lists all its declared text languages. Some may be empty; a chosen rendition has a short recovery allowance before turning off if it still cannot load. The picture keeps playing. If that channel reconnects, your chosen language is tried again unless you chose Off. C does nothing while CC is hidden. Proven tracks stay available until you change channel. Your saved language or Off choice applies when that language is proven. After more than ten seconds of playback, late availability flashes "Subtitles available · C" once in Watch if subtitles stay off. HLS discovery checks a few subtitle segments at a time while CC is off, without opening another channel connection. Receiver playback keeps the declared tracks and the reminder that live subtitles play on this computer only.

Quality

Channels start in Full HD, or the nearest quality the channel has, lower first. Change that in Settings > Live TV. If your provider has no stream for a quality right now, or doesn't answer, Automatic tries the next, at most three, one after another, and the line under the programme says so: "Full HD didn't start, playing HD". If the provider refuses the stream, Automatic stops there instead of trying more streams against a refusal. The status doesn't say why, so Mr. Streamer can't tell whether another quality would play.

Pick a quality in the menu and that channel keeps it. When it doesn't start, Mr. Streamer says why and offers another instead of switching on its own. Use Automatic in the menu, or Reset in Settings for every channel, goes back to Automatic.

After a channel fell back or failed, the menu says what became of each quality on that try: "No stream · 404", "Refused · 403", "Error · 503", "No data", "No picture", "Can't play", "Playing" or "Not tried". The number is the provider's HTTP status.

The quality is the word your provider puts in the channel's name. The resolution beside it is what the picture actually is. A channel whose name gives no quality says "Not labelled".

When a channel doesn't play

The middle of the picture says what went wrong, with a small line of what Mr. Streamer observed: the provider's HTTP status, the qualities it tried, how often it reconnected and the time. What plays lists each message.

• Retry, or R, opens the same channel again in the quality it had.
• Quality opens the quality menu. Nothing starts until you pick one.
• Channels opens the list. Next channel takes Quality's place when the channel has no quality left to try.
• A refusal offers Retry and Channels only, and Mr. Streamer never changes channel by itself.
• The cross at the message's top right closes it. The channel stays stopped; Watch in the controls, or R, tries it again.
• In Watch with a single picture playing on this computer, a channel you named fallback channels for plays the first one in its place when it has no stream, doesn't answer or isn't listed now, and says which channel plays instead and from which subscription. The next fallback follows if that one fails too. A refusal or a rate limit stops there, as do the fallbacks' own fallbacks, which are never tried. When none played, the message says so under the last one's. Multiview panes, the mini player and receivers do not run channel fallbacks.

When the picture stands still for three seconds, "Waiting for data" shows at the top right until it moves again. When data stays away for fifteen seconds, or the provider ends the stream, the channel reconnects: up to four times, after 1, 2, 4 and 8 seconds, and Stop ends that. A channel that comes back and breaks off again within 30 seconds gets no extra tries, so a stream that keeps dropping ends with "Keeps dropping" instead of reconnecting for ever. Once it played for 30 seconds, the next break has all four again. The mini player, and the bar at the foot of the pages while a TV plays, say the same in a few words.

⌘K (Ctrl K on Windows and Linux) searches every channel, movies and series, and the programmes on now and later today, in every subscription. Pick a channel, or a programme that's on, to watch it. Pick a later programme to read about it, or a movie or series to see its details. Opened from Live TV, it starts with what the list's field searched for. Live TV searches the list it shows from that field, and Movies and Series their own titles from a field in their tabs; see Movies and series. Channel name results use the same safe groups and Show copies. Right expands and Left collapses while the search field keeps focus. Programme results keep their own rows after movies and series.

Every guide day

From 0.0.24, which isn't in Stable yet, Search the guide, the calendar beside the reminders bell in Live TV, searches programme titles on every day your guide keeps: days that passed as far back as it keeps them, and days to come as far as it reaches. It opens with what the list's field searched for, and the last row of ⌘K's results, Search every guide day for …, opens it for what you typed there.

Each match shows its day, start time, channel and title, then what the guide says of the episode: S2 E4 when the guide gives valid season and episode numbers, otherwise the number as the guide writes it for the screen, with the episode title, Shown before for a repeat and Premiere when the guide says so. A guide that gives no episode number, or one that can't be read, still shows the programme, without a number. Mr. Streamer never calls an episode new because the guide marks it as a new show, leaves out a repeat mark or calls it a premiere.

Days narrows the search to any day, before today, today, tomorrow or the next 7 days, and Channels to all channels or the list you were looking at, up to 100 channels. With several subscriptions saved, Subscription picks whose guide is searched: each subscription's channels, guide mappings and saved searches are its own. Results come 50 at a time in order of start; Show more adds the next ones. Changing the words or a filter starts again from the first.

Save search keeps the words and filters under the words' name, up to 20 per subscription; saving the same words and name replaces its filters. Distinct words with the same shortened name get a numbered name. Today, Tomorrow, Before today and Next 7 days stay relative to the day you apply the saved search. Click a saved search to search it again, and the cross beside it to remove it. If a save fails, the saved searches stay as they were and Mr. Streamer says so, with Retry. If the saved searches can't be read, Mr. Streamer says so and saves nothing over them.

Down or Enter in the field moves to the matches. Up and Down move between them, Home and End jump, and Enter opens one: its description, Watch while it's on and Remind me before it starts. Escape goes back to the field, clears it, and then closes guide search, returning focus to its opener. When opened with the header calendar, focus returns to that calendar.

A programme still to come has Remind me in its details: under its channel in the guide grid, under its description in the rest of a day, and in ⌘K's search. Once set it reads Reminder set, and the programme shows a bell. Press it again to cancel. The bell beside the list's name in Live TV counts the reminders still to come and lists them, with when and on which channel each is. The cross beside one takes it out. Tab reaches the buttons, and Enter presses them.

When the programme starts, Mr. Streamer shows a notice at the top of its window, on any page, with Watch and Dismiss, and asks your system to show a notification with the programme and its channel. Nothing plays until you press Watch, and a reminder records nothing; from 0.0.23, now in Nightly, you can record it. Mr. Streamer has to be open to remind you: it doesn't wake or start your computer. After the computer slept or the app was closed, a programme that's still on reminds you once, saying how long ago it started; one that already ended is listed as Missed. The in-app notice does not depend on system notifications. System delivery is not guaranteed, and the app cannot tell whether you disabled notifications. If the system reports a delivery failure, the list says so. What a locked screen shows is your system's setting. Clicking a notification brings Mr. Streamer's window forward with its notice.

A reminder belongs to its subscription, channel and start time. If the guide later lists another programme then, the reminder says what it was and reminds you of the new one. If it lists nothing then, or your provider stops listing the channel, it says it's not in the guide now and doesn't remind you, unless the programme comes back. It never moves to a programme of the same name at another time. Reminders are kept in a local reminders.json file and cleared when the app checks after the end of the day their programme ends. Removing a subscription removes its reminders. Reminders of adult channels show only in the app while For adults is on. A reminder due while they are hidden becomes Missed and does not notify when you show them again.

Recording is new in Mr. Streamer 0.0.23, now in Nightly. Stable 0.0.22 and earlier can't record. Going back to one of them leaves your recordings and schedules on this computer without showing them; 0.0.23 shows them again, and a scheduled time that passed meanwhile, within the last week, is listed as Missed.

A recording is a copy of a live channel that Mr. Streamer saves on this computer while it plays out. It isn't catch-up, which your provider keeps and plays back, and it isn't a reminder, which only tells you a programme starts. Mr. Streamer records only while it's open and the computer is awake: it never wakes or starts your computer, and nothing records on a server.

Record now

Record, beside Watch and Guide at the top of Live TV, records the channel shown there. Pick when it stops: When it ends, two minutes after the guide's end for the programme on now; In 1 hour; In 2 hours; or At a time…, within the next 12 hours. Start recording starts it. While the channel records, the button reads Recording: it shows when the recording stops, with Stop recording, which stops it while the channel goes on playing, and Recordings, which opens the Recordings page.

A recording uses one of its subscription's connections while it records. Mr. Streamer counts as many connections as an Xtream account allows, and one for a playlist; it can't see other devices using the same account. From 0.0.24, recording the channel playing here takes no connection more: the recording and Watch read the same stream from the provider, Record says so before you start, and stopping either leaves the other going. Watching a channel that records shares its connection the same way. This works for channels your provider sends as MPEG-TS, and for HLS channels it sends as plain MPEG-TS segments. When an HLS channel comes in several qualities, the picture keeps one quality while the recording shares it, the one playing when you started recording, or the recording's when you start watching; Recording says Quality stays fixed while this records., and once the recording stops the player picks its quality again. When the player can't decode the quality being recorded, watching that channel needs a connection of its own instead. While it plays above 1080 lines, or in a quality with subtitles sent separately, which a recording would leave out, recording it needs a connection of its own, as does watching a channel that records in such a quality, and so does another channel, though your playlist gives it the same address. Some HLS streams can't be recorded at all, as playback lists. When every connection is in use, Record says so. When only the channel playing here holds the last one, Stop playing and record stops it and records instead. While recordings hold all of a subscription's connections, playing from it says so. Downloads from a subscription wait while it records.

Schedule a programme

In the guide grid, a programme that hasn't ended has Record in its details:

• Repeat: Once records that programme and follows the guide if its end moves before recording starts; then it keeps that stop time. A weekday, or Every day, records the channel at that time of day, whatever is on then. From 0.0.24, Follow programme makes a rule instead, which records the programme by its title, as below.
• Start and End each add 0 to 60 minutes, before and after, 2 and 5 minutes to begin with. One recording lasts at most 12 hours.
• The panel says whether a connection is free then. When none is, Schedule anyway keeps the schedule, and it records from when one frees up.

A scheduled programme has a ring in the grid, and its details read Scheduled, to change or cancel it. Nothing playing or downloading stops for a schedule. When its time comes while Mr. Streamer is closed, the computer sleeps or every connection is in use, it records the rest of its time and says how late it started. A time that passes with nothing recorded is listed as Missed; after a long absence, only the last week's are. A once-only schedule waits while the guide lists another programme or none at that time, so it never records the wrong show.

From 0.0.24, Follow programme records each airing of the programme's title on the channels you pick:

• Channels offers the programme's channel, on to begin with, and the others in its subscription whose guide lists the same title.
• Record: Every match, to begin with, records every airing, repeats included. New episodes only records an airing only when the guide gives its episode number and marks it as a premiere, not a repeat; it can't be picked while the guide marks none of them. The panel says how many it leaves out.
• Start and End pad each airing as a schedule's do.
• Priority, 0 to 100 and 0 to begin with, decides which airing gets a connection first when airings clash: a higher number goes first. Beside it, the panel says where the rule stands among your rules. Airings at the same priority go by their padded start, then by when each pending schedule was created. Rule airings are created again when the app restarts; a schedule you make yourself has priority 0.
• Matches in the guide lists the first 8 airings it would record now, counting the rest, and On now for one under way. Each says whether a connection is free for its padded time, from what time it would start late once one frees up, or that every connection is in use then and by what, and the panel counts the airings that clash. This counts what Mr. Streamer itself plays, records and has scheduled, not other devices on your subscription; something playing counts as holding its connection until you stop it. Nothing already playing or recording is stopped for a higher priority. Turn on rule saves it.

Each airing it finds is scheduled, with a ring in the grid. Its details read Scheduled, say the rule sets its padding and offer Cancel schedule, which lets that airing go while the rule follows the rest. Cancelled, stopped or deleted airings stay suppressed at their saved time and through overlapping guide shifts, also after a restart or a guide-source change. Unambiguous overlapping shifts follow the same airing; conflicting episode identities are treated separately unless the old airing is already settled or recording. A nonoverlapping replacement can be a new airing.

There can be 20 rules, with 100 airings scheduled between them. A check reads up to 100 current or future guide matches per subscription per rule, and a rule remembers up to 1,000 airings; once full, it schedules no more and shows that its limit was reached. A rule that can't be saved or stopped says so and can be tried again. If saved rules could not be read at startup, restore access to their saved data and restart Mr. Streamer to reload them. Recording still needs Mr. Streamer to be open.

The Recordings page

Recordings, in the top bar while anything is recorded or scheduled, lists Now, Scheduled and Recorded, plus Rules from 0.0.24. Each row has the programme, the channel and its times, a bar of what was recorded against what was planned, and how it stands:

• Recording, or Paused with why, while its time goes on. Stop ends it.
• Complete: all of its time is there.
• Stopped: you stopped it, at the time it shows.
• Partial: part of its time is missing. The row says which minutes and why, and the bar marks them: hatched in 0.0.23, red from 0.0.24.
• Missing: its file is no longer on this computer.
• Missed: a scheduled time passed with nothing recorded. Remove takes the row away.

A schedule's row has Edit and, in its menu, Cancel schedule; one a rule made reads From a rule and has no Edit. A rule's row has its title, channels, what it records, its padding and its priority, Edit to change them, and Stop following in its menu, which cancels the airings still to come and lets one recording now finish. A recording plays on this computer, as a download does, and keeps how far you got. Partial ones play, skipping what was missed. Recordings don't play on a TV. The menu beside an ended recording has Delete; a missed one, or one whose file is gone, has Remove. Recordings stay until you delete them, also after their subscription is removed, unless you turn on retention for the rule that made them, as below.

From 0.0.24 a rule can delete its own old recordings, once you turn that on for it. Nothing is deleted until you do, and recordings you made yourself, or with a schedule, are never deleted this way. A rule's row has Retention, which opens its choices: Until I delete them, the default, By count, which keeps its newest 1 to 100, or By age, in days, which keeps those that ended within the last 1 to 365 days. Recordings already started when you turn it on stay, including those still recording, unless you tick Include those recorded before now. When editing a saved policy, the checkbox names its saved start date and time; leaving it unticked preserves that cutoff. Below the choices, a preview lists up to eight recordings it would delete now with the room they take, and separately up to eight it keeps for now and why. Each list summarizes its remaining entries as “N more”; the deletion total, bytes and approval include those entries. The button says how many it deletes, such as Delete 2 and turn on, and deletes only those the preview listed: if more would go when the save checks the preview, nothing is saved or deleted, the page says so and reads the preview again. Anything becoming eligible during the save waits for a later automatic check. The rule then deletes what it lets go as Mr. Streamer checks its schedules, also after a restart. Its row, and its group's heading, say what it keeps, such as "keeps the last 5". Turn off and Stop following wait for destructive work already under way before answering, and authorize no further deletions. A deletion whose intent was already saved still retries completion, including after restart.

Retention never deletes a recording that is still recording or paused, a protected one, one opened to play since Mr. Streamer started, even once its player is closed again, or one whose end isn't saved yet. It checks all of this again just before each deletion. You can protect any recording that has a copy, also one that is still recording: its menu has Protect, or Take protection off. A protected recording has a lock beside its name and is listed under Protected on the side; retention keeps it, and Delete and Remove refuse it until you take protection off. When retention can't delete a recording, its row says "Retention couldn't delete it". Files still present keep counting toward the space recordings take. Protecting an intact copy after a failed deletion cancels that deletion. Opening it to play only postpones the saved deletion until Mr. Streamer restarts, even if you turn retention off. If the folder went but saving the inventory failed, its saved deletion keeps retrying the inventory write. Protection or opening to play clears the visible failure while that hold lasts; it preserves recovery of the missing copy. Deletion intent is saved before files go, so interrupted deletions also retry after restart. Mr. Streamer tries again within a minute, and Delete still works. Retention is never used to make room.

From 0.0.24 the page has a side: Find a recording, which looks through every recording's title and channel, then Overview, the whole page, Recorded, Scheduled and Rules, Protected while any recording is, and the groups. A group is the recordings of one programme a rule follows, or of one repeating schedule, under its name, each row named by its day; it stays after you stop following or the channel goes. Other holds the rest, with recordings made before 0.0.24, which didn't keep their rule.

In 0.0.23 a recording that is still running can't be played yet; watch the channel live instead. From 0.0.24 it plays while it records, from this computer's copy, with no connection more. The player says how much it has so far, with a red dot at its end while it records, and closing the player leaves it recording. Go to latest takes you to the newest picture it can start from, and waits there for more. Skipping and resuming land where a picture can start: for H.264 sent as is, at the last keyframe the recording's own index has checked, and with a subtitle on, only at its beginning. Other pictures play from the beginning. A recording whose index can't place its pictures also plays from the beginning, with length not known unless it can be verified. A stretch the recording missed is listed on its row, not placed on the player's bar.

From 0.0.24, recordings you are part way through are in Home's Continue watching with movies and series, by when you last played each; one still recording says so. A cached entry whose file goes missing says so and opens Recordings until the next successful progress read removes it.

With no subscription saved, the Connect screen shows Recordings while any are kept.

From 0.0.24, each viewing profile keeps its own place in each recording; Recorded says Progress is yours. Existing positions carry over to Default and stay with the exact recording after a restart or subscription removal. Background recording updates leave them alone. A place saved while the recording was still going counts against what it had then, so it is never taken as watched before the recording ends. When places can't be read, Recordings and Home say so with Try again; nothing reads as unwatched meanwhile. If saving a new position fails, the last saved position stays available and playback can try saving again. Earlier versions keep positions in the recording inventory; watching there does not replace Default’s positions when you return to 0.0.24.

When a recording is interrupted

When the stream breaks, the disk fails or fills, a storage limit is reached, the computer sleeps, Mr. Streamer crashes, or the computer shuts down, the recording pauses. It goes on in the same file with the rest of its time once Mr. Streamer runs, the computer is awake, a connection is free and there's room. The time in between is a gap, listed on its row. Nothing fills a gap, from catch-up or anywhere else.

A recording you stopped never goes on by itself, and neither does one you quit while it recorded. One also ends for good when its stream says it's over, or keeps ending soon after it starts.

When Mr. Streamer can't save a Stop or a recording's end, its row says Not saved yet. Trying again. until storage works again. Until then, a recording that ended by itself goes on at the next start while its time remains. A recording you stopped or quit goes on only if the disk also refused the mark Mr. Streamer leaves in the recording's folder, as a drive gone read-only does.

Closing, quitting and updates

Closing the window never asks. While a recording's time goes on or a schedule is kept, Mr. Streamer keeps running without its window, and opening it again shows the window. Runnable downloads also keep the app running. The native menu shows download counts, Open Mr. Streamer, download Pause/Resume and Quit Mr. Streamer. On Windows and Linux, Mr. Streamer quits by itself once no downloads can run, nothing records, nothing is scheduled and what it had to save about recordings is saved. Paused downloads alone do not keep it running.

Quitting while something records, with ⌘Q, Ctrl+Q or the tray, asks first. Quit while recording? offers Quit, which stops the recordings and keeps what they recorded, and Keep recording. A schedule still to come doesn't record while Mr. Streamer is closed. A shutdown or logout doesn't ask: recordings whose time remains go on when Mr. Streamer starts again.

A ready update offers Update after recording in Settings: choose it to install once nothing records. In the top-bar update panel, OK makes the same choice. Restart now stops the recordings first and keeps what they recorded.

Where recordings are kept

Settings > Recordings shows the folder new recordings go to, with Change and Open. To begin with, that is the recordings folder in Mr. Streamer's data folder, listed in the privacy policy. Recordings made before a change stay where they were made. Each recording is one .ts file in a folder of its own.

• Keep free on disk, 5 GB to begin with, and Space for recordings, no limit to begin with, pause a recording when it reaches them. It goes on once there is room. Nothing is deleted to make room.
• A chosen folder on a drive that isn't connected is never made on another disk. New recordings there refuse to start, and a paused one waits for its drive.

Mr. Streamer manages these folders: use Delete rather than removing files by hand. What a recording keeps, and which channels can be recorded, is in What plays.

Key	In the guide	While watching
Up, Down	Move through the list	Previous or next channel; in the list, move
Page Up, Page Down	Move ten rows	Move ten rows in the list
Enter	Watch	Open the list; in it, watch
Right	The rest of the day; from the categories, back to the channels	In the list, back from the categories
Left	Close the rest of the day, then go to the categories; in a country, back to the countries	Open the list, then its categories; in a country, back to the countries
Digits	Jump to a channel number	Jump to a channel number
S	Add to or remove from favourites	The same, for the channel you're watching
R	Reorder, in Favourites or one of your lists	Retry, once a channel failed
/	Search the list
Escape	Clear the search, then Home	Close the list, leave full screen, go back
Backspace	In a country, back to the countries	The previous channel; in a country, back to the countries
C		Subtitles on and off
G, H	G: the grid, and back to the list	Subtitles 0.1 s earlier or later
Q		The quality menu
F, M, I		Full screen, mute, show the details
P		Mini player, and back

Number entry searches All channels with the current adult visibility, even while browsing a filtered or personal list. It keeps the browsing selection and filters and chooses the first matching source when numbers repeat.

While you reorder favourites or a list, the keys are these alone:

Key	While reordering
Up, Down, Page Up, Page Down	Choose a row: one up or down, or ten
Home, End	Choose the first or the last row
Alt with those, Option on a Mac	Move the chosen channel instead
Tab	Go to Cancel, Save and the chosen row's buttons
Enter	Save
Escape	Cancel

When a channel plays on this computer as MPEG-TS, Watch shows a timeline under its controls. It spans what Mr. Streamer has kept of the channel since it started playing: up to the last 30 minutes, less when the temporary folder's 2 GiB, shared with recordings and other channels, or the 5 GB it leaves free on the disk runs out first. The times at its ends are the oldest moment kept and now. Next to them, Watch says Live, or how far behind live you are, and how much is kept.

• Pause stops the picture while the channel keeps arriving. Play goes on from where it stopped.
• Back 10 seconds and Forward 10 seconds skip and resume playback; forward past now goes live.
• Drag the timeline and let go to watch from there.
• Go live returns to now.

When you pause longer than the channel is kept, the moment you paused at is gone; Watch says so, and Play goes on from the oldest moment still kept. Switching channel and Stop let go of what was kept, while a recording of the channel goes on; quitting empties it too.

Key	While watching a channel with a timeline
Space, K	Pause, and play on
J, L	Back or forward 10 seconds
End	Go live
Left, Right on the timeline	10 seconds; Page Up, Page Down a minute

An HLS channel has this timeline only after local codec repair converts clear muxed MPEG-TS segments to MPEG-TS output. Replay uses the picture and sound captured in that output. Choosing another sound track restarts capture and its timeline. Direct HLS, including encrypted streams, separate audio renditions, fMP4, byte ranges and low-latency parts, has no retained timeline. Catch-up programmes and a channel playing on a TV also have no timeline. Their keys say This stream can't rewind, or Rewind plays here only on a TV. When the provider breaks off, the channel reconnects as before and its timeline starts again from then.

Playback key bindings

The playback keys described here are defaults. Saved keyboard overrides belong to the active viewing profile and apply to the actual player commands. A changed command no longer responds to its old default keys; reset restores them. Channel numbers, arrows, Page Up/Down, Home/End, Enter, Backspace and Escape remain fixed for channel-list navigation. Text fields and open menus keep their own keys.

While a live channel plays on this computer, open More > Multiview. The entry appears only when that subscription explicitly allows at least two streams. Add channel fills another slot from eligible subscriptions. Unknown limits and one-stream subscriptions do not qualify. Active recordings use the same provider allowance; No stream free leaves the other panes playing. The bar shows streams used and the account's limit. When they can't be checked, More and the bar say so and offer Retry.

Click a pane to give it sound and the playback controls. The other panes keep playing silently. Each pane has its own rewind position, subtitles, retry and close button. Single view keeps the selected channel and its current paused or rewound position, and closes its peers. Closing the last pane stops playback. Multiview is for live channels on this computer, not catch-up or playback on a TV.

With at least two channels open, choose Save layout, enter a name and Save. Saving the same name replaces that layout. Layout opens a saved set of channels; an unavailable channel leaves its slot unavailable. A layout saves channel identities, not temporary stream links or rewind positions, and survives restarting the app. If layouts cannot be read, choose Retry. If saving fails, the name and existing layouts stay so you can try again.

Use Tab to focus the Layout control, then Enter or Space to open it. Background behind-live labels refresh from each pane’s retained timeline; a failed read keeps its last observed position.

Single view keeps the selected pane’s paused picture and retained position. The stream count refreshes after a pane finishes opening; it reports actual provider usage.