description

w_scan2 is a small channel scan tool which generates ATSC, DVB-C, DVB-S/S2 and DVB-T/T2 channels.conf files.

It's based on the old "scan" tool from linuxtv-dvb-apps-1.1.0. The differences are:

• no initial tuning data needed, because scanning without this data is exactly what a scan tool like this should do
• it detects automatically which DVB/ATSC card to use
• much more output formats, interfacing to other dtv software.

w_scan2 is a fork of the original w_scan from https://www.gen2vdr.de/wirbel/w_scan/index2.html

main changes from w_scan to w_scan2

• keep duplicate transponders by default because a stronger transponder with the same ID might have a higher frequency and be discarded simply because it's scanned later. Also don't replace the current transponder with an advertised one by default. The latter may have a lower signal strength. More details here: https://stefantalpalaru.wordpress.com/2016/02/04/scan-all-the-things/ . The old behaviour can be enabled with -d (--delete-duplicate-transponders).

• re-enable VHF band III in Europe

requirements

• up-to-date(!) DVB kernel headers with DVB API 5.3 support

build

./configure
make

(developers making changes to "configure.ac" and "Makefile.am" also need to run ./autogen.sh)

distro support

Gentoo

eselect repository enable stefantalpalaru
emaint sync --repo stefantalpalaru
emerge w_scan2

Ubuntu

• Ubuntu stable ppa
• Ubuntu git ppa

basic usage

NOTE: Newer versions of w_scan2 need the '-c' option for specifying the country (ATSC, DVB-C and DVB-T) or '-s' for satellite (DVB-S).

DVB-C (using Germany as country, option -c)

./w_scan2 -fc -c DE > channels.conf

DVB-T

./w_scan2 -c DE > channels.conf

DVB-C and DVB-T

./w_scan2 -c DE > channels.conf && ./w_scan2 -fc -c DE > channels.conf

ATSC (terrestrial, using United States as country)

./w_scan2 -fa -c US > channels.conf

US Digital Cable (QAM Annex-B)

./w_scan2 -A2 -c US > channels.conf

ATSC, both terrestrial and digital cable

./w_scan2 -A3 -c US > channels.conf

DVB-S, here: Astra 19.2 east

./w_scan2 -fs -s S19E2

NOTE: see ./w_scan2 -s? for list of satellites.

generate (dvb)scan initial-tuning-data

./w_scan2 -c DE -x > initial_tuning_data.txt

For more sophisticated scan options see ./w_scan2 -h and ./w_scan2 -H.

credits

• "wirbel" Winfried Koehler <w_scan AT gmx-topmail DOT de> - the original author
• "e9hack" Hartmut Birr for onid-patch (2006-09-01)
• "seaman" giving his his Airstar2 for testing purposes to me
• "Wicky" for testing with Airstar2/Zarlink MT352 DVB-T
• "kilroy" for testing with Airstar2/Zarlink MT352 DVB-T and Avermedia
• "Fabrizio" for testing with Airstar2/Zarlink MT352 DVB-T
• Arturo Martinez martinez@embl.de for a huge bunch of tests on DVB-S/DVB-S2
• Rolf Ahrenberg for doing DVB-T/T2 tests and suggestions to improve w_scan
• Ștefan Talpalaru stefantalpalaru@yahoo.com - the w_scan2 fork

license

w_scan2 is licensed under GPLv2. See the included file COPYING for details.

homepage

https://github.com/stefantalpalaru/w_scan2