TiVo HME How-To: Prepare your TiVo Application for Deployment            

If you've written a TiVo app, you've probably run it in the Simulator a bunch and tested it through your own TiVo, but now you're wondering how to actually package it up so you can give it to others.  This document will give you some pointers on where to look.

Here is the release process I use for my TrafficCam Viewer application.  Your application will be different, of course, but this should give you some ideas you can leverage.

1.  Run the project and set the region to OR – Portland. Make sure a couple cameras are selected.
2. Create a deployment staging directory called My Documents\TiVo Deployment Staging Area\TrafficCam-<version> .
3. Create a trafficcam directory under there.
4. Create a jar out of the project. Call it trafficcam-<version>.jar. Uncheck factory-defaults, logs, and saves. Uncheck .classpath, .project, and todo.txt.
5. Copy logs, saves, and factory-defaults out of the working project into the staging area. Clean out logs, and everything in saves but last-region-saved.xml and 97205.xml.
6. Run jar_copier.bat to copy in all of the jar files from various places. (Copy it from the previous staging area.)
7. Copy runtc_manually.bat and runtc.sh from the previous staging area, and change the jar version.
8.  Re-run exe4j and re-issue the service executable, if necessary,
9. Zip it up.
10. Unzip it to c:\tivo and run it to test.
11. Don’t forget the source.

Deployment

• Rename the zip file to trafficcam-<version>.zip
• In FrontPage, move the old zip to the tc/install/old directory.
• Edit index.php and change all references. Update the documentation, what’s new, etc.
   

More Details

• In step 4, I use Eclipse to create the JAR file.  With your project selected, do File - Export - JAR File.
• In step 6, that jar_copier.bat file simply copies all of the JARs I need -- hme.jar, simulator.jar, etc. -- from their normal locations into my staging area.