Quite often we start watching a show whilst it is still recording.
This is fine and all works ok, except that the comskip scanning hasn’t taken place so we have to manually skip through the ads.
Is there any way that comskip scanning could happen progressively whilst a recording is taking place?
Perhaps scanning in 5 minute chunks? Or something like that?
Comskip does allow for scanning a live feed, but its quality is inferior, as it does not have as much data to work with.
IIRC, implementing this feature is nowhere on the roadmap, with no plans to do it. Apparently Aman has changed the roadmap. (See below)
(If such a feature is important, both SageTV and MythTV do have live commercial scanning.)
I would like to add this soon. For long live events I've found I can manually kick off commercial detection when I start watching and then again when we're getting close to the end. It would be nice if this happened automatically when you started watching something that was still recording.
Since I’ve got an M1 Mac mini, I’d be totally OK with repeated scanning if necessary. As you note, if a worse initial scan was initiated upon commencing viewing that would be ideal. No point scanning everything twice, but if we’ve started watching the recording that’s a pretty good indicator that it would be worth it.
Would say it should definitely be an option. For those running on low powered NAS hardware, they probably wouldn’t want to double up the scans.
Part of the problem is also that live viewing happens on the client, while the commercial detection happens on the server. I suppose this could be viable for all live viewing, so long as tuner sharing is enabled for all clients.
I like the idea that @Robinlmp suggested of triggering an in-progress scan when you actually start watching the program.
So you're manually comskipping what's already been recorded using the current method.
Not using the Live option setting in comskip.
IIRC you'll see the results on the clients as soon as comskip has completed running, regardless of tuner sharing. That's assuming you do what he said, watch the recording in progress.
My comment was regarding live viewing of a program not being recorded. While TVE and recorded content go through the DVR by necessity, by default OTA streams do not.
I’m not sure live viewing of a show that’s not being recorded really falls within the scope of this discussion?
I mean, what’s the point of comskip scanning if you’re viewing it live? You can’t skip into the future.
Well, if you've got a program on pause and your buffer is filling up, say maybe 60–90 minutes, then when you go back to resume the buffer it will have its commercials marked. (That's how it works in MythTV, and SageTV, too, I believe.)
I can see the benefit for such a feature for long programs, events, games, movies, etc., and often I will tune a channel and put it on pause so I can skip through commercials, resuming playback after half of the program has aired. Implementing a live commercial detection in this manner is no different doing it for in-progress recordings, with the added benefit of not having to delete the program after you're done.
Ah I see. More like watching on delay than live. Yes, I can see the benefit in that scenario. I guess in some senses, that is a recording, just not one being permanently saved?
Yes, and as @racameron pointed out it would be much trickier since the live TV buffer is on the client and the server can’t access it. I think lots of us would be very pleased with the option of having comskip triggered if an in-progress recording starts being viewed.
I wonder if there could be an option that if the client is on the same network that the buffer is on the server instead of stored on the client. I can see why this wouldn’t be good with a remote device, but locally the lag shouldn’t be too bad and if it were an option we could always change that if the lag was too bad.
Yea! 
Very excited to see how this shakes out. Been waiting almost five years 
Yes! Start scan when you start watching.
This has been discussed in depth in the past. There would be some advantages to having the buffer on the server (and some disadvantages). Regardless, it’s a major change to the code base so I wouldn’t hold my breath.
Why must someone always sidetrack discussions of this by detouring to watching live TV. I'm pretty sure the people asking for this are concerned with watching recordings that are still in progress.
Because technically, scanning a stream while it is recording and scanning it while it is streaming live to a client are essentially the same thing.
The only way the two topics become different and separate is if you want to have the overhead of kicking off a fresh scan every X minutes against the recorded portion. There are two different approaches to the same task, and one of the approaches will work equally well against live TV as it does for in-progress recordings. So, since one technique encompasses both situations, live TV is relevant.
