Installing Sick Beard
What is Sick Beard?
Sick Beard is described as an “Internet PVR”. Bascially what that means is, you tell it what shows you want to see, and it goes ahead and downloads new episodes of that show for you as they are released, and typically that is immensely fast!
Requirements:
Start here with getting a Usenet Provider. Once you have that, all you need is a suitable PC/Mac to install the app! Proceed!
What about old shows?
Yep, it handles them too. If you want to download the whole back catalog of all your favorite classics, as long as they are on Usenet, Sick Beard will find em. Which leads to the point of Index sites later on, take a mental note!
Installing Sick Beard on Windows:
- Download Sick Beard
- Extract the zip file to wherever you want Sick Beard to be installed
- Run sickbeard.exe, Sick Beard will be running in the background and now is accessible (Rest of the steps are optional if you want Sick Beard to start on boot)
- Right click on Sickbeard.exe and create a shortcut to it.
- Drag that shortcut to C:\Documents and Settings\Your Username\Start Menu\Programs\Startup
- Try to access Sick Beard in a new browser window via http://localhost:8081
Installing Sick Beard on Mac OSX 10.6
This way is a bit a pain, but it will enable you to have Sick Beard run at login without any manual commands and it will also allow you to update directly from within Sick Beard, so no more terminal commands.
- Download Cheetah.
- Open a new terminal window (terminal is located in your Applications/Utilities folder)
- Type cd and drag the newly created Cheetah folder into the terminal window until you get results that look similar to”cd /Users/Username/Desktop/Cheetah” and hit enter
- Type “sudo python setup.py install”
- You then probably have to type in your password to continue, do so and it will install Cheetah.
- Download and install git.
- Open a new terminal window and do a “cd /Applications“
- Type “git clone git://github.com/midgetspy/Sick-Beard.git“
- Type “python sickbeard.py -d“
- Open a new browser window and try to access the newly installed Sick Beard via http://localhost:8081
- In order for Sick Beard to run automatically at login you should open Automator and create a new action to do this
- do shell script “python /Applications/Sick-Beard/sickbeard.py”
- Save this as an application and then go to System Preferences, Accounts pane and drag this newly created application into your startup items.
Configuring SAB for Sick Beard
In your newly downloaded Sick Beard folder (/Applications/Sickbeard) you will find a folder called AutoProcessTV. Drag the contents of this folder into the scripts directory where your SABnzbd is installed (OSX – /Applications/SABnzbd : Windows C:\Program Files\SABnzbd or whichever folder you installed to) Then log in to your SABnzbd and go to the Config / Categories tab and look for TV. Next to TV look for the dropdown for post processing script and select the appropriate SABtoSickbeard(.exe for Windows or .py for OSX). Also make sure that TV sorting is disabled on the Config / Sorting tab as Sick Beard will be handling that.
Configuring Sick Beard
Connect to Sick Beard in a new browser via http://localhost:8081 if on the local machine Sick Beard is running on, or substitute localhost for the proper IP address. Browse over to the Config tab.
General Tab
The only settings I would change on this are the top two settings to make sure it doesn’t launch a browser on start and make sure it checks for updates. You can have it open a browser on launch if you want, but if you’re trying to make this as seamless as possible, you don’t want a browser to open up in front of your Media center application if using one machine as a total HTPC.
Search Settings Tab
Episode Search
- Download propers – Checked
- Search Frequency – Default 60 minutes is fine
- Usenet Retention – Set to whatever your providers retention is set for, 900 is fine for most providers.
NZB Search
- Search NZBs – Checked
- SABnzbd URL – http://0.0.0.0:8080/sabnzbd
- SABnzbd Username – Your SAB username
- SABnzbd Password – Your SAB password
- SABnzbd API Key – Can be obtained from your SABnzbd General Settings pane
- SABnzbd Category – tv (unless you changed this in your Categories within SAB)
Torrent Search
We are going to stay away from Torrent search, as it is really unreliable and this setup is not meant for Torrents anyhow.
Search Providers (THE MOST CRUCIAL PAGE IN THE SETUP)
Provider Priorities – This one you have to configure for yourself, if you are a subscriber of NZBMatrix only, drag that to the top of the list followed by Sick Beards built in search and leave the rest unchecked. If you subscribe to multiple, check the ones you are subscribed to and designate them in whichever priority feels right, obviously you can change this later.
Configure Built in Providers – This is where you are going to select the provider(s) that you subscribed to. It will ask you for information such as your username and password and API key. All of this can be obtained from your providers site.
Post Processing Tab
The options on this tab are pretty self explanatory for the user, you can configure if you want Sick Beard to rename the shows to match your current structure or to establish a new one.
Notifications Tab
This tab is where you will configure Sick Beard to automatically update your desired MediaCenter application. If you are using Plex (my suggested media center application) you would check the box next to Plex and point Sick Beard at your Plex install. If this is your all in one media center, point Plex Media Center and Plex Client at 0.0.0.0:32400. Again, more on this later.
thx for the great write up….i am stuck on one part…
I have moved the contents from my autoProcessTV folder to my SABNZBD folder, restarted SABNZBD….but yet I don’t see “TV” in my Config/Categories tab…any help?
Make sure you put it in your “Scripts” folder; not in the root of the SAB folder. Let me know if you can’t find this folder.
I don’t see a “Scripts” folder…..I see “Email”, “interfaces”, “lib”, “licenses”, “locale”, “win”
once again…this blog is great…will definitely be sharing this with my friends
Having trouble with the Configuring SAB for Sick Beard component of the install. My scripts aren’t showing in the drop-down. I made sure the folders were set up properly in sabnzbd as well.
Did you make sure you made a scripts folder in the proper directory that is specified in your SAB install?
I cannot find this folder. Using Mac osx 10.6.8 Any help would be great!
Scripts folder by default is in your Downloads folder I think. Check in your SABnzbd config look for “Scripts” directory. You might need to make the folder.
ok after googling around, i found out what i had to do….
for anyone else:
Config –> Folders
Set your script folder (mine was set to my C:\users\admin folder)
drag files over
Thanks for posting the reply Tony, sorry I didn’t get back to you sooner.
I searched up and down, is there any option anywhere to keep only one episode, to delete files from a remote xbmc box (assuming correct permissions) or to automatically delete the oldest files (based on each show)? The only solution I have found is to log in remotely to the server and delete files manually which isn’t a great long term solution.
Great question, via SickBeard I don’t believe there is a way to do this. However, I know Plex has a plugin to automatically clean up your library, or part of your library based on certain criteria; so I’m guessing XBMC must have something similar, I will look into it and get back to you ASAP.
The scripts are in the folder that I listed under Config>Folders in sabnzbd.
Hi there – under Lion if it matters – thanks for these AMAZING tutorials, followed this one through & upon restart I get a spinning cog-shaped icon in my upper right menu bar that says “Launch Sickbeard – Workflow Running…”. What did I do wrong / how do I make that go away? Doesnt seem to hurt anything, just mildly annoying…
That’s a new one for me, I will look into it and get back to you later today.
trying to execute this line:
git clone git://github.com/midgetspy/Sick-Beard.git
and I get this error:
-bash: git: command not found
help?!
Are you using OSX? Did you install everything listed above (cheetah and Git)? It appears that Git is not being recognized, I’d recommend you try to reinstall Cheetah and Git and try it again.
Awesome work! I really appreciate the time you took to do this for us noobs 🙂
When setting up sabtosickbeard for the drop down scripts tab its show sabtosickbeard.exe and not the .py.
I’m running 10.7.2
Any ideas?
Thanks!
Make sure you correctly locate the sabtosickbeard.py, as the .exe will obviously not work on your Mac being .exe is a Windows executable. Let me know if you have trouble finding it and I will do my best to help.
Thanks for the quick response. I directed the sab post-processing scripts folder to /Users/xx/Downloads/SickBeard/autoProcessTV
When I take out the exe file and leave the autoProcessTV.cfg, autoProcessTV.py, and sabToSickBeard.py the only options displayed in the scripts tab in categories is default or none. I’ve tried relocating the folder, going through the whole process of downloading the zip, and starting over.
create a folder called scripts within your downloads directory and use this path “downloads/scripts” as your script directory and put all the scripts in there, minus the exe and see how that fares for you. I think by default it looks within your users directory, so you only need to specify downloads/scripts. Let me know how this goes.
No such luck 🙁 still default and none
That’s strange… On the machine that SAB is running on, try dragging the folder where your scripts are into the scripts directory in the web ui and see if that does anything for you. You might need to restart SAB afterwards too.
I finally figured out a temporary solution. I still dont understand the problem was but I’m just happy its working now. I put the scripts folder inside my SickBeard folder inside Applications. Thank you so much for your help and dedication! You are awesome!
Glad it’s working… that is some strange behavior though.
Running Win7 64 bit. Can’t seem to get the scripts working. Found the SAB folder and created a Scripts folder but dropped it in and nothing. Don’t see a config file in the SAB folder.
Great website, everything else worked flawlessly. Just can’t seem to get this part going.
Hey Cujo, thanks! Please spread the word! Your config file should be in your C:/Users//Application data/SABnzbd I believe. I can double check for you if it’s not there though. <-- Mac user.
Hey thanks for following up. No I don’t see a config file in the SAB folder. Any input would be great.
P.S. I spread the word on ncix forums lol, the site really was helpful.
C:\Users\%userprofile%\AppData\Local\sabnzbd\sabnzbd.ini
Check here and let me know! 🙂
Hi, I am a total novice. I am having difficulty with the following steps “In your newly downloaded Sick Beard folder (/Applications/Sickbeard) you will find a folder called AutoProcessTV. Drag the contents of this folder into the scripts directory where your SABnzbd is installed (OSX – /Applications/SABnzbd ” on OSX 10.6.8. Sickbeard appears under my username folder, not Applications. Also, when I try to drag the files from utoProcess TV onto the SABnzbd in Applications, in Finder, it wont drop into it. I don’t see any script folder beneath SABnzb.
What am I doing wrong?
This confused the hell out of me too. There’s an extra step that this guide skips.
Under the folders tab of sabnzbd, you have to make sure the scripts folder is set to something. Change that line to the place you downloaded sickbeard and the rest of the guide should follow pretty well.
Hey Totalhtpc,
I am having trouble getting sick beard to open at login, can you please elaborate on that? I am using the code you provided (see screenshot)
but I get a error when I login to my mac. Any help will be greatly appreciated 🙂
http://bayimg.com/DaMlEAadK
Michael
Remove the cat before the python. cat just reads the file, and the correct syntax if you did want to cat it would be to do a cat sickbeard.py and you can read the whole config in a terminal window.
just make the code “python sickbeard.py -d” and it will run as a daemon.
I’m having trouble with SickBeard’s post processing. I get the following error after SAB finishes downloading the files.
Loading config from /Applications/Sick-Beard/autoProcessTV/autoProcessTV.cfg
ERROR: You need an autoProcessTV.cfg file – did you rename and edit the .sample?
Any idea what I might be doing wrong?
Did you make the file autoProcessTV.cfg or move it?
Just wondering, but with both Sickbeard and Couchpotato, and you set them to only download a certain filetype? Like say .mp4 with h.264 encoding?
I don’t think they are that granular, there’s probably something in the .cfg files, but I will have to do some digging.
Great article, I have referred to it a couple of times to get through my setup. I did a short video on my blog showing how the interface looks and works. Not near as detailed as your setup guide. Thanks for posting the guide. One question, I have noticed SABNZBd seems to have issues processing downloads lately. Wondering if there was an update that might have broken it. Just says process failed to move file, now I got a ton of files in my completed folder and I do not know if you can reprocess them manually.
Brad
Hello!
I went through the entire guide, and everything went well! Except for the part about configuring SickBeard to update Plex. I cannot for the life of me figure out what I am doing wrong. Whenever I enter the address of my Plex install, it says invalid. I have tried several different combinations with and without user name and password. Any assistance appreciated!
Now that NZBMatrix is no longer with us, can you suggest an alternative?. I am loving your site.
Hi, great tutorials, but I am getting stuck at one point…I got through this step:
git clone git://github.com/midgetspy/Sick-Beard.git
Cloning into ‘Sick-Beard’…
remote: Counting objects: 22248, done.
remote: Compressing objects: 100% (6400/6400), done.
remote: Total 22248 (delta 15161), reused 21678 (delta 14871)
Receiving objects: 100% (22248/22248), 8.04 MiB | 2.36 MiB/s, done.
Resolving deltas: 100% (15161/15161), done.
But then when I tried the “python sickbeard.py -d” I get the following:
python sickbeard.py -d
python: can’t open file ‘sickbeard.py’: [Errno 2] No such file or directory
What am I doing wrong? I followed your steps to the letter…I am a total novice at scripts so I probably missed some detail haha.
Thanks
I was having the same issue and I assume OP has already figured this out since this post is a few months old at this point so this is more for other people having this same problem. I did a “cd /applications/sick-beard” which took me into the sick-beard folder in applications and then ran the “python sickbeard.py -d” command and it worked. Hope this helps someone.
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