Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: Tip: Checking the validity date of keys

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Posted by Frank Cox (Member # 6258) on 11-30-2016, 01:19 AM:

I just had a sudden revelation -- don't know why this didn't occur to me before.

Sometimes I'm not entirely sure of when a key is valid until I ingest it on my server and check it there. If you want to check the validity date of a key without busting your brain figuring out time offsets from GMT and the like, you can do this on your desktop computer instead.

Key validity date as shown in the key file:
<ContentKeysNotValidBefore>2016-11-30T06:01:00+00:00</ContentKeysNotValidBefore>
<ContentKeysNotValidAfter>2016-12-23T09:59:00+00:00</ContentKeysNotValidAfter>

My local timezone is CST and that's what my computer is set for.

Here are the localized times. Just copy-and-paste the times into the date command as follows:

$ date -d 2016-11-30T06:01:00+00:00
Wed Nov 30 00:01:00 CST 2016

$ date -d 2016-12-23T09:59:00+00:00
Fri Dec 23 03:59:00 CST 2016

Posted by Leslie Hartmier (Member # 7053) on 11-30-2016, 04:39 PM:

That a GNU/linux machine?

If you do that on a Windows machine, you will change the date on your computer, unless you are wise and do not use an administrator cmd.

In which case, it will do nothing except complain that it is not an accepted format to change the date, and you do not have elevated privileges to do this.

So, don't do this on a Windows machine.

Posted by Dennis Benjamin (Member # 1137) on 11-30-2016, 05:34 PM:

Two things:

Doesn't the e-mail from Deluxe/Technicolor state the key validity in the e-mail itself?

Also, I've opened the keys using a web browser before and can see the key validity in the XML code.

Posted by Frank Cox (Member # 6258) on 11-30-2016, 07:49 PM:

1. Sometimes, but it's not necessarily there or accurate. At least in my case here since we don't have daylight saving time in Saskatchewan and the powers-that-be don't seem to understand that on a consistent basis.

2. I've never tried opening a key in a web browser. I just look at it with a text editor (vim to be exact) and what I see is a time and an offset value that's not particularly simple to read.

date -d will convert that time and offset into your local time.

Posted by Jim Cassedy (Member # 4115) on 11-30-2016, 08:03 PM:

quote: Dennis Benjamin
Doesn't the e-mail from Deluxe/Technicolor state the key validity in the e-mail itself?

Apparently not always. A lot of the shows I do are special event press/preview screenings,
often scheduled or confirmed at the last minute. Sometimes my KDM's seem to be issued
from a different entity than the ones I get issued for commercial public screenings.

I learned a long time ago to check these last minute KDM's as soon as I get them to make
sure they're valid for the show time/date I need, since some have a validity window only a
few hours long.

I open them in FIREFOX to check when a KDM comes in when I'm at home.

Posted by Carsten Kurz (Member # 5396) on 12-01-2016, 06:42 AM:

In windows, all you have to do is to select the KDM XML file in explorer and you will see the content in the right hand side content preview.

- Carsten

Posted by Randy Stankey (Member # 64) on 12-01-2016, 11:24 AM:

A KDM is just a text tile in a special format but a text tile none the less.

Any program or app that can read a text file can display a KDM.

When I worked at TREC, I often opened KDMs with TextEdit just out of habit.
Even though KDMs are automagically generated I still liked to give them a quick, visual once-over because, every once in a while, we would get a malformed or corrupted one. Like others have said, we would occasionally get one with the wrong dates between the <not valid before / after> tags.

Manually checking KDMs helped us catch errors in advance and call the distributor before we lost any shows.

Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 12-01-2016, 02:50 PM:

quote: Carsten Kurz
In windows, all you have to do is to select the KDM XML file in explorer and you will see the content in the right hand side content preview.

Or, just dbl click on the key itself and the Windows Browser will open the XML file in full screen view mode.

I do this all the time to check dates against the time in the cover letter from the depots. Their has been a few times depots don't get the times right with the key times.

-Monte

Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 12-01-2016, 05:01 PM:

You can also just download the Symmetricom Symmtime Desktop clock and run it at your correct UTC Time, leave the computers clock as is. The Symmtime clock also syncs to internet time commands. All my customers use it.

Get version 4.0 or higher if you download it...

I had one incident recently where the KDM's loaded in fine and should have been valid but were not. After Technicolor's third set of keys sent those finally worked.

Mark