Been expirimenting with the SDKs ExportSample and MediaPlaybackViewer software to learn more about reading in exported files and converting / archiving to MKVs.
If I use ExportSample and connect to a local device (let’s call it GusCam) and save the data in the database format, I get a directory structure that looks like this (underlying dirs are actually guids):
GusCam - Camera 1
GusCam - Edge Device (where does this even come from?)
GusCam - Real Device
cache.xml
config.xml
synckey
pointing MediaPlaybackViewer at this directory gives me a popup to select cameras:
Bank
All Cameras (Bank)
GusCam - Camera 1
GusCam - Camera 1 (Edge)
Selecting ‘GusCam - Camera 1’ works and I can see video previously exported as a database file. Using an internally created tool, this works as well. I can export this as MKV.
-but-
When I use data that is automatically exported by the recorder, I get a directory structure that looks like this:
archives_cache.xml
GusCam - Camera 1 - 2023-06-07T19:58:20Z
GusCam - Camera 1 - 2023-06-07T18:58:13Z
…
which is fine. Each dir is an hour of video, which makes sense.
Loading archives_cache.xml into media playback viewer does something different. I now get a popup with JUST the edge camera (which seems to populate itself as I never mention edge anywhere).
Bank
All Cameras (Bank)
GusCam - Camera 1 (Edge)
No mention of ‘GusCam - Camera 1’, which is the camera I want to export from.
My question again is: Why do I get the proper camera list when using the cache.xml generated from Export Sample, and something totally different when exporting directly from the recording server?
I guess I could just create something similar to the code in the SDK’s ExportSample using the DBExporter to generate the proper files, but I wanted to know if I missed something obvious between the two formats.
Hope I used the right terminology and that all made sense 
JR