I just found that the .update detection is broken for me with vdr-1.3.33. I performed and strace on vdr and it is not using the correct recording location:
stat("/video/.update", 0x7fffffc1e0d0) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory)
I place my recordings in /video0 using "-v /video0". It looks like the problem is the change which adds the assignment of updateFileName into the constructor of cRecordings:
cRecordings Recordings;
cRecordings::cRecordings(bool Deleted) :cThread("video directory scanner") { updateFileName = strdup(AddDirectory(VideoDirectory, ".update"));
It looks like the Recordings object is instantiated before the VideoDirectory has been parsed from the commandline, hence updateFileName always points to the default VIDEODIR.
Jon