Using a cheap remote

dmsuperman · #1 (**permalink**) 01-23-2007, 08:01 PM

I got a tuner card, all is well, but it came with a cheap remote. Using some testing I have determined that it merely sends keyboard keys instead of any actual commands like I understand other remotes do. I have looked into perhaps purchasing a better remote but they are far too expensive ($50 for a remote is a lot of money with a $50 tuner card) so I'm hoping to reprogram mine somehow. I tried Girder as suggested in the FAQ but when going to assign buttons to certain functions, it complains when I use different buttons that the assignment has already been made. To put it better, different buttons are sending (Girder at least) the same codes, so I can't have them each have their own function. Using a JavaScript that I made to tell me what button was just pressed, I determined that when pressing buttons that JavaScript can detect that they are different, but Girder cannot. How might I go about getting my remote to work with Beyond TV? The Remote is a Sicuro DEC-100 cheap-o one. I have it partially working (channel up/down and the numbers as well as arrow buttons all work) but the other buttons, such as pause/record/stop/volume/back/repeat don't work.

soham · #2 (**permalink**) 01-23-2007, 09:36 PM

If you can program your remote, there are two key mappings that Beyond TV responds to:

1) The generic Windows keys for media control. Microsoft has defined these, and most software applications support them. They are what Firefly Mini use. So if you can get your remote to send these same codes, then you will be fine.
Here's the mapping: http://blogs.snapstream.com/wp-content/keys.JPG

2) Beyond TV also has a map of keyboard hotkeys. So you could have your remote send these keys. You can see the hotkeys by pressing F1 from any screen in Beyond TV.

dmsuperman · #3 (**permalink**) 01-24-2007, 08:44 PM

There's no direct way to program my remote, to my knowledge. Would there be a program that allows me to do so? There was no remote-related software that came with it other than the driver...thinking about it I'm not even sure I needed a driver or it came with one.

OK, I found a freeware keyboard remapping tool, but when I go to remap some of the buttons (play/pause,stop,record, etc.) they all send teh same scancode, 29 (which is left control according to this program). How can I remedy this?

soham · #4 (**permalink**) 01-24-2007, 09:32 PM

Sorry, I am not familiar with your remote. Some of the other users may have some guidance about that or on using Girder.

cmcquistion · #5 (**permalink**) 02-02-2007, 10:33 AM

You may be able to use a software called HIP to intercept your input from the remote and then run particular applications and do certain actions, based on that. It is free software. I've been thinking of trying it out, myself, to solve some of my issues with the Firefly.

Another program that might be worth looking into is EventGhost. It's free, too.

dmsuperman · #6 (**permalink**) 02-02-2007, 07:04 PM

Using SageTV (bad program save 2 things, it has automatic key mapping that works with my remote, and the intelligent recording of programs i might like) I found that the buttons do actually send keys. Then, using more JavaScript, I had it alert anything that is pressed. Using that, I made up a list of what buttons are sent. Things like Ctrl + Alt + Shift + 2 are what's being sent, so maybe if I can map these out then use something like HIP or Girder but just use Ctrl + Alt + Shift + 2 on my keyboard I may be able to get it to work. That's probably why it was sending multiple scancodes to Girder, it was detecting Ctrl and Alt and Shift as seperate scancodes.

Code:

<html>
<head>
<title>test</title>
<script type='text/javascript'>
function doIt(e){
  shiftPressed = false;
  altPressed = false;
  ctrlPressed = false;
  var unicode=e.charCode? e.charCode : e.keyCode
  var evt = navigator.appName=="Netscape" ? e:event;
  shiftPressed=evt.shiftKey;
  altPressed  =evt.altKey;
  ctrlPressed =evt.ctrlKey;
  alert((shiftPressed ? "Shift + ":"") + (altPressed   ? "Alt + "  :"") + (ctrlPressed  ? "Ctrl + " :"") + String.fromCharCode(unicode));
}
</script>
</head>
<body onKeyPress='doIt(event);'>
</body>
</html>

For anyone else wanting to do this. Didn't bother testing in IE, but it works in FireFox 2.0 at least. You save that as a .html page, then hit buttons on your remote and it'll alert what buttons it sends, just do that button by button and document what each button sends, and you'll have a list of all the hotkeys your remote sends

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