custom tuner plugin

[ophois]

First some background:
I'm running sage in the UK with a telewest box. That means I'm using a hacked version of the XMLTV GUI (that changes the channel IDs to virgin/telwest channel numbers) and an hacked xmltv plugin that uses those channel IDs. It also means I need to use the exetunner plugin to call the command line redeye irda utility to change channels on the tunner box.

The problem:
The exetunner plugin results in a window poping up with some text in it. I know that this can be hidden with utilities like runhide. What I'd like to know is if it is possible to create a brand new java plugin to act as a tunner plugin. That way I could code set of java classes that nativlly control the redeye hardware over it's serial port connection.

I know you can create plugin epg readers (like the afore mentioned xmltv one), I couldn't find any info on tunner plugins however.

Thanks

[nielm]

Unfortunatly, the tuner plugin API is currently not public... You could submit a support request to make it public...

In the meantime you could make an executable java class which sends the commands and run it using the exetuner using javaw (instead of java) so it does not create a cmd window.

[bcjenkins]

You might also just ask if there is a way to run exetuner hidden without utility.

[ophois]

nielm: Thanks. I thought it was going to be the case that the API wasn't public but I'm new to SageTV (from Myth and MediaPortal) and thought I'd ask and hope I'd just missed the API doc. Your right about using javaw, but without a more integrated solution it would really just be re-inventing the wheel

bcjenkins: You'll notice I said in my original post that I know about ways to hide the window from exetunner (there are multiple listed on this forum). I was asking about an API because I thought it might be nice to have a more integrated solution for those of us in the uk using a redeye than the current solution. Any solution that requires manual registry changes isn't quite ready for primetime as far as I'm concerned. A java plugin could have been integrated with some custom GUI elements to give some configuration control from within SageTV.

In the long run it's not a big problem (or a problem at all really). I was asking as it seemed a nice little mod I could have attempted while learning the SageTV environment. I'll just find a different project to muck around with.

Thanks