IRremote with both Sage and Windows Media Player

[sonoman]

I used the modifications suggested to enable me to start/wake up sage using the green power button and they work great. The problem is now I can no longer use the silver remote to control Windows Media Player when playing a CD. It works okay initially when I insert a CD but certain buttons cause it to no longer control WMP. I suspect it may be because Sage v2 always has focus. I hope Sage includes CD playback soon as this is really needed to make it a complete media center. I will most likely revert back to my original .ini configuration. Also, is there a way to get IRremote to simply open and close Sage altogether instead of putting it into sleep mode?

Thanks,

sonoman

[Opus4]

Originally posted by sonoman
I used the modifications suggested to enable me to start/wake up sage using the green power button and they work great. The problem is now I can no longer use the silver remote to control Windows Media Player when playing a CD. It works okay initially when I insert a CD but certain buttons cause it to no longer control WMP.

If you are using my modifications, it is because when you exit SageTV, it uses the command mode(Default) to get out of SageTV mode. This forces the remote to stay in the Default section, until/unless given another mode(xxx) command to switch to another section. You can either:[list=1][*]use mode() in the [SageTV] section after the command to exit it in order to put te remote back to no forced mode. Note that after this change, you may only be able to start SageTV with the green power button if Windows focus is not on a program in use by the remote's ini.
[*]use mode(Windows Media Player) (or whatever it's bracketed [ ] section name is) to enter Windows Media Player mode when you use the remote to start that program & remember to use mode(Default) when you exit it.[/list=1]

Also, is there a way to get IRremote to simply open and close Sage altogether instead of putting it into sleep mode?

Yes. Completely exit SageTV, edit the properties file and set:

sleep_on_close=false

Then restart SageTV. It will then exit instead of sleep when you close it.

- Andy

[sonoman]

Thanks for the input, Andy. I used your suggestion to add the mode(default) to the GRNPOWER line and now I can control media player with the remote and then use the green power button to shut it down, returning the focus and IR control to sage. I just use the autoplay feature to bring it up when I insert a cd.

I also checked my sage properties for
sleep_on_close=false and it was already set to that. This works fine when using the mouse but what I would like to do is have a way to completely shut down sage using the remote and then reopen it again with the remote. Is there any way to accomplish this without messing up the way it is working now?

Again, thanks for all your help.

[Opus4]

Originally posted by sonoman
I also checked my sage properties for
sleep_on_close=false and it was already set to that. This works fine when using the mouse but what I would like to do is have a way to completely shut down sage using the remote and then reopen it again with the remote. Is there any way to accomplish this without messing up the way it is working now?

Oops. I guess I hadn't realized that the "Power" and "Power Off" commands always put SageTV to sleep, regardless of that setting. (I just tried it & both commands put it to sleep.) So.... you could do something very dangerous & send {alt}{f4} to SageTV instead of {ctrl}z. The reason I don't really like this is that it closes whatever happens to have Windows focus.

What style of ini commands are using to control SageTV? There's a link in my sig lines to a thread for controlling SageTV when it doesn't have focus. You wouldn't have to use SendMessage.exe for every command, if you don't want to, but you could use it only to close SageTV. The Windows message number should appear if you run the exe -- it lists a few message numbers. The advantage of this method is that you will be sure that the close command is only sent to SageTV, not whatever happens to have focus. I haven't tried closing it this way, but it ought to work.

But... you do know that if you exit SageTV, it won't be able to record your scheduled shows, right? That's the whoile point of putting it to sleep -- get it off the screen while letting it continue to record for you.

- Andy