Linking cable remote buttons to Sage commands

[bradlewa]

I know I'm probably missing something very basic here - what I'm trying to do is link the directional pad buttons from my Comcast remote to up/down/left/right in SageTV. This is in an attempt to navigate the on demand screens via my media extenders.

My setup is a comcast STB or DTA or whatever they are called, hooked up to an HVR-1950, and controlled via USB-UIRT. I'm using a MediaMVP and HD-200 as frontends.

I've added the IR codes from the Comcast remote via the learning function on the USB-UIRT using the SageTV interface, but I cannot figure out how to then link them to the Sage commands for directions. Is this possible?

[Fuzzy]

You will go into setup -> Detailed Setup -> Commands -> Link Infrared/Keystroke to SageTV Command. The find the command you want to link in the list, and hit select. It will then ask you to press the button that you want linked to the command... do so.

[stanger89]

Sage doesn't have the ability out of the box to pass commands through like that, the STB control (backend) and remote input (frontend) are completely disconnected. There might be an STB control plugin though that adds the functionality you're looking for.

[Fuzzy]

Oh.. sorry, yeah, didn't notice that you were trying to control the STB.

[blade]

If you find a way to do this please post it to the forums. I've wanted to do this myself, but have never taken the time to look into how. If it's not possible to do through Sage you might be able to use an IR repeater to send the signal directly to the cable box from the remote.

[GKusnick]

Also bear in mind that "live" TV in Sage runs a few seconds behind realtime. So even if you get this to work, there's going to be a significant delay (much like the familiar channel-change delay) between pushing a button on the remote and seeing the STB's cursor move on screen. This does not seem like a very user-friendly solution for navigating STB menus.

[blade]

Originally Posted by GKusnick

Also bear in mind that "live" TV in Sage runs a few seconds behind realtime. So even if you get this to work, there's going to be a significant delay (much like the familiar channel-change delay) between pushing a button on the remote and seeing the STB's cursor move on screen. This does not seem like a very user-friendly solution for navigating STB menus.

Yeah the delay isn't very desirable, but it would be nice to actually be able to watch VOD without having to rent a second box.

[Fuzzy]

Everything I watch is pre-recorded... it's all OnDemand...

[blade]

Originally Posted by Fuzzy

Everything I watch is pre-recorded... it's all OnDemand...

Everything I watch is pre-recorded as well. The problem is when a ball game goes into overtime, power failure, programming is interrupted due to emergency weather reports, etc..... and the episode isn't scheduled to re-air any time soon. Also I watch almost everything in order of the original air date. Sometimes I'm missing 1 episode and have 30-40 others recorded and am just waiting on it to re-air. The missing episode is sometimes available on VOD through the STB, but it's sitting in a rack in the basement.

[GKusnick]

Check out your provider's website. It's possible they have a way to send shows to your STB from there. For instance DirecTV has an iPhone app that can apparently do this (haven't tried it myself).

[bradlewa]

I guess I'm confused as to why this isn't possible. If the USB-UIRT can learn commands for 0-9 from my Comcast remote, and those can be automatically linked to the Sage commands for those numbers, why can't other Comcast remote buttons be linked in a similar way. I know the USB-UIRT can learn those commands - I've already done that, and the IR commands are in the USB-UIRT config file. What's the limitation for then linking those to pre-established Sage functions (i.e. the directional keys)?

Personally I don't have a problem with the delay - it would just be great to not have to go into the other room, and manually start the OnDemand movie. But if it can't be done, oh well. Anyway, thanks for the replies.

[stanger89]

Originally Posted by bradlewa

I guess I'm confused as to why this isn't possible. If the USB-UIRT can learn commands for 0-9 from my Comcast remote, and those can be automatically linked to the Sage commands for those numbers, why can't other Comcast remote buttons be linked in a similar way.

But they're two separate things. When you learn them with the USB-UIRT (I think) they are learned for the function of transmitting IR to the box. When you learn SageTV commands, those are learned for receipt by/control of SageTV.

There is no direct link in SageTV from Sage Command to USB-UIRT output. There is nothing built into SageTV to say, when this Sage Command fires, send this USB-UIRT command.

I know the USB-UIRT can learn those commands - I've already done that, and the IR commands are in the USB-UIRT config file. What's the limitation for then linking those to pre-established Sage functions (i.e. the directional keys)?

SageTV didn't implement such functionality, there's no link between Sage Commands and IR output.

Personally I don't have a problem with the delay - it would just be great to not have to go into the other room, and manually start the OnDemand movie. But if it can't be done, oh well. Anyway, thanks for the replies.

No one is saying it can't be done, it's just not built in. It's not part of the core/stock SageTV functionality. In fact I thought someone had already created a plugin/customization for it. In fact, here's an example, though I don't know if it works with V7 or not:
http://forums.sage.tv/forums/showthr...ght=stb+remote

[GKusnick]

Suppose we take away the STB and plug a game console into your capture card. Your buddy is at the console doing a quest walkthrough or whatever, while you sit in the next room watching the captured video on your HD200. You wouldn't expect that pushing buttons on your HD200 remote would affect the movements of the character in the game; there's no connection between your Sage UI and the game controller. You're just watching a video.

What you're asking for is basically the same thing. The remote in your hand controls the Sage UI and video playback. That's all it does. It so happens that the video being played shows a picture of your STB menus. But it's just a video; there's no connection between your remote and that STB menu.

Creating such a connection is not as straightforward as it might seem. You'd need a way to tell Sage not to interpret your button clicks as Sage UI commands but to pass them through to the backend instead. (And you'd need a way to get out of that mode.) Also, what happens if more than one client is watching that source? Who gets to control the STB, or do you fight for it? What if you pause or rewind the video playback? Navigating STB menus requires direct, realtime interaction. But the whole idea of SageTV (or any other DVR) is to break that realtime link and decouple video playback from the video source.

I think your best bet for solving this sort of problem is going to be either some browser-based tool as I mentioned earlier, or else finding a way to pipe the STB output directly into a secondary input of your TV without going through Sage.

[Fuzzy]

It's something that is indeed possible, and can be done with a UI Mod. It would take bringing up a window with the video window in it, that hooks into the navigation events (left, right, up, down, select, etc) and checks which encoder is recording the currently playing video - then transmits the UI codes from there (which I do believe there are API calls to do). Possible... just not done.

[korben_dallas]

LM Remote KeyMap

I have heard of success with this app. It reportedly has an options menu within SageTV LiveTV that will pop up a virtual remote which can use your IR blaster to send commands directly to the STB.

[Fuzzy]

Originally Posted by korben_dallas

LM Remote KeyMap

I have heard of success with this app. It reportedly has an options menu within SageTV LiveTV that will pop up a virtual remote which can use your IR blaster to send commands directly to the STB.

LMRemote KeyMap is an external program, and a sagetv plugin to allow sage to send commands to LM Remote to change channels. It does no do anything in the interface. There may be a plugin that does as you describe, but this isn't it.

[korben_dallas]

http://forums.sage.tv/forums/showthr...9&postcount=12

If you are using an USB-UIRT or MCE blaster, then take a look at my software LM Remote KeyMap it does features an OnScreen Remote to be used during LiveTV (the OnScreen remote is accessible through the regular options menu and is overlaid on top of the video)

Exactly.

It should either on the default STV or SageMC.

The LM Remote KeyMap OnScreen remote is working with the current beta version of SageTV V7.

Regards,
Stéphane.

[Fuzzy]

Technically, that's a different STVI (called OnScreen Remote), and I don't think you even need to use LMRemote Keymap for it to function. I don't believe it's been updated to work with v7 though.

EDIT: Upon further looking, it does call to RKM directly, instead of using the SageTV api to trigger the ir blaster. the sage API may not have had that functionality when he wrote that import, but any updated import should definitely go through the api instead.

[bradlewa]

Originally Posted by GKusnick

Suppose we take away the STB and plug a game console into your capture card. Your buddy is at the console doing a quest walkthrough or whatever, while you sit in the next room watching the captured video on your HD200. You wouldn't expect that pushing buttons on your HD200 remote would affect the movements of the character in the game; there's no connection between your Sage UI and the game controller. You're just watching a video.

On the surface, that much I understand. But in essence, there has to be a connection between Sage and the STB controller (in this case USB-UIRT), otherwise, you wouldn't need to teach the USB-UIRT the IR commands for 0-9 in the first place. In your example, if you could somehow teach the USB-UIRT the commands the video game controller was emitting, and then link them up to commands from the Sage remote, then you could in theory connect the two (albeit on a time delay via the video capture and displaying back to the frontend). I know it doesn't work like this out of the box, but what I'm saying is that there could be a way to link any USB-UIRT learned IR code back to a Sage function that can be mapped on its remote.

I don't mean to beat a dead horse here, but my understanding (at least of channel changes) was that you key in the numbers on the Sage remote. It relays that signal to the Sage backend, which interprets them, and sends them to the USB-UIRT to emit an IR signal (based on the codes logged in its .ir file) to the STB. The STB changes the channel, and the video I'm watching on Sage changes. Unless I'm missing something, it seems Sage does already translate commands from the Sage remote through USB-UIRT to the Comcast box.

Just bear with me for a second - at least for Comcast, all you would need are up, down, left, right, and select to navigate the OnDemand menus. And for Comcast, OnDemand is channel 1. So you set up channel 1 as a capture channel (like I can do manually now anyway), and have the video play through that channel (of course without metadata, etc). Sage doesn't need to know when to stop automatically, since it's OnDemand, I'm already watching it and know when it's done. With Comcast, to exit the OnDemand menus, all you have to do is change the channel. So once the video I'm watching is done, it would be as simple as that.

Again, here's the confusion. Through Sage, I can teach USB-UIRT the IR codes for 0-9, as well as additional codes - I know it works, I've seen the codes in the .ir file (in this case I've taught it up, down, left, right, and select...this is starting to sound like I'm trying to play Contra). Sage must already have the built in functionality to link those IR codes to Sage's own internal codes for 0-9, and by extension back to the Sage remote for those numbers.

So my question is still, why isn't there a straightforward way to link the Comcast IR codes for up, down, left, right in the .ir file to existing Sage commands already mapped to its remote? At least in my setup, those 4 Sage remote functions don't do anything once I tune a channel, so there shouldn't be confusion on Sage's end as to what I am trying to have it do. The only quirk would be mapping the 'enter' IR code to something other than enter button on the Sage remote.

Granted, I haven't even looked at this extension you guys have linked to - I'll do that now. I just wanted to see if there's something major I'm missing about the way Sage relays messages from its own remote to the cable box.

Just thinking about 0-9, this is how it works, right?

Press button on Sage remote -> Sage backend interprets and calls on .ir file for appropriate IR emission sequence -> Sage tells USB-UIRT to emit sequence -> cable box receives/interprets signal -> changes appears on screen

Again, sorry if I'm not being clear - just trying to understand if this is even possible.

[GKusnick]

Originally Posted by bradlewa

I don't mean to beat a dead horse here, but my understanding (at least of channel changes) was that you key in the numbers on the Sage remote. It relays that signal to the Sage backend, which interprets them, and sends them to the USB-UIRT to emit an IR signal (based on the codes logged in its .ir file) to the STB. The STB changes the channel, and the video I'm watching on Sage changes. Unless I'm missing something, it seems Sage does already translate commands from the Sage remote through USB-UIRT to the Comcast box.

...

Just thinking about 0-9, this is how it works, right?

Not really. What happens is that you tell the client what program you want to watch. You could do this by punching in a channel number, or pushing the Live TV button, or selecting a show from the Program Guide, or any number of other ways. But all of them translate internally, on the client end, to "I want to watch this program," and the exact keystrokes you used to get there are forgotten.

The client then sends that request to the server, which asks itself, what channel is that program on, and what free tuners do I have that can tune that channel? Having found one, it looks up the channel mappings for that tuner to find out what physical channel number it corresponds to. It then figures out how to control that tuner (internal card, USB, serial cable, FireWire, IR blaster, or whatnot) and gives the necessary commands to change the channel, which may bear no relation whatsoever to the numbers you punched in on your remote. In some cases it may not need to change the channel at all, if the tuner is already tuned to that channel.

So the bottom line is that it isn't anything remotely like pushing buttons on your remote and having those same commands echoed through the USB-UIRT to the STB. There's a whole lot of translation steps, remappings, and conditional logic in between, all related to tuners and channel lineups and such. Passing through menu navigation commands is not just a minor extension of that scheme. It requires a whole separate mechanism.