[hawkeye27]

Ok, well I have it all configured - but something is not quite right. I have removed Plex from the application folder for no interference, but the "always on" option on the remote doesnt seem to be working (or is overridden somehow by Remote Buddy). I couldnt get XBMC to start by using the play button, menu button, etc (it is supposed to, right? I might be confusing this with Plex). So - I had to write a little applescript and assign it with Remote Buddy to start and stop XBMC.

Also, when I run the XBMChelper in standalone, it tells me that it can't find any remotes (I assume that is because I do not have any paired to the Mac Mini), and it will accept input from remotes as they are found. Then however, it does nothing when I press any buttons. First I had Remote Buddy on, which I figured might interfere, so I turned it off, still didn't see anything. Next I uninstalled the Candelair driver that RemoteBuddy uses and rebooted - same thing. The really odd thing was that with Candelair and Remote Buddy turned off - even the Harmony "Plex" device setting didn't let me control XBMC. Not sure why that is happening, and it precludes me from getting any data from XBMChelper. Any ideas what might be going on?

[jmarshall]

You have to start XBMCHelper with the --verbose option to get decent feedback. From a terminal.

Once that is done, it should pick up the remote input whether they're paired or not I think? You'll need Candelair installed on 10.6.0 or 10.6.1.

Cheers,
Jonathan

[hawkeye27]

Just wanted to let you know I had not fallen off the face of the earth. Have had a lot of other things going on lately. I have got everything configured but am still not able to launch XBMCHelper in verbose mode. I open the terminal and I browse to the file at /Applications/XBMC.app/Contents/Resources/XBMC/tools/osx/, however when I type XBMCHelper at the terminal prompt, I just get a "-bash: XBMCHelper: command not found".

When typing "open XBMCHelper", it launches the program, not in verbose mode. "open XBMCHelper --verbose" thinks that I am passing the "--verbose" switch to the open command, not to XBMCHelper. Any pointers on getting this running? My hope is that the verbose output has raw codes we can compile into a list and maybe get Logitech to add.

[hawkeye27]

Nevermind - got it, it fires right up when I run the command in the terminal as such:
/Applications/XBMC.app/Contents/Resources/XBMC/tools/osx/XBMCHelper --verbose

Oddly, does not like running XBMCHelper from inside the osx/ directory, oh well. So - it looks like the buttons are being received correctly - showing my Apple Remote IDs I programmed into the Harmony, and the corresponding buttons (Plus, Minus, Play/Pause). So - keymap.xml is my next target. Might be able to get this running without RemoteBuddy after all.

[jmarshall]

Great! Let us know how it works out.

[hawkeye27]

Next issue - having trouble figuring out how to translate what XBMCHelper sees (Apple Remote ID, button name) to the keymap.xml. Looks like from what I am seeing that I need to track down what the obc's are for the keypresses - so I created an advancedsettings.xml in /Applications/XBMC.app/Contents/Resources/XBMC/userdata/, with contents of:
<advancedsettings>
<displayremotecodes>true</displayremotecodes>
</advancedsettings>

However, when I fire up XBMC and start pressing buttons, I get nothing onscreen. Any ideas on this? Feel like I am SO close to not having to buy Remote Buddy when my trial runs out.

Side note - boo on the poor buffering in starting a video in XBMC for OSX. Did I just not notice this in XBMC for Windows, or is this a specific deficiency of the OSX version?

[jmarshall]

XBMCHelper should I think give you the button codes itself when you press the buttons?

Then go straight into your keymap file (joystick.Harmony.xml) and edit accordingly.

Copying it to userdata/keymaps/ and editing it there is the best plan.

Cheers,
Jonathan

[hawkeye27]

Unfortunately I am still not getting codes, even after trying in XBMCHelper in verbose mode. Is there some sort of extra verbose mode to show codes maybe? do I need the advancedsesttings.xml in another location? I have noticed in the joystick.Harmony.xml file it references it as AdvancedSettings.xml, so I have tried matching the capital letters (even though the online FAQs list it as all lowercase, no change. Here is the XBMCHelper Output when I press one of the buttons on the remote

2009-11-24 20:18:46.246 XBMCHelper[29398:903] Change of remote ID from -1 to 203
2009-11-24 20:18:46.246 XBMCHelper[29398:903] Received button 'Right' press event
2009-11-24 20:18:46.248 XBMCHelper[29398:903] XBMCClientWrapperImpl:endButton sending button 4 down:2 up:0
2009-11-24 20:18:46.248 XBMCHelper[29398:903] Received button 'Right' release event
2009-11-24 20:18:46.249 XBMCHelper[29398:903] XBMCClientWrapperImpl:endButton sending button 4 down:0 up:4

Note the release event - I guess that is something the Apple remote sends. The number after XBMCHelper seems to be some sort of process ID or instance number, as it stays the same for every button pressed on the harmony, irregardless of what remote ID the signal is coming from.

Any pointers?

[jmarshall]

Ah, looks like it's hard coded. Naughty, but I probably would have done the same thing :p

It's hardcoded to look at button codes from device ids 150-160 inclusive. The codes sent are then code 1-> code 110 based on (device_id - 150)*10 + button_id. button_id is then 1..10 as follows:

1. Up (allows release)
2. Down (allows release)
3. Left (allows release)
4. Right (allows release)
5. Play
6. Menu
7. Play held
8. Menu held
9. Right held (allows release)
10. Left held (allows release)

If you want to get together and hack up something that works a bit nicer, pop onto IRC and go to #xbmc on freenode, and ask for me, mdd or davilla, and we'll work with you to get it going a little better.

In the meantime, you may be able to work with that device range? As an example, pressing LEFT on device 150 should produce code 3, whereas pressing RIGHT on device 158 should produce code 84.

Cheers,
Jonathan

[hawkeye27]

Ah - that's where it becomes a bit tricky. I don't have an apple remote, borrowed one from a guy a while back to program codes 198-205 into my Harmony. Let me tell you, it was quite fun to cycle that thing all the way back to the original code so he could use it on his Mac for a presentation shortly afterwards without him having to figure out how to repair it. So, without getting another remote to play with it'll be difficult.

If it is hardcoded - then I am not sure what to make of that. My codes I recorded were all short presses, not the long presses (which I am theorizing are the reasons for the delay in the "Plex" device on the Harmony setup). I would have to assume the ones used for this device are long preses, or perhaps waiting for the press/release dual code combo of one of the buttons that "(allows release)". This is just an assumption though. If it is using the short press codes - then anything I work to try to put together will be no better.

I know that using recorded short press codes in conjunction with Remote Buddy is much more responsive than the Harmony "Plex" device, but if the XBMCHelper is not going to reproduce that same speed (or better maybe?), then it would seem to be a flaw(delay) in XBMCHelper's processing of the remote command. Is there any way to check to see whether the up/down navigation buttons are just looking for single codes, and perhaps even tell if they are the long codes? I understand all of this is hardcoded. Perhaps you would have an idea of where to look.

My first intention was obviously to get this working for myself as best as I could, but I was also hoping that this would in the end yield an improved response through XBMCHelper. So I guess a more important question is - is this valuable to anyone else than just me? If your offer to help "hack something up" would result in just a custom build that wouldn't help anyone else (and might not work on future releases) - I wouldn't want to take up your time.

Thoughts? Thanks again for all your help with this so far.

[mr.b]

Nevermind - got it, it fires right up when I run the command in the terminal as such:
/Applications/XBMC.app/Contents/Resources/XBMC/tools/osx/XBMCHelper --verbose

Oddly, does not like running XBMCHelper from inside the osx/ directory, oh well. So - it looks like the buttons are being received correctly - showing my Apple Remote IDs I programmed into the Harmony, and the corresponding buttons (Plus, Minus, Play/Pause). So - keymap.xml is my next target. Might be able to get this running without RemoteBuddy after all.

perhaps you're just not too familiar with unix platforms? from within the directory, you'd need to run the binary prepended with a './', like:

Code:

$ pwd
/Applications/XBMC.app/Contents/Resources/XBMC/tools/osx
$ ./XBMCHelper --verbose

--just trying to be helpful

[hawkeye27]

mr.b, you are correct. I'm a Windows guy venturing (stumbling) off into new pastures. Thanks for the tip.

Can I just say - it's amazing the kind of responsiveness I am getting in this thread considering it's in the Windows support forum and the topic has decidedly turned away from Windows.

[mr.b]

mr.b, you are correct. I'm a Windows guy venturing (stumbling) off into new pastures. Thanks for the tip.

Can I just say - it's amazing the kind of responsiveness I am getting in this thread considering it's in the Windows support forum and the topic has decidedly turned away from Windows.

I'm a "New Posts" refresh addict -- if the thread has a good title, I'll check it out

[jmarshall]

hawkeye27: If it's faster then it'll definitely be of use to more folk

Drop me a PM with your email address and I'll send through an XBMCHelper binary built with support for your device codes as a starting point.

Cheers,
Jonathan

[hawkeye27]

Ok, I have the custom binary in place and have captured the remote code button IDs for my Harmony. However I cannot seem to get the keymap (joystick.Harmony.xml) setup correctly. Is this the one I need to edit? I have tried placing it in my user profile folder and inside the XBMC.app with no positive results. In one situation the "Up" button caused the volume to turn down, but this was only because the button ID (22) corresponded to another item in joystick.Harmony.xml which I had not modified from the old configuration.