[Feeler/suggestion/Idea] All in one remote
#1
Question 
This is more towards freezy, since he developed the XBMC remote app, but I'd also like to toss this out to the community to gauge interest and get some feedback on the feasibility of my idea.

I recently picked up a 7" Coby tablet to use purely as a remote for selecting music, movies and tv shows on my HTPC. I used to (and still use) a Logitech Harmony remote control for everything else, but I'm the kind of person who prefers to be able to do everything from one remote. Before I begin, I'd like to just say thank you for designing an awesome remote. While I wish there was options for different layouts for movies (say tiled covers 3/4 wide, similar to the tv show listings), it is probably the best remote type app available for something like this.


So here's my idea/suggestion. While work continues on the base remote functionality, I'd like to suggest adding the ability to control TVs and AV receivers as well from the app. Right now, the remote app opens up to list "music/movies/tv" , etc. A new screen would need to be added to list "TV/Receiver/XBMC" icons. But how do you control your TV or Receiver from the app without an Infrared module on the tablet? That's the feeler/idea portion below.

To realize the above feature, you need the ability to send IR commands to various devices. It would not be overly expensive to design a wi-fi box that could sit on a table near your stereo rack with an IR emitter/receiver on the end that could be used to send commands to a TV or other device. Said device would probably consume less than 3x3x0.5" of space including case, and could last anywhere around 8-60 hours on a charge, depending on usage (wifi module requires around 130mA during transmit, but <40 while idle, figures assuming 2000-6000 mAh battery, 50-150mA current draw for device). I haven't looked at BOM costs yet, but from the main parts (microcontroller, wifi module, etc) it should cost no more than around 60 USD for low-qty builds.

The idea goes something like this. Turn box on, it gets an IP address from your router. You open the remote on tablet/phone, and would configure the "extender' IP in the XBMC remote control. You could also log into the IP address of the device to configure static/dhcp settings, name, etc. Once XBMC remote is configured for an "extender" you would then see "TV/Stereo" buttons added to the UI. In addition to the possibility of an already built in database of IR codes, there would be a learning function that would allow you to program new remotes into the app. to store new remotes, you could select a button in the app, hit learn, and point your remote at the extender box to learn the command.

At an average cost of 100-250$ or more for a learning remote, this would be a much cheaper solution. Full disclosure: I'm not a electrical design engineer or programmer, I've taught myself enough to know some android development, and I am pretty good with designing and building electronic circuits (I build a lot of surface mount stuff), so I have some experience, but would like to see if anyone in the community would be interested in collaborating)

I'm still debating if I want to start investing the time in beginning a schematic/PCB design for this, but I'd like to see if anyone else thinks this would be a great idea and would be interested in getting involved (as well as freezy's opinions on modifying the remote)

Thanks.
Board: Zotac ION-A-U Case: M350 Mini ITX Memory: 4GB Patriot PC6400 OS: XBMC on OpenELEC.tv build 6936 on a Corsair 32GB SSD Media Storage: W2K8 running on 14TB RAID 5 on an Asrock board w/ AMD Athlon X2 250 and PERC 6/I controller w/ 8 Samsung HD204UI Green drives Time to interface from power switch: 22.4 seconds.
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#2
If your media centre is turned on all the time you can get a USB IR transmitter and use (Win)LIRC to control your AV Gear that way - would be neat if XBMC could link in with that though - e.g. you could add a option to change the audio output source (e.g. TV, Surround Sound) then as you change the volume on XBMC Remote it changes the volume on the actual source rather than the output volume from the XBMC.
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#3
(2012-05-16, 11:54)kevjs1982 Wrote: If your media centre is turned on all the time you can get a USB IR transmitter and use (Win)LIRC to control your AV Gear that way - would be neat if XBMC could link in with that though - e.g. you could add a option to change the audio output source (e.g. TV, Surround Sound) then as you change the volume on XBMC Remote it changes the volume on the actual source rather than the output volume from the XBMC.

interesting. having a hardware dongle would move the functionality into XBMC however, and while that might open up support for more installations (instead of just users with XBMC remote for android), that would also move the remote functions from the actual "remote" into xbmc itself...I'd assume tv/stereo/whatever functionality would still need to be added to the remote app to utilize it.

The upside to moving it into Lirc, is that Lirc already has support for a large number of remotes built in, so it would save a little re-inventing of the wheel, unless of course there was a way to pull Lirc data into the remote.
Board: Zotac ION-A-U Case: M350 Mini ITX Memory: 4GB Patriot PC6400 OS: XBMC on OpenELEC.tv build 6936 on a Corsair 32GB SSD Media Storage: W2K8 running on 14TB RAID 5 on an Asrock board w/ AMD Athlon X2 250 and PERC 6/I controller w/ 8 Samsung HD204UI Green drives Time to interface from power switch: 22.4 seconds.
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[Feeler/suggestion/Idea] All in one remote0