What's new in Apple Remote Keybindings in XBMC for Mac
#61
Thanks Tyche. That was enough to get me sorted.
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#62
Hilbe Wrote:Has there been any discussion to import the Harmony settings from Plex? Plex has hacked together a ton of Apple Remotes to make many, many available buttons to Plex. They even have a Plex Player hardware device listed in the Harmony software now. I assume a similar method could be used in XBMC...

I agree, the Plex solution seems light years ahead of the current state of what XBMC can do regarding supporting remotes on Apples.

For those less clear on how Apple remotes work, and how Plex has utilised this, here is a summary of what is happening.

An Apple Remote can be 'paired' to an individual Mac (or AppleTV) so that if for example you have both a Mac and an AppleTV in the same room and each has an Apple Remote, then the Mac would respond only to its remote, and the AppleTV would respond only to its. This is obviously a useful capability.

Note: By default, Macs and AppleTVs are not paired to an individual remote and would accept commands from any Apple remote.

The interesting part is how this is done, from memory I believe this works based on the fact that a Mac (or AppleTV) can actually accept 256 different and unique remote codes, these are divided in to 16 sets of 16 (apologies if I misremember the correct numbers). If a Mac (or AppleTV) is not paired to a remote then each set of 16 is treated as identical to the others. So if it received button 1 from set 1, and button 1 from set 2 they would be treated identically. When however a Mac (or AppleTV) is paired to a remote, then that remote would be using one specific set out of the 16 different possible sets and the Mac or AppleTV would ignore the commands from the other 15 sets. This potentially means in one room you could have 16 different pairings.

I would guess the way the Apple Remote itself learns which set to use (when in Paired mode) depends on how long you hold down the buttons to trigger the Mac or AppleTV in to pairing, 1 second might be set 1, 2 seconds might be set 2, and so on.

What Plex has done is in their software which is still using the same Mac IR receiver (Plex is not available for AppleTV) can therefore as the Apple hardware can receive 16x16=256 different IR commands, the Plex software treats these as all different allowing you to define far more than 16 buttons. The drawback is that you can no longer use pairing to prevent (Apple) remote control conflicts.

This single feature is one that might by itself be enough to persuade me to use Plex rather than XBMC, I am actually currently building a media server and testing both Plex and XBMC.
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#63
Actually the latest beta for XBMCHelper, coupled with the new keymaps.xml, works identically to Plex. So much so that I now use the same Harmony configuration (including custom buttons) for both Plex and XBMC.

The problem is that the version of the IR helper currently in the SVN doesn't work too well, so you need to hack in the one supplied by this thread. Once you do that, the world is your oyster.
brave little meme loves you.
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#64
The beta version of XBMCHelper is for use with XBMC Babylon and should work quite well. If not please post it in that thread.

Current svn supports the Harmony and it can be activated in System->AppleRemote
Looks like we travelled light years in a few weeks Tongue

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#65
MaestroDD Wrote:The beta version of XBMCHelper is for use with XBMC Babylon and should work quite well. If not please post it in that thread.

Current svn supports the Harmony and it can be activated in System->AppleRemote

It does support the Harmony, but for some reason not all commands work. the same Keymap file that works with your beta does not work with the SVN version - only basic controls work but no advanced mappings.
brave little meme loves you.
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#66
Which ones don't work exactly and I'll try it out here.
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#67
Doraemonn Wrote:It does support the Harmony, but for some reason not all commands work. the same Keymap file that works with your beta does not work with the SVN version - only basic controls work but no advanced mappings.

hm, can't reproduce. Did you switch to the proper remote in Settings->System->AppleRemote?

Please feel free to create a new thread with issues you find with XBMCHelper in current svn. Make sure you use a recent version (>=r20247), there was a little bugger (swapped left/right - again)

cheers,
mdd

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Do not e-mail XBMC-Team members directly asking for support. Read/follow the forum rules. If you don't have the time to read them, please don't take the time to post in this forum!
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#68
So I'm a bit confused as to the status of XBMCHelper in regaurds to ATV.

Does the update support other remotes (trained via Frontrow) now?

Has the configuration for displaying remote codes now work for the ATV?


Thanks
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#69
DevinCook Wrote:So I'm a bit confused as to the status of XBMCHelper in regaurds to ATV.

Does the update support other remotes (trained via Frontrow) now?
see http://forum.xbmc.org/showthread.php?tid=48332
Trained/Learned remotes should work with Launcher 3.0

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Do not e-mail XBMC-Team members directly asking for support. Read/follow the forum rules. If you don't have the time to read them, please don't take the time to post in this forum!
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#70
Wow, thanks, I wish I new earlier. My hours of cursing the ATV are over.

Now if someone could figure out how to slip in a couple of extra buttons...

Oh well, this is truly wonderful.
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#71
has anyone previously posted or can post a keymap.xml with the same button mapping as plex? so the remote behaves exactly the same? i've tried making my own with no luck and have searched in vein. any help would be appreciated.

many thanks.
Q6600, ASUS P5W, 6GB DDR2 and 2.5TB RAID running Mac OS X 10.5.5 and XBMC
xbox v1.0 (softmod) XBMC Dash
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#72
I too am using my Harmony set up as a "Plex" device in the Harmony software.

With the latest SVN I am seeing most functions work, including Menu to launch the XBMC app from the desktop. But for some reason the fast forward and rewind buttons are functioning the same as chapter forward and chapter back.

Help?

Using latest XBMCHelper beta as well as Keymap.xml from the XBMCHelper thread.

Is it as simple as setting up my Mac Mini as another device in the Harmony software (not Plex)?
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#73
would someone be able to explain why i don't get the same keymapping as stated in the the first post? am i missing something really obvious here? i've been using the latest SVN builds as they're released and the controls have never been as stated in the first post. i spent a little while editing the keymap.xml yesterday and upon closer inspection of the first post it seems that all i've done is to recreate that. so why am i not getting the right controls as default? any help would be greatly appreciated.

many thanks,

mass
Q6600, ASUS P5W, 6GB DDR2 and 2.5TB RAID running Mac OS X 10.5.5 and XBMC
xbox v1.0 (softmod) XBMC Dash
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#74
El Massman Wrote:would someone be able to explain why i don't get the same keymapping as stated in the the first post? am i missing something really obvious here? i've been using the latest SVN builds as they're released and the controls have never been as stated in the first post. i spent a little while editing the keymap.xml yesterday and upon closer inspection of the first post it seems that all i've done is to recreate that. so why am i not getting the right controls as default? any help would be greatly appreciated.

many thanks,

mass

http://forum.xbmc.org/showthread.php?tid=47124

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Do not e-mail XBMC-Team members directly asking for support. Read/follow the forum rules. If you don't have the time to read them, please don't take the time to post in this forum!
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