[teaguecl]

Can anyone tell me what, if any, keys work at boot up? for example loading a computer with trucrypt. Will the keyboard work at boot up to enter the password?

thanks in advance,

JR

Most keys work, but I don't have a complete list. Pretty much all of the "bottom" keys work (QWERTY keyboard) and all of the "top" keys (remote control) do not. It will work fine for simple text entry, though I found it problematic that there is no "TAB" key.

[Thizizmyname]

It's a fantastic remote, but I don't want to claim it's perfect. Maybe the Boxee remote will be better, it's should arrive in a few weeks.

My main concern with the boxee remote is just that ht "top" is missing one or twelve keys. I would like a stop, info, play/pause, queue among others, and mapping "hold for x seconds" for all those would be even more mind challenging than stop with slow button.

Best would be if you could remove the paint and make your own button logos ^.^
...can that be done...?

[FoeHammer865]

Best would be if you could remove the paint and make your own button logos ^.^
...can that be done...?

Oh, anything is possible with a dremel, some goo-gone, a toothpick and some enamel modeling paint.

[Rannd]

Maybe the Boxee remote will be better, it's should arrive in a few weeks.

So, any update on which remote you like best out of the two?

[mbetter]

I just got this remote, and it is really nice. It's not going to replace a universal remote (Harmony) for complicated setups, but for my simple two device config (TV, HTPC) it is beautiful. Having a qwerty keyboard is great, I can't believe I've gone this long without it!
You can configure some keys to use IR. I've done this with the Power and Volume keys so that they will control the TV set. All the other keys work over bluetooth, and are treated like a keyboard in Linux.
Warning: it is not easy to set up this remote!

First, you need to patch your kernel using Jarod Wilson's work from MythTV. https://patchwork.kernel.org/patch/161481/ This patch improves the HID driver so that it recognizes the scancodes the remote produces, and generates the correct keycodes. Hopefully this patch will make it into standard kernels quickly.

Second, X sucks. It can't handle keycodes larger than 255 - which this remote uses. You can solve this a number of different ways (HAL FDI, eventlircd), I used a program called keyfuzz to do it. I had to compile this from source, and manually modify the init.d script it came with to work properly. http://0pointer.de/lennart/projects/keyfuzz/

Third, you need to modify ~.xbmc/userdata/keyboard.xml to remap the keys to useful xbmc functions.

As soon as Jarod's patch lands in a release version of Ubuntu, I'll work with the LiveCD guys to get it to work "out of the box".

Thanks for this info! There's no way in hell that I would have got this thing going without it.

[teaguecl]

As an update, I got the "Tivo" button to work. Basically, it was mapped to a multimedia key that XBMC was unaware of. I submitted a patch (http://trac.xbmc.org/ticket/11281), assuming it gets accepted we will eventually have a fully working remote.
I'm still stumped by the "LiveTV" button, it's the only key that's still non-functional for me.

[waffles730]

I just got this remote, and it is really nice. It's not going to replace a universal remote (Harmony) for complicated setups, but for my simple two device config (TV, HTPC) it is beautiful. Having a qwerty keyboard is great, I can't believe I've gone this long without it!
You can configure some keys to use IR. I've done this with the Power and Volume keys so that they will control the TV set. All the other keys work over bluetooth, and are treated like a keyboard in Linux.
Warning: it is not easy to set up this remote!

First, you need to patch your kernel using Jarod Wilson's work from MythTV. https://patchwork.kernel.org/patch/161481/ This patch improves the HID driver so that it recognizes the scancodes the remote produces, and generates the correct keycodes. Hopefully this patch will make it into standard kernels quickly.

Second, X sucks. It can't handle keycodes larger than 255 - which this remote uses. You can solve this a number of different ways (HAL FDI, eventlircd), I used a program called keyfuzz to do it. I had to compile this from source, and manually modify the init.d script it came with to work properly. http://0pointer.de/lennart/projects/keyfuzz/

Third, you need to modify ~.xbmc/userdata/keyboard.xml to remap the keys to useful xbmc functions.

As soon as Jarod's patch lands in a release version of Ubuntu, I'll work with the LiveCD guys to get it to work "out of the box".

Hi there teaguecl. I'm new to the forum and I'm also trying to get the TiVo Slider to work. I'm not a linux n00b, but I've never patched a kernel before. Would you be able to give some more detail on exactly what to do with Jarod Wilson's patch in step one? I'm on Mythbuntu 10.10 right now... and have no clue where to start. After that, I have high hopes of being able to figure the rest out

I'm excited to get this beast working!

[speed32219]

So far the best I have found for size and price is the Rii RF. Everything works OTB and it is backlit, which you can turn on or off. It sells for <40 on-line. Size is like a smart phone, but a little longer by 3 inches.

BTW, it is a mini-kybd, with multi-media keys and if you are familiar with keyboard shorcuts (x=stop) then it is a great addition to XBMC. It isn't perfect, but it is the best remote keybd combo I own especially when running FF and streaming. (better than Gyration remote & Keybd., or any remote/keybd for that matter)

EDIT: Sorry, I did not mean to hijack this thread, it is about the new Tivo remote, which looks pretty great.

[teaguecl]

Hi there teaguecl. I'm new to the forum and I'm also trying to get the TiVo Slider to work. I'm not a linux n00b, but I've never patched a kernel before. Would you be able to give some more detail on exactly what to do with Jarod Wilson's patch in step one? I'm on Mythbuntu 10.10 right now... and have no clue where to start. After that, I have high hopes of being able to figure the rest out

I'm excited to get this beast working!

Unfortunately I don't know how to help you with Mythbuntu. Compiling your kernel is not trivial - in fact I think it's harder now than it was 15 years ago when I first did it!
I followed the Ubuntu Community guide when I did it, applying the patch at the "Modify the source for your needs" section. I would recommend doing this is a virtual machine which is set up like your htpc, it's probably not a good idea to install all of the kernel compile prerequisites on your xbmc box.

I'll try to get a read from Jarod as to how the patch is going - last I checked it was meeting some resistance from the kernel maintainers. If it looks like it will be a while, we can create a wiki to document all the steps required.

[waffles730]

That's a great idea about compiling in a VM - I'd rather not mess up my HTPC for an extended time period if I can help it. The girlfriend wouldn't be too thrilled

Thank you for the link. I'll check it out when I get home this evening, spin up an identical VM, and see what I can get working.

[waffles730]

Just as an additional piece of information, the kernel I am running is

dan@scatcat:~$ uname -a
Linux scatcat 2.6.35-28-generic #50-Ubuntu SMP Fri Mar 18 18:42:20 UTC 2011 x86_64 GNU/Linux

[teaguecl]

I just got an update on the patch. Jarod ran into some issues pushing it upstream, and had to re-work it a bit to be more amenable to the kernel maintainers. The work is done and tested, and he's hoping it will land in 2.6.40. Once that patch lands the remote will function, with the exception of 4 buttons - he did not mention which ones, but I have a guess There is an additional patch for those buttons, which won't land until sometime after 2.6.40.
So my guess is that this will not make it into Ubuntu for a while, probably won't be in XBMC Eden, and therefore will be a long wait for XBMC. Based on that I suggest we create a wiki page to document how to get this remote to function on XBMC Live Dharma. Waffles, save your notes and we can collaborate on this.

[waffles730]

Thanks for the update. A wiki sounds great. I will take notes on what I do (and I'm sure look for help along the way!) and maybe we can help others. I'll post back when I have something.

[teaguecl]

I created a link to a new wiki page on the Remotes page (http://wiki.xbmc.org/index.php?title=Remote_Controls)
Unfortunately, I don't have permission to create a new page on the wiki, so that's as far as I could go. We'll have to find a wiki admin (ninja) to create a page for us to get started.

[ckm5]

Hi there,

I'm a longtime user and lurker. Since I've been hacking Linux for around 15 years, I thought I'd see if I could get this remote working...

Well, the kernel patch failed as the kernel I have (Ubuntu Lucid) is different enough from the patch kernel, so before hacking up kernel code, I thought I'd see what can be done in userspace. After all, the bluetooth stack does run partially in userspace...

For a start, I followed the PS3 remote instructions here http://wiki.xbmc.org/index.php?title=HOW..._BD_Remote to expand bluez beyond standard keycode recognition. After several reboots and reinstalling all the bluetooth support software from synaptics, the Tivo remote was recognized. I would note that you need to use code 0000, not the standard randomly generated code.

It looks like I'm going to do some key mapping as only part of the keys work. The keyboard seems to work fine, but only up/down works on the nav pad. Left-right and select are non-functional. On the remote bit, volume, play, pause, ff, rev work.

I haven't yet looked at debugging bluez to discover what other codes are being send, the only thing I saw was dmesg complaining about not being able to emulate raw mode for keycode 240.

I don't know if anyone has gone down this route, but I'm hoping I can just modify the bluetooth input keymap without having to mod the kernel. It would seem logical that BT captures all the keycodes at some level, regardless of what USB HID does with it afterwords...

Chris.