RMIR Xsight Support

[tranx]

PS
With Xsight Colour as above, where the soft screen in devices in RMIR doesn't look right, the assignments in the bottom row of hard buttons assignments is linked to the soft buttons in page '0', i.e. duplicated or removed when a command one one of them is added or removed.

In my turn , and in due course, advice would be much appreciated.

[vickyg2003]

Sorry to derail this, but I have a software request.

Is there anyway that RM can be modified to have a default SAVE directory? One of the Supremely nice features of RM is that I can open a RDMU file directly from the file section, and then its gone, but if I need to make changes for an upload, I go to save it in my RMIR file but I'm in the temp directory. I did that 15 times today, and to build a few remotes, and it was just too much. So I thought I'd ask if it could be done while you are actively working on the software anyway. I don't know if this impacts anyone else's workflow, but it sure gets me over and over again.

[lnoland1]

I finally got all of my upgrades made and now I would like to add some activities but, frankly, I don't understand the activities tab of RMIR at all. Power Macro? Picture, Sound and Power Assist? Button Groups? What are all of these things? How would I use them? Why would I use them? I tried looking at the "help" selections but they were obviously written for a different version of the tool and don't have anything about the activities tab. I tried looking through this thread but everywhere there is discussion of activities, everyone here seems to already know what they are all about so there is no discussion of basic functionality. Is there some documentation somewhere which I don't know about?

Any help would be appreciated. Thanks.

- Les

[tranx]

Hi Les
I have just got things going with an Xsight Colour too, and am myself saving my latest problems until mathdon has some time again to deal with the earlier queue. However I can probably help with using the basic configuration in RMIR for ARRX15, if only because I understand it is very similar to the Colour which I have managed to set up using many of the functions.

Luckily I do not need to try to re-invent the wheel because in general the available guides still apply. What makes it hard to follow could be because the set up for Xsights in RMIR is different from that for many other JP1 remotes. They all vary but the native functions of Xsights just differ a lot more!

You might best start by adjusting the upgrades in RMIR so that the Xsight buttons all work as expected from the remote. Then it will be evident that the options are mostly to allow the functions to be mixed by copying them directly between devices. Don't worry about button groups or Activities to begin with.

You know all this but the term Activty is imprecise. To me it just means a configuration which includes a collection of devices, which is confusing because Xsight 'Devices' tend to end up as being just that, although Xsight Activities also mix up those mixed Devices!

e.g. 'Favourites' is a separately configured hybrid Activity/Device, which includes one or more 'button groups', one from a device which you are required to choose while setting it up, and one consisting of a unique separate predetermined button group, or subgroups for family members. 'Favourites' itself then becomes a sort of 'activity', one which must contain, in the button group/s on the soft buttons, macros made up only from original commands on the chosen device's digit buttons, plus one command such as Enter or OK to finish it off, (it has just dawned that it might even be a suitable Input command) together with all the hard buttons as defined in the 'chosen device'.

In practice it is quite useful that the Favourites activity contains all the usual hard buttons for the chosen device. Its soft buttons are not available but, in the RMIR device screen of the chosen device, the most useful ones can conveniently be copied to its digit buttons so that the Favourites button can be used directly to select your most popular device, such as the TV, with suitable modifications to give more power to its hard buttons.

Essentially there are just individual commands and macros to be defined and allocated, and then copied around, while the Activity wrapper is largely irrelevant. Even the 'ordinary' macros (which are more usually 'global') must be defined at first to 'belong' to a device (like 'DSMs'), and not to a button. Once that has been done they can be copied to other devices, either in the the device screens or in the the macro screens of RMIR.

If you get stuck with a particular thing I could try again to clarify that!
Chris

[mathdon]

I am now working on the various RMIR issues that have recently been raised, but one of them is causing difficulty. See this post for more details. However, I hope it will only be a few days now before they are all resolved.

[tranx]

I finally got all of my upgrades made and now I would like to add some activities but, frankly, I don't understand the activities tab of RMIR at all. Power Macro? Picture, Sound and Power Assist? Button Groups? What are all of these things? How would I use them? Why would I use them? I tried looking at the "help" selections but they were obviously written for a different version of the tool and don't have anything about the activities tab. I tried looking through this thread but everywhere there is discussion of activities, everyone here seems to already know what they are all about so there is no discussion of basic functionality. Is there some documentation somewhere which I don't know about?

Any help would be appreciated. Thanks.

- Les

Hi Les, apologies that I missed the point. Once you have clicked New in the bottom row, In the first row there appears a new tab which reveals a page for the new activity

Next row is editable activity name; Power macro (double click the space to edit a macro, which might just as well include the Tv's input command); icon (if required in addition to the name).

Next row is the ''assists" separately for Picture, Sound, and Power. By default the Assist button appears on the first LCD page of each activity unless that is full. The idea is to define here the command which would correct any out-of-synch in the three categories, if that should occur. (it should not be necessary so if things go well don't bother with it)

Next row is Activity Group Assignments. Each button group in the activity can be assigned to a device, which can be selected from drop-downs which appear in the text box under the corresponding device column.

Again these facilities are to mix functions in an activity, but the best part is so called 'Power Macro'. It is is most useful if it contains an input and that single command may be all the 'Power Macro' needs to contain. Our boxes all need a warm up time and that can be included as part of a power command, followed by the input, so you don't have to watch a blank screen, but we put the power commands somewhere else and just change activities when a particular box is ready.
Chris

[mathdon]

Here is RMIR v2.03 Alpha 25, which should resolve all the recently reported issues with RMIR for XSight remotes. I have also posted a revised set of RDFs and maps for recent remotes which adds an RDF for the URC-8602 XSight Colour.

To Jaco_J: As you tried a factory reset on your XSight Colour, you may have lost the setup that was on your remote (though it may have been saved in EZ-RC). In case you have lost it, I have posted a .rmir file with the setup that was in your raw download and which will load into this new version of RMIR.

If anyone else has lost data that was in their raw download, please let me know as I can create .rmir files from any of them.

To vickyg2003: I haven't dealt with your request as I don't understand what you want. File dialogs looking for .rmir files should open in the last directory you loaded a .rmir file from, or saved one to. The same holds for .rmdu files but the two "last used" directories are maintained separately. If there is a bug in this behaviour, can you please tell me how to reproduce it. If you want only a single "last used" directory for both .rmir and .rmdu files, let me know and I can make this an option.

[tranx]

Mathdon, thank you for all of that:
The macros which can be defined in the activity page now work, Many Thanks!
0 problem in device configuration cured thanks.
I can see the XsightColour illustration (due to the extra Colour RDF as advised) thank you.

I have it now from EZ-RC as you explained could be done but from the favourites setup page I think that at some stage I exported the female-head-icon with 24g and saved it to a file.
In the attached rmir I imagine that is why it is now still absent from the icon matrix, but it and can't apparently be retrieved from the file I saved it to:
that seems to be because, in the Activity set up page, the 'import from file' button cannot be 'un-greyed out'

In the macro set up page; function-selection dropdown: 'button:home', 'button:favourites', 'button:activities', 'button:devices' appear. Is there a reason for that? They don't seem to be effective in any way but, even if those lcd pages were to be displayed, I wonder how any particular item there could be selected.

Set to soft13 and set14 in the 'samsung' device are a couple of 'watch xxx' macros (corresponding to those which are defined as power macros in the activity set up.
At least they they do issue the 'watch xxxx' start macros, but their positions in the RMIR soft button pages do not correspond with those in the remote's lcd itself.
Is this inevitable because of the way Xsight stores its buttons, which can't be shown in RMIR?

In the device: layout screen there is a row marked 'Alias' (greyed-out). What is its significance please?

http://www.hifi-remote.com/forums/dload ... e_id=12840

[mdavej]

Graham,

I'm having some trouble with this version. Here's my raw ir file from an 18G that won't load. One wrinkle is my protocols.ini has a new entry from the post below. Would you add that to your next release?

I have one request related to vicky's. I'd like to see .txt and .ir files saved in the recent list as well and included in the filter in the open dialog, if it's not too much trouble. Many upgrades on the site are still txt format from the KM days.

Thanks

http://www.hifi-remote.com/forums/dload ... le_id=8852

http://www.hifi-remote.com/forums/viewt ... 985#115985

[mathdon]

Dave, I have fixed your bug. It has been there for some time, though, not something introduced in Alpha 25. I've also added the Roku protocol to protocols.ini, as you requested. Please try RMIR v2.03 Alpha 25a.

Enhancements like your and Vicky's requests will have to wait till this round of bugs has been dealt with, however.

[mdavej]

That did the trick. Thanks!

[vickyg2003]

To vickyg2003: I haven't dealt with your request as I don't understand what you want. File dialogs looking for .rmir files should open in the last directory you loaded a .rmir file from, or saved one to. The same holds for .rmdu files but the two "last used" directories are maintained separately. If there is a bug in this behaviour, can you please tell me how to reproduce it. If you want only a single "last used" directory for both .rmir and .rmdu files, let me know and I can make this an option.

Missed this
There isnt a bug, this works exactly as advertised. I was hoping for an option to override this for a default save directory. Typically i open files from the download page so i am always in the temp directory. When i find one worth saving i always have to navigate all the way back to my rdmu folder. Its not a showstopper at all, merely tedious.

[mathdon]

Vicky, if I understand correctly, you would like an option to make the "last used" directory be a "last saved" one, so that it changed only when you save a file into a different directory, not when you load a file from a different one. Opening a dialog for loading would still open in this directory, but if you changed to load from a different one, that default would not change. Is that right?

If so, I should be able to provide that as an option.

[xnappo]

It would be nice if there was both a 'last load' and 'last save' directory.

In my usual workflow, I might download upgrades to my 'download' directory, then save then to my 'upgrades' directory.

Does that meet what you want Vicky?

xnappo

[mdavej]

New request. EZ-RC limits "Pause after..." in a macro step in a macro or activity to 10 seconds. This appears to be a requirement since using a value larger than this will lock up the remote. So would it be possible to put an entry limit of 10 in this field?

Thanks