General help with macro design

crowfan · Post by **crowfan** » Thu Feb 23, 2006 5:04 pm

Thanks.

It's becoming rapidly apparent that I know nothing about the extenders and all the various functions within them. Any and all help is appreciated.

Eglass · Post by **Eglass** » Thu Feb 23, 2006 8:30 pm

Ok here goes a brief explanation of how I setup my ToadTog.

MY VCR for instance is a Toshiba and has not discrete ON/Off.
It takes 2 entries in the SPCL PROT FNS tab to make this work one for ON the other for OFF
First entry
Device: VCR
Key: DisceteON
Type: ToagTog (MISC:1800)
Toggle#: 2 (use a different one for each device)
Condition: Force ON
Already ON Keys: Blank
Off/On Keys: Power (or where ever you have the power cmd stored in your device upgrade)

Second Entry
Device: VCR
Key: DiscreteOFF
Type: ToagTog (MISC:1800)
Toggle#: 2 (use a different one for each device)
Condition: ForceOff
On/Off Keys: Power (or where ever you have the power cmd stored in your device upgrade)
Already Off Keys: blank

That's it, then in your macros you do DEV_VCR (This is an Extender Function) DiscreteON (or OFF depending on which macro)

Be sure all your devices are off after you download to the remote since that is the state the toggle will start in.

As for getting the extender up and running, and since your remote is different than mine, this is what I had to do:
prepare my current config (make some modification to my KM devices and key moves in IR) and then "merge or install" your current config with the extender modifications. You'll pretty much have to read the extender instructions on how to do this but it really isn't that hard just takes a little time to make everything work correctly I got my remote in some endless loops a few times, had to remove the batteries and redownload a new config and try again.

I hope this helps, let me know what else I can help you with.

crowfan · Post by **crowfan** » Thu Feb 23, 2006 9:47 pm

Thanks for your input. The only problem that I have is that there is no DiscreteON or DiscreteOFF keys for me to select. Is this something that I have to add in RM and then import into IR? The only ones that I have available in the drop-down lists are the default keys on the remote. Are these Phantom keys, or do I have to add them in RM?

Based on other things I've read here, these buttons SHOULD appear. But they don't. Are they just not available for this remote, or did I do something wrong?

{EDIT: I think they are just called "Phantom1, Phantom2, etc. for my remote. Is that right?}

Post by **The Robman** » Thu Feb 23, 2006 10:32 pm

The discrete and phantom buttons are not real buttons. Every remote supports a much larger range of button codes that just those which are used by the physical buttons, so we just randomly pick button codes that have not been used for real buttons and we call them "phantom" buttons. The discrete buttons are just phantom buttons with more purposeful names.

Therefore, you can substitute a phantom for a discrete and the process will work just the same. If you don't have enough phantoms for your remote, you can edit the RDF to add more.

Eglass · Post by **Eglass** » Fri Feb 24, 2006 7:53 am

I just pulled up IR (and RM) and selected the 8910 remote and Phantom1-3 are listed don't forget you can easily make these 3 into 9 by using shift and x-shift functions as well.

For the record I built my ToadTogs in IR and I have been using KM to build my device upgrades.
I started out with RM and then switched to KM, I'm really not sure why I really like the LAYOUT tab in RM gives a nice visual of which buttons are where I find myself looking at my actual remote when I am in KM trying to decide where to put functions I commonly use.

I have never edited an RDF file but it looks like you could simply rename the phantom1-3 if you want the names to be more meaning full.
Below are the lines from the rdf file for the 8910
Phantom1=$3D
Phantom2=$3E
Phantom3=$3F
Or from what Rob said it sounds like you can add new phantoms (or discretes) and I guess you just select a new hex code that is not already in use? Can you confirm this Rob?

johnsfine · Post by **johnsfine** » Fri Feb 24, 2006 8:15 am

Eglass wrote: don't forget you can easily make these 3 into 9 by using shift and x-shift functions as well.

Some RDF files enable x-shift, others don't.

Eglass wrote:it looks like you could simply rename the phantom1-3 if you want the names to be more meaning full.

Right.

Eglass wrote: Or from what Rob said it sounds like you can add new phantoms (or discretes) and I guess you just select a new hex code that is not already in use?

Maybe.

I haven't done much with RDF's that don't enable x-shift and/or RDF's that don't have lots of extra keycodes reserved for extender, so I'm not sure.

When you have x-shift and you have keycodes reserved for extender, things get very messy if you try to invent a phantom with keycode higher than 3F, and there probably aren't any codes unused from 01 to 3F. So then the answer would be "no" you can't add new phantoms.

Several models (I forget which) mess up when you try to use keycode 40. But if you're not using the extender nor x-shift, I think most models are fine with keycodes 41 through 7F. If so, you would have room for more phantoms than you could reasonably want.

When actually programming a remote (rather than just talking about it) I find phantom codes useless. I use shifted or x-shifted codes instead. There is no way I'm going to invent a user visible meaning for every shifted code, so there are plently left for use instead of phantoms. The advantage of using a shifted keys, is that it's easier to test things with shifted keys if your macros don't behave as expected.

crowfan · Post by **crowfan** » Fri Feb 24, 2006 4:45 pm

OK, here's where I'm at:

I have this programmed on my Spcl Prot Fns tab for Discrete On:

Device: TV
Key: Phantom2
Type: ToadTog [Misc 1800]
Toggle: 0
Condition: Force On
Already On Keys: Power
On/Off Keys: blank

Then I have this, for Discrete Off:

Device: TV
Key: Phantom3
Type: ToadTog [Misc 1800]
Toggle: 0
Condition: Force Off
Already Off Keys: Power
On/Off Keys: blank

I have that pair for my TV, another pair for my receiver, and one more pair for my DVD player.

Then I have macros set up which look like this:

DEV_TV
Phantom2
TV/Vid [this step and next select the right input]
5
DEV_AUD
Phantom2
2 [this step selects right input]
DEV_VCR [this is my TiVo]

That particular macro is what I run when I want to watch my TiVo. But here's the problem I have. Let's say I run that macro, and I'm watching my TiVo. Then I decide to watch a DVD. If I run the macro to watch a DVD (which looks exactly like the one above, except for the different inputs, and the steps that power on the DVD player), it will turn the TV and receiver off.

The power functions (the Phantom2 key presses) are not acting like discretes. They are still acting like toggles. What am I doing wrong?

johnsfine · Post by **johnsfine** » Fri Feb 24, 2006 5:01 pm

I haven't used ToadTogs since IR.exe was enhanced to show the ToadTogs readably, so maybe I'm misunderstanding something but ...

Believing the readable text, it looks like you have the actions reversed.

Discrete On says send the toggle if the device was already on.
Discrete Off says send the toggle if the device was already off.

They should each send the toggle only when the internal state is changing.

crowfan · Post by **crowfan** » Fri Feb 24, 2006 6:24 pm

I thought that looked strange myself, but those are the only options that I have on the screen (i.e., when I set the condition to Force On, the two choices below are Off/On and Already On).

Mark Pierson · Post by **Mark Pierson** » Fri Feb 24, 2006 7:01 pm

crowfan wrote:I thought that looked strange myself

For a "discrete ON" move POWER to the Off/On list and delete it from Already On. This will equate to "if the device is Already On, do nothing otherwise send POWER and set (force) the toggle state to ON".

crowfan · Post by **crowfan** » Fri Feb 24, 2006 7:23 pm

I thought I had tried that before, but I tried it again and it worked. Thanks for your help.

Now I have to tackle the pause feature and VPT functionality with the extender. I'm getting there.

crowfan · Post by **crowfan** » Fri Feb 24, 2006 8:15 pm

OK I have VPT functionality working but I am lost when it comes to the pause.

I have a pause programmed in using the protocol in the extender. But it's not pausing long enough, and it's set to the highest value (FF). I've read in other threads that the built-in pause protocol in the extender isn't that great, and that I should use a freestanding one. I've downloaded the pause.txt file from the Yahoo Special Protocols folder, but I'm not sure what to do with it now. I use RM.

Thanks!

Eglass · Post by **Eglass** » Fri Feb 24, 2006 9:50 pm

Sorry about that after looking back over my config what I posted was wrong (I have edited it and it's right now). I think there is a problem with IR not displaying the data correctly, I thought I was noticing that last night when I was typing up the post but figured it was just me.
It did it again tonight though too, it seems if you open one then hit cancel and open a different one the second one displays incorrectly, if you cancel that one and open it again it displays correctly. This is with version 6.15 of IR and Version 2.14 of DecodeIR.dll.

For the benefit of the others since Crowfan already has VPT working:
The VPT is pretty simple on the 15-2116 you just set it on the General Tab under the Other Settings: My Sys Vol Device: Audio (or what ever device you use) and the don't use the SET_VOL_KEY command anywhere unless you want to change from the default Volume device for some reason.

Glad to hear you are making progress Crowfan.