JP1 Remotes

[stangbat]

[vickyg2003]

I converted IRHELP.hlp to IRHELP.PDF, see if you can read chapter 4 in this mode.
http://www.hifi-remote.com/forums/dload.php?action=file&file_id=8629
I'll look forward to reading your wiki when its up.

[stangbat]

[vickyg2003]

Well it was a good exercise for me. I wanted to learn how to use Acrobat with those side indexes for a long time.

IRHelp was something that I started and never finished, since I lost momentum. Since posting that PDF I've been motivated to update IRHelp. I've taken Chapter 1 and converted it from the hodgepadge of notes into a coherant document and updated a bunch of stuff that has changed since I started.

I hope to have an update sometime this week.
_________________
Remember to provide feedback to let us know how the problem was solved and share your upgrades.

Tip: When creating an upgrade, always include ALL functions from the oem remote, even if you never plan on assigning them to a button. Complete function lists makes an upgrade more helpful to others.

[xnappo]

[The Robman]

All my other sites are on Go Daddy, this is the only site still on this old iPower server, I don't know if Go Daddy has wiki built in, but even if it doesn't, I doubt that it's that hard to set up.

The only reason that I haven't moved it yet is because I don't know how to copy the databases over. The iPower backup format is not compatible with Go Daddy, so I tried creating an SQL file but it didn't work.

If anyone would like to help, let me know. If I can get it done this month, it will save me another year of dual hosting fees.
_________________
Rob
www.hifi-remote.com
Please don't PM me with remote questions, post them in the forums so all the experts can help!

[eferz]

It is good that you all have considered opening up a Wiki for JP1. Personally, I think they're a great documentation tool for ever evolving projects and tools like the ones that you've all been working with here. However, instead of trying to host yourself on your own server. You might consider hosting from http://www.wikia.com/. That way you don't have to worry storing images on a separate site like imageshack, as we have to do for these forums.

I started putting together a wiki for the Slingbox at http://slingbox.wikia.com. It's pretty bare right now but I have rewritten Alan's "Guide to Custom Remote Controls" document as one of the articles. However, as I was transcribing it, I realized it has various amounts of information for several different tools. The information was inconsistent and varied from the esoteric to the generic.

While reading the guide, I started to think certain parts of the documentation wasn't as relevant to the process. Some parts would have been better served if it referred to different sections of separate documentation which was more specific to the tool. Then I started to think, I can make this guide more palatable if I took some sections out and referred to the JP1 documentation. However, I then come to understand why Alan wrote the documentation in that manner.

It appears the documentation for the many JP1 tools is contained within different niches of electronic documentation all over the site. From Windows .hlp files, to Adobe .PDFs, forum posts, and even private discussions. It would takes a lot of moxie for someone new to overcome challenges in finding the current and relevant information. So, I was going to start writing Wiki manuals for the different JP1 tools to serve as a foundation for Alan's guide. The idea is to lay the tool manuals as a foundation to better serve shorter project orientated how-to guides. Much similar to the wiki on Sorceforge which Greg recently put up for the recent implementations for RMIR.

Now that I realized you were toying with the idea but didn't know how to get it started. Maybe I can help you, help me. That way we can get the information in a single reference point, have it available to anybody with a web browser, and more importantly get the subject matter experts involved. I'd be wiling to donate my free time in order to get this going. After all, I was going to do it anyways.

It would be easy to get started. I would recommend someone to volunteer to be the wiki's overseer. That person should have a well rounded and have a diverse knowledge of the subject matter. Effectively they would be the one with the most ability to roll back or delete any changes of the wiki. From seeing the posts here, I think Rob would probably be best suited for this role. It ridiculously easy too, go to http://www.wikia.com click on the "create a wiki" pick a name, put some description, chose a layout theme, and *BAM* new wiki.

We can then have the subject matter experts come in an create the article primers. Also easy to do; perform a search in the wiki and opt to create an article and save it. For example, have Greg create an article called "Remote Master Manual". Then I could come in, write out an outline then slowly fill in the information. As the project evolves different people can add or subtract information. Then Greg would be the overseer for article, so he can review and modify the changes from the reports. Once we have the foundation in place, then project orientated articles could easily be written and the wiki can blossom.

The idea is to plant the seed and watch the community help it grow from a sprouting to huge tree with hundreds of branches enveloping the wealth of information related to JP1.

My 2 cents anyways.

[The Robman]

I have gone ahead and installed a wiki on this site, so it's all yours...
http://hifi-remote.com/wiki/
_________________
Rob
www.hifi-remote.com
Please don't PM me with remote questions, post them in the forums so all the experts can help!

[eferz]

[The Robman]

Thanks Earl, I just flipped the switch. Let me know if there are any other settings that need to be changed.
_________________
Rob
www.hifi-remote.com
Please don't PM me with remote questions, post them in the forums so all the experts can help!

[The Robman]

After an initial burst of activity by Earl (above), the wiki site has been dormant, but it still requires maintenance as the spambots keep vandalizing the site.

So, does anyone here intend to use it or should I shut it down?

Personally, I think it would be a good idea to copy all of our various beginner type documentation over there, just to have it on one place.

Thoughts?
_________________
Rob
www.hifi-remote.com
Please don't PM me with remote questions, post them in the forums so all the experts can help!

[vickyg2003]

I see you put a new wiki, icon at the top of the page. That might drive more than bot traffic there.

I do really like the look and feel that EARL got in his RM guide.

I don't understand the wiki idea. I understand its kind of a help document that can be created and edited by the members (or spammers). I know that some of the help documents are a bit out of date. I just don't understand how the wiki is improvement to the beginner's readme thread that we already have. Unless this can all be updated.

My problem with the beginner documents was there were so many of them, and there wasn't a beginning-to-end guide. So I wrote my little document that starts where I wanted to start, and it ended up being 108 pages and its just an overview! Its more or less, here's your remote, and this is what it can do out of the box. Here's how our tools can help. I haven't gotten into anything technical. I wrote this in HTML so that if I wanted I could add it to the wiki, but its so LONG, even if its divided up into chapters, and then there is still the problem of how to find what you are looking for. I'd like to move the souce back to word doc, so that I had better page control, but I'm still keeping it HTM, in case I go this way. With the PDF you can search all the chapters and you can have it read out loud to you, if you can get past KM being read as kilometers I have previously zipped it and stored it here in the file section but I have temporarily set it up on my website. IRHelp to see how it looks. Its my understanding though that the PDF format can't be read by our linux friends. Is that correct?
_________________
Remember to provide feedback to let us know how the problem was solved and share your upgrades.

Tip: When creating an upgrade, always include ALL functions from the oem remote, even if you never plan on assigning them to a button. Complete function lists makes an upgrade more helpful to others.

[The Robman]

The wiki would be helpful if we can get all of the documentation moved over there. I think the main problem that newbies have is knowing which docs to read, assuming they can find them in the first place.

I was just reading the Capn's Extender FAQ today, and that's a perfect example of something that could be ported over to the wiki.

Plus, in the future, as newbie's come along, rather than us asking them how the docs could be improved, they can just improve them themselves.
_________________
Rob
www.hifi-remote.com
Please don't PM me with remote questions, post them in the forums so all the experts can help!

[vickyg2003]

[Capn Trips]