RMIR: Prototype IR function in RM

[vickyg2003]

Oh and one last thing, I will add my vote along with Alan that there still needs to be a direct link to a stand alone RM, without the need to go through RMIR first. There are many of us, myself included, that deal with upgrades far more often than we deal with remotes, so I find myself using KM and RM far more than I use IR.exe, with the exception being when someone gives me an IR file of learns that I need to convert into an upgrade. Alan does similar work, which is why he's in the same boat.

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Ditto that here. I'm in and out of RM all day long. I use IR a lot too, to check my protocols, but the way RMIR is going, I will not be able to use it fjor an IR replacement, so I really would like to have a shortcut that gets me directly into RM.

[mathdon]

This trying to import and decipher a device upgrade from a download, is so overly complicated. I really don't understand why we are even trying to do it. Its just so confusing!

So that you can edit the device, while IR.exe only allows you to view it. Isn't that an improvement rather than a source of confusion?

[xnappo]

Chris, isn't it a reasonable compromise to say, go ahead and do all the cool development that you're doing, just don't take away any of the features that we have today?

No, that is not unreasonable. I have never said that we shouldn't add a save-able 'show keymoves from upgrades' at least as a stop-gap since as you mentioned it should be easy. In fact I stated many many times last weekend that Greg has accepted the bug request from Capn to do that.

I have only said that Greg wants brainstorming on other ways to accomplish the same thing and wants to fully understand the way people use the tools.

We can have many ways to view things in RM-IR.

xnappo

[xnappo]

This trying to import and decipher a device upgrade from a download, is so overly complicated. I really don't understand why we are even trying to do it. Its just so confusing!

So that you can edit the device, while IR.exe only allows you to view it. Isn't that an improvement rather than a source of confusion?

I am not very organized, so the nice thing for me is when I edit a remote I haven't used in a while, I don't have to try to remember what version of an upgrade I used.

xnappo

[vickyg2003]

This trying to import and decipher a device upgrade from a download, is so overly complicated. I really don't understand why we are even trying to do it. Its just so confusing!

So that you can edit the device, while IR.exe only allows you to view it. Isn't that an improvement rather than a source of confusion?

No, not with all the clicking and page changing I have have to do in RMIR, IR is so much easier, and then I can see what I've got without a 5 to 10 more clicks and page changes. I have a limited attention span, and RMIR really is beyond my ability to even want to find things. RMIR is so much harder to manage. But that's just me.


I know that this is just a preview, but its not what I want. I am a heavy RM user, and will continue to because its easier for me than KM is. I'm a heavy IR user, and with RMIR being so difficult to use for system level control of the remote, I don't think I'll be switching. I can always look at other peoples remotes with out going through RMIR by editing the RMIR to be just the image. I think looking at an IR image without any comments, would be easier than all the page changes that you need to do to find the hidden information you've got in RMIR. But that's just me.

[xnappo]

No, not with all the clicking and page changing I have have to do in RMIR, IR is so much easier, and then I can see what I've got without a 5 to 10 more clicks and page changes. I have a limited attention span, and RMIR really is beyond my ability to even want to find things. RMIR is so much harder to manage. But that's just me.

Vicki, I am trying to understand what you are talking about here. Are you talking about not being able to see a quick summary of the upgrade from the 'Devices' tab?

I think that would tie in to Elizabeth's request and I agree. In RM-IR it is easier to build and maintain the remote since it is all in one app.

HOWEVER I agree it is harder to get a summary of what is in the remote when you are done. This ties into the displaying of keymoves, upgrades etc.

xnappo

[vickyg2003]

No, not with all the clicking and page changing I have have to do in RMIR, IR is so much easier, and then I can see what I've got without a 5 to 10 more clicks and page changes. I have a limited attention span, and RMIR really is beyond my ability to even want to find things. RMIR is so much harder to manage. But that's just me.

Vicki, I am trying to understand what you are talking about here. Are you talking about not being able to see a quick summary of the upgrade from the 'Devices' tab?

I think that would tie in to Elizabeth's request and I agree. In RM-IR it is easier to build and maintain the remote since it is all in one app.

HOWEVER I agree it is harder to get a summary of what is in the remote when you are done. This ties into the displaying of keymoves, upgrades etc.

xnappo

Well one of the things that I look at all the time, in IR, is the hex assigned to the button. Neither KM nor RM, nor RMIR show that information, only IR does that.

To find that information out of RMIR, I need to open device, write down the exact name of the function that is assigned to the key, then switch back to the function page, and make sure that the function is spelled right, and there is only one and then read the hex.

And then there is the ability to paste in an upgrade. I can't tell you how many times I am comparing KM to RM to see where a problem lies. Quite often RM doesn't process a KM upgrade correctly. Greg always fixes these problems quickly, but there is no way to paste this stuff into KM.

It will be interesting to see how protocol upgrades are going to be handled.

[Capn Trips]

I appreciate that my request is "accepted" but it's been there for quite a while and has not actually been implemented. Based upon the furore (like my British spelling?) about this, perhaps it could move up on the priority list?

And it's not just "displaying" keymoves and protocol upgrades. It's also "disassociating" them, in case one wants to keep or edit keymoves or protocols whilst deleting an upgrade.

If you implement this, then I predict that you'll get more of the traditional "experts" on this forum using RMIR routinely, and subsequently, get better ideas for future development. (imho)

The reason it hasn't been worked on is simply that it is a big change, and not something I can undertake when I have only a couple of hours to work on each week.

As for brainstorming other ways, I HEARTILY support Dave's "RM-layout-page" like opening page for RMIR. Of course it's non-trivial to determine what accompanying panel ought to be displayed when various buttons are clicked/highlighted, so it'll take some thinking, but I think that would be the next quantum leap in RMIR usability.

It is an interesting idea. There are also a lot of details to work out.

also support direct launch of RM, as frequently one manipulates upgrades for other reasons and does not need the tedium of navigating through RMIR just to get there.

Already restored.

Darn it, I meant to quote this post, but edited it instead. Sorry about that. - Greg

[vickyg2003]

And it's not just "displaying" keymoves and protocol upgrades. It's also "disassociating" them, in case one wants to keep or edit keymoves or protocols whilst deleting an upgrade.

DITTO that as well.

I routinely add a device, and then delete the device to get the "keymoves only" since the device is already built in.

Another Bug
If I edit the device and change the type/device number, I don't get the "do you want to associate the device with a device button message, even if there are keymoves". I don't know if it properly changes the keymoves since I can't see them. But oh well what does that matter!

[xnappo]

Capn - I agree with everything you said.

Hopefully Greg will too

xnappo

[vickyg2003]

Another Bug
If I edit the device and change the type/device number, I don't get the "do you want to associate the device with a device button message, even if there are keymoves". I don't know if it properly changes the keymoves since I can't see them. But oh well what does that matter!

Its a bigger bug than I thought. Editing the device type and device number, doesn't actually effect the device. RMIR says I have TV/0001 but the upgrade is actually DVD/1227 and all of the reported keymoves don't exist.

[mathdon]

We are listening. Here's a new version of the Devices tab. The file is one from Liz with an added device, one with the Denon-K protocol. You will see that the Panasonic Combo and Denon-K protocols are both correctly identified, despite both being variant 2 of PID 00 CD. The addition was made in IR.exe and the resulting .ir file opened in RMIR, so the Devices data is constructed entirely from the remote's binary image.



So my message to everyone is: don't give up on RMIR yet.

[The Robman]

I see the Denon-K upgrade was made using RM, is that why Denon-K was picked over Panasonic, or is RMIR using the fixed data to distinguish them?

[Capn Trips]

By the way, is anybody actually using the feature request and bug report features at sourceforge to document all of these ideas? I try to do the ones I identify, but I seem to be the only one.

(I sort of arbitrarily assign priorities to them as well, since there is nobody there to overrule me, but the "prioritization" appears to have little effect on selection of sequence for development/implementation)

[vickyg2003]

By the way, is anybody actually using the feature request and bug report features at sourceforge to document all of these ideas? I try to do the ones I identify, but I seem to be the only one.

Have no idea where it is, nor how to use it.