JP1 Remotes

The Robman

I am trying to program a modified Sony DirecTivo remote for someone and I have loaded extender2. Everything seems to be working OK except for the SHIFT button. I left the default TV-POWER key as the shift key, and it works the first time, but that's it, it never works again.

I have since re-worked all the macros to be un-shifted and they work but I'd prefer to make them shifted again.

Can someone more familiar with extenders take a look at my file to see if I made any obvious mistakes.
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Rob
www.hifi-remote.com
Please don't PM me with remote questions, post them in the forums so all the experts can help!

Herbie · Joined: 02 Feb 2004 Posts: 81

Rob, I don't see anything erroneous at first glance.

I don't think its related it your problem, but one thing I see that's "unconventional" is the way you toggle the "other" keyset in the macro. It looks like you do an O_AUX so you can use the ThumbsUp (DiscreteOn?),1 sequence, and then switch tp O_TV for some further commands. I think this is fine, but it omits the potential use of the "temporary device selection" scheme in the macro.

Maybe there are reasons for the way you did it, but I tend to use the X_AUX type commands to temporarily select the device for those sort of short command strings. On the other hand, I tend to nest (or at least allow for nesting of) my macros, so a lot of my macros are written explicitly with the X_device and X_Cancel tags so that they can be called safely from within other macros. I only use the V_device and O_device tags when I want to actually transfer those keysets to user control.
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TiVo FREAK!
Brutalizing my 15-1994 since 2000, thanks to JP1
Now abusing a 6131m, 2116, and 2104 too!

Herbie · Joined: 02 Feb 2004 Posts: 81

Ahha, I think I've got it:

The TV-POWER button is only defined in the KM buttons list for some devices, sort of like how some keys on the 1994 aren't defined for all devices. (TVs don't get transport keys, etc.)

One of the device types that DOES NOT use the TV-POWER button is the SAT device, which it looks like all your devices are defined as.

So I'm guessing that as soon as you start running macros, you switch into the SAT device keymap and then the TV-POWER button is no longer available to that device.

Or at least, thats how KM sees it, maybe that's not actually the case and its just an error in KM.

Not really extender related, it looks like a quirk of that remote.
_________________
TiVo FREAK!
Brutalizing my 15-1994 since 2000, thanks to JP1
Now abusing a 6131m, 2116, and 2104 too!

The Robman · Posted: Wed Dec 01, 2004 2:49 pm Post subject:

Re: the X_ vs. O_ thing, I thought about that, but it didn't seem to make a difference which ones I used.

Re: the TV-POWER button. In the un-extended remote, this button would always punch through to the TV code, even when the remote was in SAT mode, but I'm not sure how this is supposed to work in the extended version. The TV/1800 "extender launcher" setup code doesn't have the POWER button defined, could this be the problem?

I'm not sure how I'm supposed to rectify the situation, do I need a keymove against TV/1800 programmed to the TV-POWER button in SAT mode or maybe a macro? I would have thought that this sort of thing would have been taken care of in the extender code itself (if possible).

I'm not sure how the SHIFT key is supposed to stay active here.
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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 · Posted: Thu Dec 02, 2004 11:40 pm Post subject:

No thoughts from the various extender experts?
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Rob
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Please don't PM me with remote questions, post them in the forums so all the experts can help!

mtakahar · Expert Joined: 03 Aug 2003 Posts: 281

Rob,

Sorry getting back to you this late. I've been on vacation.

I chose the volume keys (vol+/- and mute) for activation instead of the TV power key as in many other extenders. The TV/1800 "extender launcher" upgrade has these volume keys defined, and any of these keys do the same thing, just activates the extender. The shift key and the punch through features are completely controlled by the extender while it's active, and it doesn't matter how native remote's programming behaves with a press of the TV Power key.

One thing I can think of as an explanation for the first-time-only shift key symptom is that the remote getting reset when the macro associated to the shifted key is causing a crash somehow, deactivating the extender. Does it look like the case? You may want to create some key moves on some shifted keys using the pause protocol (TV/1104) and see if the shift key would work. (The extender version of the pause protocol blinks the LED as many times as the specified value in the Hex command, which makes easy to figure out whether intended upgrade/protocol is used.)

Hal

The Robman · Posted: Fri Dec 03, 2004 8:10 am Post subject:

The extender seems to be still active. Like I said, I ended up programming the macros to the un-shifted numeric buttons and they work just fine there. I can't do any further testing myself because the remote is already on it's way back to the owner, but if we do find a fix, I can send him an updated IR file.

Hal, if you're willing, could you try loading my IR file into your Sony remote and see if you get the same symptoms.

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

mtakahar · Expert Joined: 03 Aug 2003 Posts: 281

mtakahar · Expert Joined: 03 Aug 2003 Posts: 281

Rob,

The image you posted doesn't have the protocol $DE that is used by the Sony DVD (SAT/533) upgrade. Using shift-4 or shift-sat_power will cause the remote to reset. How did you determine that the extender was still working after the first use of the shift key?

Hal

The Robman · Posted: Sat Dec 04, 2004 11:03 am Post subject:

Sorry, the file I loaded is an out date file. I did notice that DE needed to be added and it's in the current image. Of course, I have changed all the macros to be un-shifted in the current image.

Sony_DTivo_Extender2.IR
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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 · Posted: Thu Dec 09, 2004 5:53 pm Post subject:

The user now has the remote that I modified for him, so we're ready to try any suggestions that anyone may have. I can believe how few responses this thread is getting as I thought there were many more extender experts than appears to be the case.
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Rob
www.hifi-remote.com
Please don't PM me with remote questions, post them in the forums so all the experts can help!

leres · Joined: 01 Jan 2005 Posts: 13 Location: Alameda, CA

I added a JP1 jumper to a RM-Y809 today. It has a stock 1K eeprom and works with the extender except for shift. I'd like to use TV/video as my shift key so I set the shift keycode to $26. I see the same problem Rob reports; shift only works the first time after booting the extender.

It would appear the extender boots up in TV mode; the TV input discretes I programmed work ok. My TV device is an upgrade that has a TV/video key but it not mapped (or else it would send the IR code). My SAT device is an upgrade for the HD DirecTiVo and my CBL device is a SD DirecTiVo (0639). Neither of these have TV/video keys.

I've also tried using TV_power as the shift key but my TV device is the only one that has that that key so of course it only works the first time as well.

Are we stuck picking a shift key that might not be mapped but must exist in all devices in use?

The extender documentation says that key moves are not allowed but device specific macros DSMs are. I'm not sure how they work; do you just put them in as a "key move" and they're like a macro except you can pick the device they're active in and you can only specify one button (EFC)? Or are keymoves ignored by the extender even if ir.exe puts them in the eeprom?

Which rdf files should we use? The ones that came with the 1.17 zipfile or the ones that come with the extender? I'm using the latter.

The Robman · Posted: Sat Jan 01, 2005 12:15 pm Post subject:

Just FYI, I replaced the 1k EEPROM with a 2k chip as part of the upgrade. I should also point out that we never resolved this issue and I was very disappointed by the lack of assistance provided.

We ended up sacrificing the numeric keys and programmed the macros to the un-shifted numeric keys.
_________________
Rob
www.hifi-remote.com
Please don't PM me with remote questions, post them in the forums so all the experts can help!

leres · Joined: 01 Jan 2005 Posts: 13 Location: Alameda, CA

I did some more testing today. Setting the shift key to right arrow (exists in all the keymaps) works. Of course, it has the effect of sending right arrow in the current device mode.

Then I tried using TV/video as the shift key. As before, it works the first time after booting the extender. But after a lot of dicking around I noticed that it works after the first time if you hit TV/video and the shifted macro button really quickly. I also tried the stock extender configuration with TV power (key code 1) as the shift key and the two DSMs that swap TV power and SAT power for the TV device. It has the same timing problem that TV/video has (you have to be quick to get shift to work).

I don't think there's supposed to be a timeout for shift (certainly there's not one when the shift key is right arrow) so I think this is just a bug with the extender.

Later I came up with ths hack; my input selection macros are on shifted numbers buttons, e.g. shift-2 for TiVo and shift-3 for CBL. So in any mode shift-2 goes to TiVo inputs and shift-3 goes to CBL inputs (but only if you get the timing right).

Then I made a DSM ("hex cmd" keymove) for shift-TV/video in TiVo mode that did the keycode for shift-3 and another one in CBL mode for shift-2.

So now, if I'm in TiVo mode, hitting TV/video twice (easier to do quickly than TV/video and 3) I switch to CBL mode. Hitting TV/video twice puts me back in TiVo mode. It basically turns TV/video into a TiVo/CBL toggle. A nice side effect is if you don't hit it fast enough, nothing bad happens since TV/video doesn't do anything in either of the two device modes.

But as soon as I got that working I came up with an even better idea.

First set shift to X_Cancel ($7F) to disable it. Next add a macro for TV/video that changes to AUX2 mode (O_AUX2) which is setup to be a SAT with code 0000 to disable it. Then create DSMs for the AUX2 device that map numbers to shifted numbers. For example, device AUX, button 2 maps to TV/1103, hex cmd $96 (shift-2).

To use it you enter TV/video and enter AUX2 mode. Then enter which maps to shift-2 and that macro sends your input IR codes and sets your device mode.

The main drawback I see with this is if you hit TV/video by mistake, you're stuck in AUX2 until you figure it out and hit a number key.

Still, this seems to be an acceptable workaround!

vasqued2 · Expert Joined: 03 Aug 2003 Posts: 67

First let me start out by saying I have neither the remote nor did I write the code. I see a couple things in the code that could be happening but without the remote I can't do any tests so I'll need you to do it.

First, the byte holding the shift could be getting overwritten by either the Extender itself or the ROM calls. I think this is highly unlikely given the same byte has been used to indicate shifting in every remote I've seen. I see nothing in the extender that would cause the problem, but that doesn't mean it isn't there.

Second, and more likely, the Shift is timing out and getting reset. There is code in the Extender to do this and I suspect that is what is happening. The problem is that I see no reason why it would behave any differently depending on which key is being used as Shift.

So, just to be clear, does the Shift key itself work correctly all of the time and the problem only occurs when another button is pressed, or does it happen all of the time?

Also, do you know how to recompile and reinstall the extender? If so, it will make my job easier. If not, we'll probably have to edit the hex file to try some things.

David