Hi,
I have an Asus PPC with 4 hard buttons + arrows (U/D/L/R/ok)

I just started a configuration from scratch for a receiver, a dvd player, a cable box.
(And I dont (want to) use cff files).

I wish to set volume up/down and channel +/- on the 4 hard buttons whatever the current selected device is (means volume always to be sent to the receiver and channel+/- always sent to the cable box)

Is that possible ? (on the menu "setup hard buttons", i just can't select volume if the current device is the dvd recorder not the cable box :-(

Thank's for your help.
Tanguy, Paris, France.

Cool. Why? Don't get me wrong, I still think that Total Remote's native mode is easier to deal with than CCF mode, but I am always curious to hear why someone does not wish to use CCFs.


The concept is often referred to as "punch-thru", but tragically Total Remote does not currently support a universal punch-thru function. This can be worked around, but not super elegantly. I assume here that you want to control a receiver's volume regardless of what other device you are controlling. My example will cite a receiver and a DVD player.

Make a custom DVD skin. The big trick here is we can define all sorts of cool and non-obvious functionality when making custom skins. Use the standard mask colors of "volume up" and "volume down" for the receiver; do NOT use these for the DVD player, even if the DVD player does have it's own volume control. For the DVD player, create up/down buttons using some of the undefined mask colors. You can make the receiver's volume controls visible on the skin by defining button up/down states for each button, or you can make what I call "invisible targets" that are made of JUST a mask and no button up/down image. Place these in some apparently empty space somewhere on your custom skin; as an example take a look at the standard DVD skin that comes with Total Remote, and notice that there is some empty space around the central navigation pad. It isn't too hard to see how you could squeeze a couple of masks in those areas to create buttons that could not be seen but could be triggered. Once you have made your skin with the receiver's controls using the standard mask colors for vol+/- (but no visible buttons) and your DVD vol+/- control using undefined mask colors AND plainly visible buttons, you can assign codes to them. Get both OEM remotes, enter learning mode, learn all the codes from your DVD player remote that you need to complete your custom layout, then learn the vol+/- commands from your receiver remote onto the invisible buttons you made. Remember, just because the masked area lacks a visible button up/down state doesn't mean squat; button images do not define the button, the mask does. You can click on "invisible" buttons just like any button, but you will not see ANY indication of it on the PPC. That is why you must know the exact placement of the mask, since you will be "clicking blind". No one else, not even an experienced user, will be able to tell where the invisible buttons are without looking at the skin file itself.

BTW, a simple way of doing this on skins that already have a volume control (such as the TV skin) is to take the standard skin, add two invisible buttons with the standard vol+/- mask colors, and change the existing volume control to use other mask colors.

What does all this do? By using the standard vol+/- masks you can control then from the hardware buttons (by default it is the D-pad's left and right controls), and by using something OTHER than the standard vol+/- colors you can still define volume controls that can be accessed on-screen for those (assumedly) few times you will ever need them.

Last thought: a REALLY damn easy way of doing most of this would be to simply overwrite the existing volume controls with the ones from your receiver. If you have a TV device/skin that is completely programmed, you can use learning mode to overwrite the volume buttons with the codes from your receiver's remote. Of course this means you cannot control the TV anymore, but most people with a home entertainment or home theater system usually route all audio through a home stereo anyway, so you may never ever need the volume controls for your TV, and not mind giving them up.

Damn, that was a LONG tutorial. I better save that for the manual. :)


--Don, Pixel-pushing pontificator of the PPC remote

Hi and thanks for such a long a precise reply
I will read it carefully before asking more questions.
(but i'm affraid i'll have some more anyway :-)


The main answer is : I have a Macintosh and I love to work with it.
The second answer is : I also have a PC, but I use it as less as possible (so I dont want to use pronto edit to make cff files)
And, at last, i'm not shure cff files support millions of colors, do they ?


I'm used of work arrounds, i'm a developper too ;-)

Thank's again.

Roland.

***

P.S. I spent a lot of time to sort the palette.png by categories (functions, letters, digits, colors, and so on, so. So if anybody is interessed (even you Don :-) just drop me a mail, i'll send you the file by return (as .png or/and .psd file)

I have no problem with users asking thoughtful questions! :)


Do you use Pocket Mac? I have never heard from anyone who is using it, but it looks interesting. Also, be aware that being on a Mac does not preclude editing a CCF; you can use Tonto, which as I recall is written in Java and should work on any modern computer. You can easily find it here.


Not that I am aware of, although I suspect you could use a CCF editor to put a 24bit image in that would not display optimally on an old Pronto but might render perfectly on a PDA.


GIVE!!!! MUST HAVE!!!! :)

Drop a note to the guys in the beta program and they will make sure it gets to me: trbeta_at_griffintechnology_dotcom. I look forward to it! If it is really useful, can I have your premission to include it with the standard Total Remote skin docs?


--Don

Mr. Stratton, i just bought a copy of total remote and think it is great. I have been working with it for three straight days. i sent and email to the support team, got an answer which said i would love the program but did not answer my questions. your answers in this forum are the reasons i bought the program. it is great. i need to know how to assign functions to the hard buttons on my toshiba pda(by the way the toshiba e335 controls my equipment from 20 to 30 feet away without any help. the other thing that is happening is that when i put the tivo codes in they seem to double. is there anything i can do about this. my email is [email protected]. thanks Joe

First, start with page 6 of the Total Remote manual which discusses rudimentary setup of hardware buttons.

Read it? Great. Let me elaborate.

The hardware buttons functions are limited by the particular kind of device you are working with. The buttons can only be assigned commands from a preset list, and this list varies depending on the device. For example, VCR devices can assign functions like fast-forward and rewind, while TV devices would not have those options but would likely have options not found on a VCR.

The button assignment itself is based on using a skin that adheres to the standard mask pallete, so that when you select "volume +" in the list of hardware button options it will trigger the volume + button/mask in your skin. This obviously works for all the standard skins, but if you have custom skins that do not follow the standard skin design guidelines and use non-standard mask colors the hardware buttons will not work.

Please note this sucks. My bad. Sorry. You can't make software perfect the first time. :)

v3.0 will include two decent variations of this; you will be able to learn an IR command to any hardware button (independant of any other configuration, overriding any previously set behavior) and you will be able to "symbolically link" hardware buttons with on-screen buttons, which will completely eliminate both the limitation of functions and the reliance on standard mask colors.


I find that I can cure this by learning the remote using an abnormally short or abnormally long keypress when learning. Sometimes I have found devices that only need a "normal" press of their own remote control's button to achive the desired effect, but when I learn the command using a "normal" keypress I can either get no signal/sporadic signal or doubles and triples (sort of opposite problems, yet very related). Try it both ways; sampling with an extra-short tap of the keys and with an extra-long hold of the keys and see what your device likes best. One-shot learning is great for this kind of experimentation, since you can test the button right away.

BTW, the method of using One-shot to rapidly test learned codes was not stupid, but is non-optimal, so in v3.0 there will be a button right on the learning screen so can can try it INSTANTLY and continue tweaking if needed.

Hope this helps.


--Don, Master Of Writing More Documentation On RC.com Than In Our Own Manual

Don Thanks for all your help. i am sorry i did not look at all the posts before i asked the question about the tivo again. the other question is my last one for now. I really will try to learn this program. of all the ones i have tried this one is the best. Joe

Hi,
Don, I just sent it by email; If Anyone else wants it, just ask me by email : roland_at_rolandtanguy_dot_net.
(and You may use it in the doc if you find it usefull of course !)

***

I need a clarification about hardware buttons.
Masks and standard color are clear for me, but what makes (for example) Vol+/Vol- to be present in the hardware buttons assigment popup menu ?

Is it because this function is "logical" for a specific kind of device (TV/Receiver) and this kind of device is the current one...
OR
is it because there are standard buttons vol+/vol- (visible or invisible) with standard color mask for those actions, designed in the current template ?

Thanks for your help.

Thanks for the sorted palette! I will be including it in a revision to the skin docs soon.


Both, and neither. The possible functions of the hardware buttons are hard-coded into the app. We arbitrarily decided on some functions for each device type. There is absolutely no way for a user to specify a new function for the hardware buttons. This will be revised by the time we release v3.0 so that various types of symbolic association will be possible.


--Don