Well Joacim, she should be thanking me instead... This way you won't be holding the pronto all the time while watching a movie with her like most other users do:)
to get serious, I would like to remind you some other possibilities: phone control and remote pc control.
checkout this thread:
[Link: remotecentral.com]
I have actually used a friend's pronto to control mine from his house...

What a killer argument.. :)

Yes, I read the thread earlier. I don't think I'll have so much use for Remote controlling my Pronto connected comupter thru another computer, if you know what I mean.. ;)

Eventually, when I get the voice control setup, the way I want it, I will be looking in to controlling the pronto by phone. "Press 1 so start recording.. Press 2 to stop current recording" etc... I think that would be of much greater use, to me at least.


This voice control thing is getting a bit out of hand, according to my friends a family anyway. A genious is rarely appreciated in his own time, right? ;)

When you (George) first gave me this idea, my intent were to use my workmachine (IBM Thinkpad 770) to handle the voice control. But after a few hours of struggling I discovered that you can't use an ordinary microphone to do the job, because of the way the hardware connection is set up. There's a way round this but troubles gave me a new idea of a more permanent, and better(?), installation...

I have an old Pentium 200MMX witch I will use for this purpose instead. My intent is to have a custom made box for this computer. What's good with the laptop is it's low noise level, compared to my stationary computer. So I think that by removing all unnecessary equipment, like videocard, soundcard etc etc, I should be able to make it almost quiet. The ultimate solution would be to place it in a sealed "DeskPro"-like box, expermints will tell if that will be possible.

I bet your wondering:"What if you make modifications to your pronto layout?"
Well, I'm already in the process of creating macros that will handle potential updates to the layout/functionality of the pronto. Transfer of files from computers will be handled by a program called StarGate, that will be running at all times. I'm also going to install PCAnywhere on it so I'll be able to remote tune the computer if anything goes wrong. Scheduled restarts of the hardware is also handled thru macros.

I think I have all bases covered.


In retrospect I MIGHT agree that I've gone a bit overboard with this idea, but I think it's kind of cool and I'm interested to see how far I can take it...


Next project will be to control the VCR thru a phone, schedule taping, start, stop etc.


Regards!

Joacim Boive

Man, I luv you guys. I have had my RC500 for approx 5 weeks and was getting to the point where I had tweaked my design to the limit. Now you've opened up a whole new realm of fun and games, Kee up the good work fella's. Lee.

Is there a way to make this work on Virtual PC? I can't get the microphone to be recognized...

This is along the lines of remotely controlling your pronto from another computer.....

I have this small (and free) utility called WinVNC that allows me to control my desktop over a network or across the internet. It comes with a small client program that I can run and connect to my machine to control, but it also is a small web server that runs a java script for control. I also have a name on dyndns.org (a free dynamic dns service) so from any webbrowser anywhere I can go to [Link: myname.dyndns.org] and supply my password and a java script runs with my desktop, any mouse movement or key strokes are like i'm sitting at my computer.

And if you run the emulator it's simple to remotely control your pronto, you could even run pronto edit and customize it some more while away from home.

Over a modem it's a little slow since it draws your entire desktop, but if you have a home network then you now have control from anywhere in the house, and it's pretty fast.

Just some thoughts,
Nick

[Link: uk.research.att.com]

While I agree with the idea of being able to control your A/V setup through a web page (see my site at http://www.geekster.com for what I've done already), the Pronto is one WAY expensive PC->IR interface! I think there used to be a One For All remote with a serial cable, don't know if there are any others now that One For All tanked, but it seems like such a simple curcuit to build to take commands from a serial port and convert them to IR...

Steve

Its worth pointing out that vnc is a multi platform program, I even spotted a version for my Psion Series 5 palmtop but was afraid to download it ;)

Laurie

I've been thinking about voice control lately and I don't think -- in the long run -- it would ever functionally replace buttons. In the middle of a movie, are you going to keep saying "volume up", "volume down"? I can see it for basically macro and simple tasks -- "turn system on", "play movie", etc., but it would complement plain old hand control, not replace.

The thing that I believe will make voice control truly effective will be a wireless microphone you wear. It'll have to be almost invisible and weigh nothing. It might actually be "implanted" in you, and use your body itself as the broadcast antenna. It could tap a vein and be powered by a little "hydraulic" generator that spins as blood passes thru it.

My whole point is that you'd want to be very discrete with your voice. Instead of needing to shout to be heard over your theater sounds, you could just whisper. It could be soft enough that no one else in the room could hear you, but your internal microphone would pick it up. No one will want to have to wear or hold a mike any more than we want to have to hold onto out prontos. No one will want to have to hunt for the mike as it will occasinally get lost like your remotes do. Thus an implanted mike is probably our destiny if any form of voice control is to become prevelant.

My two cents.

Dave

Just think of Star Trek (of course it's a window into our future...) -- when by yourself or you're doing "group" commands, by voice. But have you noticed when they want to actually get some work done they sit at a console or use a PADD? :-)

My wife has always had voice control for the RC5000. Every time she says "turn the volume down! or "stop changing channels" I do. (joke)

Marc

Just out of curiosity, how reliable are the programs that you guys are using? I am using VoiceAssist which came with my creative soundcard. This program works decently, but it has a hard time picking up commands if there is noise in the room (i.e. music, movie sounds). Turn down the sound would be the obvious answer, but that is what I want the pronto to do. I was just curious as to the reliability of the other programs. By the way, VoiceAssist is quite simple because you do not have to deal with the whole web page business and it has a built in macro editor.

I use a wireless neck tie mike clipped on my couch, with the receiver hooked to the sound card. Never misses a command...

What is the name/brand of the microphone?

Question: If you had an answering machine and put the mic by it, could you control your Pronto by the mic picking up your voice being recorded on the answering machine? You would need an answering machine without a set message record length. How close does your voice have to match your "learned" commands? You could also password protect access with a phrase.