Messages

511

Installation issues / Re: Control DirecTV receiver via serial

« on: October 04, 2008, 01:46:32 am »

I'm sorry, perhaps I am just dense or something but this is not making much sense to me. It looks like the whole generic serial device thing is meant to only emulate button presses on a remote control, and that is not what I want here.
Is there really no way to just have it execute an external script anytime the channel needs changed, and pass that script just a single argument of the channel number? Thats all I need to get this working the same as it is right now with MythtTV.

512

Installation issues / Re: Control DirecTV receiver via serial

« on: October 03, 2008, 03:12:17 pm »

I had already read through that page, but it really didnt help me, perhaps because I know nothing of Ruby.
I dug through the perl script I am using to get an idea of exactly what it is doing, and it looks like it is forming a packet of 6 bytes. For instance to change to channel 244:
0xFA leading byte
0xA6 "change channel" command
0x00 channel high byte
0xF4 channel low byte
0xFF trailing byte
0xFF trailing byte
The sat box sends back a confirmation of this, but I am really not concerned with receiving events from it since it is always turned on anyway. I also dug up a page documenting this protocol, if interested http://www.dar.net/~andy/tivo/rca_dss_serial.html
How would I implement this in a generic serial device?

513

Installation issues / Control DirecTV receiver via serial

« on: October 03, 2008, 06:52:00 am »

I am working on switching to LMCE from my existing pure MythTV setup, but am not quite sure how to get LMCE to control my sat box. Currently MythTV calls an external perl script that simply accepts the channel number as its only option, and creates a data packet to send to the box over a connected serial cable. If the channel change succeeds, the script exits normally. If it fails, the script exits with an error.
The box is a RCA, model is D10-100 (yes, it is quite old. I passed on a free upgrade recently because I really like the serial control). I was unable to find an existing template for this system. I did poke around in the generic serial device, but it really doesnt make sense to me (and I am a programmer by trade). Is there some option I am overlooking in LMCE, or do I just set it up directly in MythTV like I have it in my current setup?