Topics

1

Developers / MPD integration

« on: January 06, 2014, 11:14:43 am »

Hello.

I've been after integrating spotify into linuxmce for ages, even trying to write a full dce/ spotify component (failed miserably).

I've come across an MPD implementation -> http://www.mopidy.com/  that gives an MPD interface to spotify, soundcloud, icecast etc and also local files as per normal.

I've got it all set up on my 10.04 core (it was a royal PITA with its old version of python, but I got it running eventually), and it's now lovely, I can use any MPD client to control and query spotify streaming music, alongside local files.

I'm wondering if anyone has considered MPD at all for a more general integration?   Seems like it might be a good thing to delegate music handling too, especially something plugin based like mopidy that would allow leveraging all the work they've put in.

Maybe, a mopidy server per user for them to control that can then be streamed out tom the various EAs?   dunno.

David.

2

Users / IR trans

« on: January 14, 2013, 02:24:58 pm »

Hey, just wondering if anyone had any experience using an IR Trans IR blaster/ receiver?

I got one as it seemed to be specifically supported by LMCE, but the learning function doesn't seem to work.

My TV doesn't seem to have well publicised IR codes (samsung UE40ES6300).

Ideally I could get this to learn IR codes, think thats possible?

Cheers,

David

3

Users / Recommendations for plug and play screens/ tvs/ monitors

« on: January 14, 2013, 12:43:29 pm »

Yo,

I was wondering if anyone had any recommended screens (monitor, TV, whatever) to use.  around the 38 inch mark, full HD.  Something that can be plugged into an MD and then everything works automatically....
I've had a look through the wiki, but I've not seen anything.  If I've missed the page, I'd be grateful for a link :-)

Cheers,

David.

4

Users / Ortek MCE alike remote

« on: April 30, 2012, 01:25:42 am »

Howdy.

I bought a remote from maplin the other day and wasn't watching too closely. So I ended up with a maplin branded 'Vista MCE Remote' that is actually an Ortek VRC-1100 in drag.
Rather than return it, I thought I'd try to get the thing working with LMCE.

Following instructions found here --> http://wiki.xbmc.org/index.php?title=HOW-TO:Configure_VRC-1100_remote_for_Ubuntu
I've got commands coming through in irw from the remote nicely, although the update was a little invasive (adding udev rules, installing inputlirc)

However, actually getting the wee beastie to control the orbiter on the core is another matter.  I've tried various things, but nothing seems to have any particular effect, so I'm at a loss where to properly start..

Also, a 'USB Game Pad Remote' is being continually installed. and re-installed with a few minutes if I remove it, anything to do with this?

David

5

Developers / Spotify device

« on: February 06, 2012, 11:00:21 am »

Howdy.

So, following on from my foray into qOrbiter, I'd like to have a crack at a DCE device proper.   As I've wittered on at length about on the dev IRC, I'd like to make a device that can play spotify stream music and control it via qorbiter.

Before embarking on a coding adventure (some time later this month or likely in March), I'm gathering some information on what approaches to take. So, a few questions if anyone has an idea.

Spotify is based on user accounts.  I'd like to be able to have multiple devices to play differnt music in different areas, but that requires more than one spotify account. We have 2 accounrs, one for me and one for my wife.  So that fits into a device per user model, but I'm not sure if thats the best model.  You can't have a single user account in use by more than 1 device at a time.

My questions :-

• Where should this device live (core, media director), and should I have it being a device per user account?
  
• Might there be a way to have the device on the core, and expose the audio as a network stream?  If this is possible, it'd be cool, as then non media directors could tap into the stream, and stream could be played over multiple zones from the same device.
• Is there a preferred mechanism to output sound (eg, alsa, phonon etc)?  (although some networked solution does seem preferable...)
  
• This is going to need a UI in the orbiter.  I've no real interest in adding to the current orbiter, only qorbiter.  Given that, whats the outline of the process to add a totally new set of screens? small single numbers thereof. (feel free to RTFM me on this if there's an entry somewhere I haven't found yet)

So, any ideas welcome.

David.

6

Users / Insteon versus XX for lighting.

« on: November 25, 2011, 12:34:26 pm »

Hiya,

I'm looking to do some lighting automation.

Which system would be recommended for best integration with lmce?   
I've seen people pushing insteon online as a better alternative to X10, but then there's the others around.

I'm in the UK, looking for  :-

• Cheap
• On/ Off plus dimming
• Mains lights
• Socketed lights (table lamps and the like)

Also, does anyone know of automated switches/ solutions that can power down an entire ring main?

I ask as I'm interested in putting the core on its own line off the meter and then be able to power up/ down the whole house remotely.

Sound feasible?

David.

7

Developers / qOrbiter build

« on: November 22, 2011, 12:51:05 am »

Hello.

I'm trying to get a clean build for the qOrbiter using qt creator.

I'm pretty sure I'm doing something silly, my C++ is not great.

I'm on 64 bit ubuntu 11.10.  I've downloaded the latest source (following the wiki page), generated the device and set up QT Creator as in the wiki.

I've selected the 'for_desktop' config.
I've tried with QT (64 bit shipped with QT Creator) 4.7.4 and 4.8.0 with the same result.

On build/ Run, I then get a compile error in DataGrid.cpp.

../../DCE/DataGrid.cpp: In constructor ‘DCE::DataGridTable::DataGridTable()’:
../../DCE/DataGrid.cpp:336:26: error: cannot call constructor ‘DCE::Message::Message’ directly [-fpermissive]
../../DCE/DataGrid.cpp:336:26: error:   for a function-style cast, remove the redundant ‘::Message’ [-fpermissive]
make: *** [DataGrid.o] Error 1

Commenting that line lets me proceed a little further, whereupon I get :-

/usr/bin/ld: qorbitermanager.o: undefined reference to symbol 'QAbstractSocket::isValid() const'
make: Leaving directory `/home/david/Development/Source/opensource/linuxmce1004/src/qOrbiter/build-output'
/usr/bin/ld: note: 'QAbstractSocket::isValid() const' is defined in DSO /home/david/Apps/QtSDK/Desktop/Qt/4.8.0/gcc/lib/libQtNetwork.so.4 so try adding it to the linker command line
/home/david/Apps/QtSDK/Desktop/Qt/4.8.0/gcc/lib/libQtNetwork.so.4: could not read symbols: Invalid operation
collect2: ld returned 1 exit status
make: *** [qOrbiter] Error 1
The process "/usr/bin/make" exited with code 2.
Error while building project qOrbiter_src (target: Desktop)
When executing build step 'Make'

Any ideas?

If its the 64bitness, I might have to investigate running 32bit versions of the qt libs.

Cheers,

David.

8

Wiki / Link Spamming warning

« on: November 11, 2011, 12:31:35 pm »

Hello.

I've been installing a core into virtual box and I thought I'd include updated network settings based on my (seemingly successful) configuration in virtual box on the wiki page.

I've tried updating the page, however it keeps on telling me that I'm link spamming and to contact an admin.

So here I am!

David.

9

Developers / Orbiter UI Elements/ HA Designer

« on: November 11, 2011, 12:01:30 am »

Hiya,

I see the comprehensive series of screen casts for creating new bits of Orbiter UI.

I was wondering, will they still be valid for the qOrbiter when its finished (looking very slick now..)?

Sorry if this is a silly question, just checking that the underlying data is being altered at all.

Cheers,

David.

10

Feature requests & roadmap / KDE Integration

« on: February 04, 2010, 12:57:31 pm »

Way back when, there was a lot of talk and a little publicity about LinuxMCE somehow becoming integrated into KDE.  I can see that this hasn't been pushed much since. 
Does anyone remember what the plan/ reasoning was behind the ideas?  Is it still valid in some way?

Should we try to resurrect it?

Cheers,

David.

11

Developers / Java DCE Implementation

« on: January 31, 2010, 01:42:39 am »

Hello linux mce peeps.

I have been beavering away for the last week or so on an implementation of the DCE protocol in Java.

I now have a version mostly ready(possibly), so I thought I would present it for review.

The basic reading of the binary stream is derived from the TivoOrbiter code in svn, and the docs on the subject in the wiki.

I have developed a library that is intended to be usable on both JavaSE and Java ME (MIDP 2.0 via network sockets, not bluetooth).

In order to do this, without hobbling the api to java 1.3 and the ME subset, I've developed the core library in java 1.3 (and ME subset), and then created 2 'profiles' (I'm a java dav, gotta follow sun on this . .) SE and ME.

So I have 3 jar files :-
 jdce-core.jar
 jdce-me.jar
 jdce-se.jar

The 2 profiles provide the API for the device programmer, the core library does the heavy lifting, and is shared.  The 2 versions of the API are very similar, but the SE one uses generics, the collections framework and enums, the ME one . . doesn't.

To get a hold of this library, since this is targeted at developers only, you must check it out of sourceforge subversion.

svn co https://javadce.svn.sourceforge.net/svnroot/javadce/trunk jdce

Within the jdce directory you will find the 3 libraries, 2 example devices (one SE, one ME) and an ant build file.

To compile all the libs and devices run ant (see below to get J2ME compilation working)

Examine the device source code for usage, feel free to dig into the library source as well.

This is all quite lightly tested, and likely won't work(see the magic numbers below)  It is not release quality, please don't view it as anything more than highly experimental code.

Please note that this is not, and will not be included with the LinuxMCE 8.10 release. it may (going off brief conversations with the devs) be possible to includ it with future versions of LMCE if it is shown to be popular enough and above all stable. So by all means send me bug reports and ideas for improvements.

Please don't hassle the regular devs with this, they don't know anything about it, and won't be able to help you.

Before you submit a bug report about the 'magic' numbers everywhere, I haven't yet implemented scraping the DB for the reference information (a la sql2cpp). I will be doing this as a priority and integrating it into the ant build.  At present, this means that command/ event id's, parameter id's etc are hard coded into the source, and are from my system.  They may well be the same as on yours, they likely won't (as I've made some new commands etc for the bit torrent device).

I'm not trying to re-implement any part of LinuxMCE, only extend the potential reach of the system into Java land, and allow new parts of the system to be developed by all those Java programmers out there.

Have fun, lemme know if any one is interested.

David.

Bugs
Bug reports go to me, not to the LinuxMCE trac; you can put them on sourceforge (https://sourceforge.net/projects/javadce), if you like.

J2ME SDK
You need to have some j2me development kit installed to compile jdce-me and the example J2ME device.  I use the sub WTK2.5.2 (from Sun). The compilation tool I've used (antenna), seems to support most of the others automatically, however you do need to set a property (wtk.home) in the build files (core, me, ExampleDevice) to reflect your installation.

Android
After a, very, brief look into the android sdk I believe that all the classes I have used are within the standard android library, apart from the odd apache commons class I have used.  I haven't tested this, I'm not an android dev, however I will be more than happy to make amendments to support this on android.

12

Developers / Message Protocol

« on: January 19, 2010, 01:59:50 pm »

Hi Guys.

I played around with linuxmce a whiiillle ago, but got sidetracked by life a bit (babies etc).

I've been ghosting the boards for a few weeks to get a feel of the way things have progressed, and I'm quite impressed.  Apart from the odd bit of name calling (fun!), development seems to be moving on apace.

I'm a java dev, and I haven't really got the time to invest in learning to code C++ particularly well.  Following on from that, I'm interested in making a first class java based DCE device (probably a DCE/ JMS bridge as a POC).  I've found the Tivo Orbiter, which will serve as a good base, and I've read through the majority of the programmers guide. 

I think I understand the basics of the architecture, and the DCE message format (down to binary).  What I'm having trouble tracking down is the message protocol. As in, what are the message types, where are they defined, where do they go etc.   I realise that these are probably, to a certain extent, defined in the dce device code.  My question is, where would the best place to begin understanding the protocol? 

I know this is a basic question, but all I need is where the edge to pick is, I'll unravel the rest.

Cheers,

David.

13

Developers / Java/ J2ME mobile orbiter

« on: October 19, 2007, 04:31:08 pm »

How do,

I've been watching the forums for a while and I've seen feature requests for a mobile java orbiter appear every so often, with the occasional 'Yes, that sounds great, I'll get on it!'  Does anyone know if this is in progress?

I'm a very experienced java dev, including j2me, and I'd be happy to help with the effort, or start the effort if it's dead at the mo.

I'm a bit hazy about the remote orbiter architecture, and my C/C++ is decidedly ropey, so I can start to do this if someone is willing to give me a few pointers . .

Cheers,

David.

14

Installation issues / ATI Remote Wonder

« on: July 14, 2007, 04:00:19 pm »

Hi,

I've been scanning all over the forums and docs about how to get the ATI remote wonder remote to work with lmce.  As far as I can see, this should work through lirc, however I've come to a bit of a dead end with that.
What happens at the moment is I boot up my hybrid, with the remote dongle plugged in, and it starts to emulate a mouse.  This is from the ati_remote modules that gets auto loaded at boot time.
However, there is no lirc running, and lmce doesn't seem to recognise the remote.
I've added a child device, with the licr config pulled from lirc.org, still not joy.  I've tried disabling the ati_remote module, nada. 
I've tried installing lirc from the repositories (strangely it seemed not be be already), still nothing.
I'm at the end of my ideas, anyone had any joy with this remote?

David.