[mythtv-users] Switching between Mythtv and Amarok

[Michael T. Dean]

On 06/15/2008 06:18 AM, Dave M G wrote:
> There are two remaining issues, which I hope are relatively small clean 
> up issues.
>
> 1. I finally understand how to switch modes within the .lircrc file. So 
> if I press the "Music" key on my remote, the control goes from mythtv to 
> amarok.
>
> However, the modes don't switch if I select the entry in the MythTV menu 
> (which I prefer to do, or at least would rather not give up on the 
> option yet).
>
> How do I get a command that's executed in the main menu to tell LIRC 
> which mode to be in? I would assume that means further editing of the 
> mainmenu.xml file, beyond what I already have - which, just for 
> reference, is just:
> <button>
> <type>MUSIC</type>
> <text>Amarok</text>
> <action>EXEC amarok</action>
> </button>
>   

There is no "supported" way of doing so.

http://ml.osdir.com/hardware.lirc/2006-04/msg00073.html .  Part of that
patch was applied, but AIUI they wanted the ability to get/set the mode
to be integrated into lircrcd (which, BTW, if using LIRC modes, you'll
probably need to run), so the lirc_getmode and lirc_setmode programs
aren't official.

In truth, this was the very reason that after figuring out LIRC modes, I
decided not to use them.  Perhaps one day I'll actually integrate the
allow-scripts-to-change-modes functionality into lircrcd, but it's not
high on my TODO list.

> 2. When I press the "Music" button on my remote, I still get two 
> instances of Amarok started. I think this is because the remote is 
> sending multiple signals for each one time I hit a button.
>
> I suspect this is the case because when I'm in Amarok, and I hit the 
> "Skip" button to go forward one song, it jumps two songs over.
>
> I tried adjusting the "repeat" option on the settings in .lircrc for the 
> affected buttons. But setting it low, to 1, makes skipping forward jump 
> four or five songs. Higher numbers like 6 or 10 seem to still jump by 
> two with each one press of the button.
>
> Can I calm down my remote so that I can be sure it's only sending one 
> instance of a signal?
>   

You did see the part of my response where I said that repeat should be 0
for the Music button, right?

If, even with repeat=0 you still get double keypresses, your remote is
probably sending a toggle bit and your lircd.conf doesn't properly
define your remote, so you end up with 2 button presses--one for button
pressed and one for button released.  If so, you need to fix your
lircd.conf.

Mike