[mythtv-users] Logitech Harmony remote replacement - SofaBaton U1 ?

[Paul Gardiner]

On 22/06/2021 19:01, Mike Perkins wrote:
> On 22/06/2021 17:05, Paul Gardiner wrote:
>>
>>
>> On 22/06/2021 12:24, Mike Perkins wrote:
>>> On 22/06/2021 10:08, Paul Gardiner wrote:
>>>> On 21/06/2021 23:07, Phill Edwards wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>      >>> The Sofabaton is my expected fallback when/if my Harmony's 
>>>>> quit
>>>>>      >>> working.  Sadly, I don't know of any other affordable, 
>>>>> universal,
>>>>>      >>> bluetooth remotes.
>>>>>
>>>>>     The sofa baton is an interesting device, and it is on sale in
>>>>>     amazon's prime day for less than US $40.
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> I just watched a review of the Sofabaton. Looks ok but doesn't seem 
>>>>> to have the equivalent of Harmony's activities, which means it 
>>>>> can't automatically select HDMI inputs when you turn things on. 
>>>>> That was such a good WAF feature.
>>>>
>>>> Yes, but I think you could make it emulate that feature, providing 
>>>> you reserve one button for the activity-change-over actions so, 
>>>> unlike with the harmony where you just change activity, you'd need 
>>>> to change activity and then press your setup button.
>>>>
>>> I think that it is a balance of where you want to have the 'business 
>>> logic', if you like. In the Harmony, the existing state of everything 
>>> is held in the remote itself, so it knows what to change when you 
>>> press an activity button.
>>>
>>> It would be possible to move that all to your host end. That way, 
>>> you'd simply have a spare button on the remote which, when pressed, 
>>> runs (for example) a script which reads the existing state info 
>>> previously stored in, I dunno, /var/something, and does whatever is 
>>> required to effect the switching.
>>>
>>> Of course, that implies that that host retains all the state info so 
>>> would have to be on all the time. Suitable project for a RPi, anyone?
>>
>>
>> I was thinking of restricting to idempotent actions, so no state 
>> memory is needed: turn every device needed on, turn every device not 
>> needed off, don't use toggles, don't use next or prev actrions.
>>
> Unfortunately most power buttons on remotes /are/ just toggles. If you 
> need to change the input source for the TV, also, different TVs use 
> differing approaches.

Oh, I must be lucky. Every one of my devices has separate power off and 
power on, some in addition to a toggle. Likewise for input selection. 
Hmmm, come to think of it, they do have exceptionally big remotes. :-)