[mythtv] Interface to HID remote devices

[Micah Galizia]

On 6/4/07, Clint Eaker <ceaker at mindspring.com> wrote:
>
> I'm trying to investigate using a HID remote control device (Logitech
> UltraX remote) with Mythtv.  Basically, it appears to the system as a HID
> keyboard.  What I'm finding using EditKeys is that while many of the keys on
> the remote are recognized by Mythtv, many of the media remote oriented keys
> are not acknowledged by Mythtv at all (pressing the button on the remote to
> map the key/button within EditKeys simply does nothing).


Correct.

I have determined that support for the Logitech UltraX remote has been added
> to hid-input.c (http://lkml.org/lkml/2005/9/10/197).  I'm assuming that
> what's going on is that Mythtv is listening for standard keyboard input.  It
> appears that somewhere along the line the remote buttons that don't map to a
> standard keyboard are getting dropped (buttons like 'DVD' or 'TV').  I don't
> know whether they are being ignored by the standard keyboard driver or
> ignored by Mythtv (I suspect the former, but that's just a guess).


Keys aren't ignored by anything.  However, not all kernel level events
translate properly in X.  Whats worse, is that QT doesn't listen to all of
X's key events.  There are several different X drivers you can play with to
try to get more of your keys working.  I played with the evdev X driver in a
while, but that is probably your best bet to get all of the keys working in
X.  From there you can modmap them to something that QT can understand, and
then bind them with mythcontrols.

The biggest challenge I'm running into is simply finding any kind of
> description of how any of this works.  I'm not familiar with the linux
> architecture for handling user input or how it is received by
> applications.  My suspicion is that to get this to work, Mythtv would have
> to be modified to recognize and listen to a separate interface in the HID
> driver that provides the key presses that are not part of the standard
> keyboard.  But I don't know how to confirm this.


 I tried that a LONG time ago and never got anywhere with it.  Ideally
everything would translate nicely, but neither X nor QT have events for all
of the multimedia buttons on that remote control.  You might have to accept
that not all keys will work (or you might just need to map some of them).

Can anyone point me in the right direction for how I might be able to make
> some progress on this?  Anything would be appreciated (suggestions on this
> forum, other forums that might be more suited to these questions, HOWTOs,
> documentation, anything).


I think the solution above might be your only hope.  LIRC might also give
you the desired effect, and there is lots of documentation on that.

Cheers
-- 
"The mark of an immature man is that he wants to die nobly for a cause,
while the mark of the mature man is that he wants to live humbly for one."
--W. Stekel
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