[mythtv-users] Setting up a Logitech Harmony Smart Control remote with mythtv

[Greg Oliver]

On Thu, Dec 14, 2017 at 4:20 PM, Anthony Giggins <seven at seven.dorksville.net
> wrote:

>
>
> On 15 December 2017 at 05:31, Greg Oliver <oliver.greg at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> On Thu, Dec 14, 2017 at 1:23 PM, Andre Newman MythTV <
>> mythtv-list at dinkum.org.uk> wrote:
>>
>>>
>>> > On 14 Dec 2017, at 16:53, David Engel <david at istwok.net> wrote:
>>> >
>>> > On Thu, Dec 14, 2017 at 12:37:02PM +0100, Andre Newman MythTV wrote:
>>> >>
>>> >>> On 14 Dec 2017, at 00:54, Anthony Giggins <
>>> seven at seven.dorksville.net> wrote:
>>> >>>
>>> >>>
>>> >>>
>>> >>> On 14 December 2017 at 09:33, David Engel <david at istwok.net> wrote:
>>> >>> On Wed, Dec 13, 2017 at 11:01:42PM +0000, Jim Abernathy wrote:
>>> >>>> I have 2 Harmony Smart control remotes and I love them.  For
>>> controlling standard stuff it works great.  I even have one mythtv frontend
>>> controlled by it.  That system has a Microsoft MCE 1039 IR remote and I
>>> added the Mythtv FE as a Microsoft Media PC.  That remote works on Live TV,
>>> FireTV, and Mythtv.
>>> >>>>
>>> >>>> So now to the problem.  My newest FE uses an old Vista MCE remote
>>> model VRC-1100.  Using the wiki on mythtv on the VRC-1100, I got my FE
>>> working fine with the Microsoft Vista remote.  Now I want the Harmony Smart
>>> Control remote to work with it.  But not sure where to start.  I thought
>>> I’d check with the experts here before digging much further.
>>> >>>
>>> >>> Chuck your IR remote and receiver and go get a ~$15 (or less) USB
>>> >>> Bluetooth dongle.  Then configure your Harmony Hub to use BT instead
>>> >>> of IR.  You'll get a *much* more reliable and faster remote.
>>> >>>
>>> >>> David
>>> >>>
>>> >>> Ditto Bluetooth is miles better then IR with the Harmony setup.
>>> >>
>>> >> Very interesting, which Harmony profile do you use for the Bluetooth?
>>> >>
>>> >> My IR has always been a bit of a pain and I have a couple of BT
>>> adaptors knocking around.
>>> >
>>> > As noted in another message in this thread, tell the Harmony you're
>>> > setting up a Windows Computer.
>>>
>>> Thanks I spotted that on the way past, a little job for the weekend.
>>>
>>> Just a curious bystander, but could someone tell me *why* this is so
>> much better than IR which has worked for me well for so many years.  In my
>> opinion, I have had several issue with BT on Linux in the past, and I
>> cannot think of a single time IR has failed me.
>>
>> Is it just the response time?  So going from IR on the remote directly to
>> the IR receiver through USB on the host is that much slower than going WiFi
>> from the remote to the Hub, then BT to the BT receiver through the same USB
>> with keyboard emulation is that much faster?
>>
>> Any other pros to switching to BT?  I guess I could always run them both
>> since the remote does both and play with it, but it just seems like I would
>> not notice anything since I never type with a remote and I have already
>> mapped all the keys I would ever use in my lirc config file..
>>
>> Just trying to get the benefits all explained :)
>>
>>
> Key Presses are much more responsive (makes the whole frontend feel
> faster) and theres no messing around with lirc or ir-keytable
>
> The only down side is trying to get "cheap" linux compatible BT dongles,
> seems to be hit or miss which chipsets are floating about.
>
> Cheers,
>
> Anthony
>
> Long ago I bought a Tivo peanut remote just to have a small keyboard to
use when I needed to type in MythTV for whatever reason.  It came with it's
own BT receiver and works well for that.  I also have some micro keyboards
that have their own USB sticks (like a logitech Unified Receiver) that are
hand sized.  They needed recharging too often to keep me happy, so now they
are used for headless servers and to watch MythTV from my laptop in hotel
rooms when I need them.

I guess I will just have to setup the harmony stuff to see if it is
noticeable.  I do not really like the Hub architecture - I can control it
from anywhere on the network with no authentication whatsoever.  Not very
smart on their part.  I guess I will put it on the same private network
with my DirectTV receivers in the same boat..  All this IoT stuff is
quickly getting out of hand with security :)

Thanks for the info.

-Greg
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