MCE Remote with VLC (update 18 February 2010)

January 26th, 2010 by Arend 59 comments »
philips-mce-remote

philips-mce-remote

Background:

At home I use Windows Media Center available on Windows 7. It’s a great program but it doesn’t play all the video codecs and file types that I have in my library. Even advanced codec packs like sharks “Windows 7 codecs” do not always solve this problem. To the rescue comes VLC . A media player that can handle almost any media file you throw at it. When using VLC however, I’m no longer able to use my Media Center Remote Control.

Say hello to mceRemote2vlc:

I decided to try and build an application to handle this, without incorporating this functionality into VLC, but using VLC’s excellent RC interface. In short it allows you to control a running VLC instance by communicating with VLC’s built-in TCP-server.
If you want to give it a try be sure to:

  • Go to Tools-Preferences.
    Select Show All settings (bottom left corner)
    Click on Interface->Main interfaces
    Check “Remote control interface”
    Click on Interface->Main interfaces->RC
    Enter in the field “TCP command input”: 127.0.0.1:8765
    Check “Do not open a DOS command box interface”
  • Install the .NET Framework 3.5 (if not already available)
  • Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7
  • A Windows MCE Remote , the following eHome compatible remote devices should be supported:
    • Microsoft/Philips 2005
    • Microsoft/Philips 2004
    • HP
    • FIC Spectra/Mycom Mediacenter
    • Toshiba/Hauppauge SMK MCE remote
    • Hauppauge OEM MCE remote
    • Mitsumi MCE remote
    • Fujitsu Scaleo-E
    • Pinnacle PCTV Remote
    • Shuttle MCE Remote
    • Centarea Master Remote II

Supported buttons and default mappings:

button vlc_command Description
None none
Power1 none
Left menu left navigate menu
Right menu right navigate menu
Pause pause pause
Power2 quit exit vlc
PowerTV none
Stop stop stop playback
Record record ?
Rewind key key-jump-short go 10 seconds back
Play play play
Forward key key-jump+short skip 10 seconds
Replay previous previous playlist item
Skip next next playlist item
Back previous previous playlist item
Up menu up navigate menu
Info key key-intf-show toggle display interface in fullscreen mode
Ok menu select menu select
VolumeUp key key-vol-up volume up
VolumeDown key key-vol-down volume down
Start none
ChannelUp chapter_n next chapter
ChannelDown chapter_p previous chapter
Mute key key-vol-mute mute sound
RecordedTV f toggle fullscreen
Guide none
LiveTV none
DVDMenu key key-disc-menu show dvd disc menu
NumPad1 none
NumPad2 none
NumPad3 none
NumPad4 none
NumPad5 none
NumPad6 none
NumPad7 none
NumPad8 none
NumPad9 none
NumPad0 none
Oem8 none
OemGate none
Clear none
Enter none
Teletext key key-aspect-ratio toggle aspect ratio
Red key key-aspect-ratio toggle aspect ratio
Green key key-deinterlace deinterlace
Yellow key key-subtitle-track toggle through all subtitles
Blue key key-audio-track toggle through all audio tracks
AspectRatio key key-aspect-ratio toggle aspect ratio
Print none
Down menu down navigate menu

Download:

http://www.arenddeboer.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/Setupv1.0.10.zip

A big “thank you” goes to the team of MediaPortal as most of the functionality is coming right out of this project

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PDA / GPS bike mounted USB charger

December 27th, 2008 by Arend No comments »

I love to go on holiday by bike. And as a tech nerd I can’t be bothered by plain paper-maps!
Having a GPS-mapping application like OziExplorer on your bike makes navigation very easy.

The problem however is with the rapid draining of the battery-powered GPS / PDA.
Especially mobile phones / PDA’s have a very short (battery) lifespan, often no more then a couple of hours when the display is always on and a GPS-application running. Normally I just dragged a lot of AA aka penlite batteries with me and powered the phone with a simple battery holder like this one:
4_aa_battery_holder1

Of course this isn’t the best solution and I was looking for better alternatives.
Then I stumbled upon this genius, hub-dynamo driven “Bike mounted USB Charger” on an English bicycle forum.
The idea is quite simple. You take a HUB-Dynamo (Shimano DH-3R30) (I ordered one from ebay for less then 40 euro).
The hub-dynamo generates an alternating current that needs to be rectified and the voltage output should be regulated to 5 volts for USB powered devices.

The hub-dynamo:
dscf2834

These are the parts you need, available at any electronic (parts) store.
D1 – D4     1N5818
C1             2200uF   16v
C2, C3       470uF     63v   Low ESR
C4             .47uF      Tantalum bead
C5             22uF       Tantalum bead
R1             47K         .25W

Solder the parts according to this schematic:
dynamo1sbp

And there you go, you have the best energy- efficient charger, all done with green energy!

This is my effort. It still needs some good housing and connectors but it works perfectly:
dscf28291

For more detailed information visit the bike forum at http://yacf.co.uk/forum/index.php
Many thanks go to Simon Galgut for providing the electronic schematic.

Google maps API for Flash

December 27th, 2008 by Arend No comments »

The nice folks at google have made a Flash library-api for google maps.
I have made a sample application which displays my “current” position on the map.

How it works:

Mobile phone
On the Mobile Phone,  a Windows Mobile 6.1 ( HTC Touch Diamond) runs a .NET CF 3.5 application that sends the current GPS-location to the server. This is done every second, or on a chosen interval.

Live tracking application

Live tracking application

The server
On the server there is a simple php script that stores the GPS-location and device-id, send by the phone, in a database.

The web-application
The web-application is build in Adobe Flex Builder 3  and fetches the last known GPS-location from the server.
It then  draws a marker on the map and starts updating again.

To get an idea of how it works without me being on the run (and running the gps mobile application) use the simulation mode.
I have recorded two sample tracks, a walking track and a track by car.

Things to do:
Smooth map movement
Select mobile device(s) to show, and zoom map to show all selected mobile devices.
Show (last known) direction, speed, distance, top speed..

(this is partly implemented in the html/javascript version on http://www.arenddeboer.com/liveTracking/)