Infrared remote control module for Windows

[Lurch]

Hi everybody (first post)!

VLC is a real fine player and all, but it appears to me that there's no way to control VLC through my infrared remote control which is a URC9040 from One-For-All (see http://www.oneforall.com/).

Please correct me if I'm wrong, but I've been searching for hours now and couldn't find anything appropriate. In VLC, the term "remote control" seems to be used in different contexts, but from what I understand other issues are adressed (HTTP remote control and console). I feel a bit surprised and puzzled that there's no straight support for such a simple device, but then we're talking windows here, perhaps someone could enlighten me on the background why there's no support in VLC/Windows in this field (I've read about the lirc support in VLC/Linux, but even though I love Linux, my PC at home runs XP).

The infrared receiver is a USB device that came bundled with the remote control. I assume it's all proprietary, and that might be the reason why there's no support so far.

I would call myself a sophisticated software developer, and I'm now tinkering with the thought of writing a VLC module for this specific device.

So now I'm here to ask you for a bit of developer advice:

• First, I assume this project is possible and not very difficult, would you agree?
• The big picture: Once I have access to incoming RC events from the USB port I should be able to map them to VLC commands and trigger them from within my module, correct?
• Has something like this been done before, or will I need to start from scratch?
• I was too lazy to look for it now, is there any kind of sample module and API description for module developers?

Perhaps it's possible to generalize that module to support a broader spectrum of Windows infrared remote controls at a later point in time. I for one am sick of having to walk up to my PC for things like "Pause" or "Play", now that I own such a fine device. I control all of my multimedia equipment (TV, DVB-T receiver, Stereo) with it now, except for my PC, which was actually the reason for buying it in the first place (d'oh!).

Thanks for any help on this,
Christian.

[wurlyfan]

Hi Christian

Greetings from New Zealand! Did you ever make any progress with this project? If s\o, I would be very interested to hear about it. I am also very interested in learning how to control VLC from an IR remote.

[some1]

Hey!
Ive got a MCE IR Remote Control, on a XP Pro SP 2 PC, and I want to get it fully working (Volume, Mute, and so does the DVD Menu stuff works, but power, Play/Pause etc dont!).

[xyz]

Hello,
If you are using VLC 0.9.9 or higher then try this:

http://www.eventghost.org/forum/viewtop ... 7900#p7900

The software lets you create different scripts for different applications, therefore you can assign the same buttons to different functions according to what programs are running.

Have fun.

[Melloware]

xyz, This thread is two years old and you revive it for this information now?

[xyz]

xyz, This thread is two years old and you revive it for this information now?

And what is wrong with that? Wasn't I suppose to search the forum for a particular subject before starting a new post?
The other thing is that I've been searching for a solution to this problem for a long time (that's how i remembered about this post) and I only found the solution that actually works with any type of remote now, so I figured that maybe someone else wants to here about it.

[adeb2]

xyz, This thread is two years old and you revive it for this information now?

Indeed, I don't get why responding on old threads is such a bad thing.
Thanks for the info xyz.

[arend]

I created a "quick and dirty" solution to this problem, have a look at: http://www.arenddeboer.com/mce-remote-with-vlc/

[vichtak]

after some search:

irreco work for OS2008 Diablo and Nokia N800 or N810
The irreco's doc says it handle VLC

Telnet backend
With telnet backend user can use Irreco for controlling mediaplayers and other software that can be controlled via telnet. Telnet backend comes with default telnet commands for MPD, Foobar, MythTV, VLC and Winamp.

source: http://irreco.garage.maemo.org/documentation.html

I didn't test it. If somebody did, comments are welcome.

[JimOfMex]

I have been perplexed by this same problem. I have found a workaround. Although I never changed the User Interface settings on previous versions of VLC, I did change it to Remote Control after reading this thread. It made no difference. Although most of the controls continue to work in VLC Version 2.1.2, the Play/Pause button does not. Repeatedly pressing this button alternately causes a Play arrow icon and a Pause icon to appear in the upper right-hand of the screen (new behavior in my experience), but the video continues to play.
WORKAROUND: On my remote, I have found another key that also causes the Play and Pause icons to appear. Conveniently, it also causes the video to stop and start. My remote's brand name is simply PC-Remote. There are no other names nor models on the control. I have had it several years. The key that actually stops and start the video is the center one in the bottom-most row of 3 buttons. The symbol on it is two squares meant to represent two windows. When VLC doesn't have focus, the button switches the focus from whichever window has it to whichever window had it before. Even with VLC running, it used to cause VLC to leave full-screen mode and bring a different window into focus. Now, it just starts and stops the video. I now have the interface set to Qt, but it behaved the same in RC.

[Jean-Baptiste Kempf]

fixed in 2.1.3