Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

Copernicus, you echo my thoughts exactly. Not having an IR receiver and currently being too cheap and busy to buy a receiver and learn to "learn" the codes, I guess I'll just stick with the remote that came with the TV.

Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

Great app @Copernicus kudos, really great job. Pierogi just work with all devices at home, just one TV resist - Bang&Olufsen TV set. Any hint where to look for solution?

Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

Will do! Or, at least I'll give it a try -- I'm amazed at how easy it is to create these vector images, but I'm really no artist. :)

Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

Ah, Bang & Olufsen -- I've always wanted to test if the N900 could actually handle one of those. With B&O, the key is the carrier frequency: basically, every manufacturer working with CIR devices has chosen to send their data at a frequency of around 38 kilohertz (or, sometimes, around 56 kilohertz); for various reasons, those speeds could be reached by common and inexpensive electronics components. But B&O (and nobody else, so far as I know), decided to use a carrier frequency of 455 kilohertz in their remote controls.

Technically, it is possible to set the N900's IR carrier frequency all the way up to 500 kilohertz (or, at least, that's what the device driver will accept); but I've never tried it against a real device. Also, there are just very few config files available; I've got one for a "Beo4" remote, which has some TV controls -- let me try to add it in, and see what happens...

Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

Good news for frequency issue, I have Beo4 too, well, lets play :)

Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

Well, I've gotta say, I'm learning a lot from the effort to port to Android. For one thing, while the tabbed-panel interface is just barely workable in landscape mode, it is completely useless in portrait (which is what I need on all current Android devices with IR). I can barely get three tabs on the screen at once. The Android UI itself has a wonderful finger-flickable tab interface, but Qt doesn't yet have access to it. :( It's exactly what I want; in fact, it looks more like just a horizontal list of labels than a set of tabs. Which got me thinking: "Wait. A horizontal list?"

I checked, and yes, the Qt List Widget can work horizontally as well as vertically. For some reason, I never even thought about that before; last year, I had tried things like attaching a combo box to stacked widget to construct my own pseudo-tab-widget, but it never really worked. In fact, I still had all that code mothballed, so I just swapped out the combo box with a horizontal list widget, and voila, scrolling tabs just as nice as anything Android can provide!

Now, this is using Qt 5; but I checked Qt 4.8, and pretty much everything I needed was there as well (although, in a slightly rougher form). It took a little bit of effort, but double voila, scrolling tabs on the N900! And not just scrolling tabs, finger-flickable scrolling tabs. :) I'll append a screenshot to this post. Basically, if you need to move the tab bar to get to the tab you need, just drag your finger across it to pull it one way or the other.

What this really means is that I'm no longer restricted to just 5 or 6 panels in a set! To start with, I've gone ahead and added the "Input" and "Adjust" panels to the default set. This means that I no longer have to try and squeeze the input selector into the Utility panel, so I've put that guy back to his good old 3-row self. (I've also gone ahead and added some common input buttons to the input panel; the top row has a few devices, and the second row has a few connection formats.)

So, Pierogi 1.1.33 has been pushed up to extras-devel, containing these changes. Please tell me what you think. :) (One more thing I should note -- I've used some Qt stylesheets to make the list of tabs look more like a tab bar should; but I don't know if that will interfere with custom N900 themes. If you've got a custom theme, and are having problems with this version of Pierogi, please let me know.)

Oh, BTW, on Bang & Olufsen -- this is going to take some effort. These guys have come up with a protocol that is totally their own. For one thing, they use a trinary number system, rather than binary -- they have values for "0", "1", and "Same as the previous bit". For some reason, you aren't allowed to send two consecutive "0" or "1" bits; so, if you want to send the number 12 (binary 1100), you'd send "1", "Same as the last bit", "0", "Same as the last bit".

Also, they have at least 4 different ways of repeating a command. And an entirely novel way of switching a remote control between different keysets (which I'm still trying to wrap my head around). Getting a keyset up and running for them is going to be fun... :)

Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

I like the new tab bar, very slick.

One small issue though, drag your finger across it and when lifted another tab is highlighted but not selected. not a big issue but could confuse some if done accidentally.

is it possible to put panel filter in the actual remote definition? would prevent tv controls being displayed instead of audio receiver when switching remote.

Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

Drat! I thought sure I had fixed that problem. (It was happening for me as well, until I changed the signal I was looking for from "currentRowChanged()" to "itemActivated()".) Can I ask, does this happen to you if, for example, you go to "Select Keyset" from the menu, and drag the list of keysets up and down? I'm using the same technique there...

I have been wanting to try something like that. It just requires that I do a bit more work. :) Up to now, my panel sets have been something I put together kind of informally; so, the link between a particular set and a particular sort of device is kind of abstract. I just need to write all that down in a form the N900 can understand. :)

Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

I can confirm that but it only happens on Panels with no scrollable tabs ;)

Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

Oops, I didn't even think to test that. :o Thanks!

Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

Ok, Pierogi 1.1.34 is on its way up to extras-devel, with a fix to work correctly even when the tab bar does not scroll. :)

Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

Please excuse this post that turned into a wall of text, it maybe disjointed as I have been back over it several times

Well after seeing this I thought I would try and play with getting Pierogi working in portrait on the N900.
It is something we spoke about a good while ago now, it would be nice to allow Pierogi to work in both orientations, especially with Android version looming. Currently the only way to see how Pierogi works in portrait is with CSSU's forcedrotation enabled. So I re-enabled this and had a play...

Upon poking about in the sources of 1.1.33 I spotted you have started making a portrait friendly version of the main panel. Looks good BTW I hope to see it functional.
TBH most of the panels are now usable in portrait, some work perfectly the Menu for example, the keypad panel has a couple of buttons that have text overlap.
Anyway I with you working on new stylesheets at the moment I thought I'd poke about elsewhere.
However, while I was poking about, one thing I remembered I mentioned a while ago was that your preferences panels on all your pasta's work poorly in portrait mode. So I had a go at 'fixing' it in Pierogi as an example.
See the attached file and screenshots.

A few notes, with this layout text inside items cannot be too long, this is why pushbutton and checkbox text has been cut down a lot.
There is no easy way to word wrap text in these items so I suggest that if you like and wish to use my example, that the Macro File button needs to change. The content on the button needs to be a QLabel which has the wordwrap option. This is checked, see the default keyset bit, for example. This could would be the way to add addition information above an item if it will not fit.
The button would then be used just to open the file select dialog. Maybe with "Select File..."
I didn't want to mess about with the source to do this, especially now you have since released another version.

Right that's my playing about out of the way, now I have found a minor bug while playing about in prefs panel. The "Use default keyset for all volume control" (I am glad I cut that text down on my version ;)) checkbox is not disabled and also can be checked even if no Default Keyset is selected. This only happens if you have never used this item before. You can actually see this in my screenshots. Hopefully you understand what I am getting at if not I can explain further in another post.

Now for my ideas I think you could make the former tab bar, new list widget, more usable now.
Personally I would move "Choose Panels" and "Choose Favourites" up to the Action Menu.
I would also then IMO group "Select Keyset", "Automated Keyset Search" and Browse Partial List" under one action item. Reasoning for the latter being I have noted a few people still don't understand why there device isn't in the device list. If they where a list of methods to find a keyset that would make more sense, all IMO of course.

Finally in addition to my ideas above I think the option to move the new listwidget to the bottom of the page would be handy. I feel this new flicky listwidget would be easier to use with my thumb along the bottom of the screen than the top. I would assume this could be possible in a similar way to switching the volume and channel buttons.

Anyway thank you for making it this far, hopefully you didn't mind me poking about in your application too much ;) and my rambling are useful.

Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

Thank you for all the comments! I at least have no problems with a wall of text. ;) Let me start by saying that I do want to bring all the portrait-mode layouts over to the N900 side. (There's a lot of GUI code that is, unfortunately, not going to be portable between the two OSs. But at least the panels can be shared between the two platforms.)

Actually, that particular layout is very, very old. :) I started on a portrait-mode version of Pierogi a long time ago, but after realizing just how much work it would be (basically, I would have needed to re-layout every single screen in the entire app), I kinda gave up on it.

Now, with Android, I'm having to re-layout every single screen in the entire app, so I guess I should have done the work after all. :)

Yeah, the big thing here is that I can't use the vertical space nearly as efficiently as the horizontal space, as English is a very horizontal language. (I've lately been wondering if I couldn't just label all my portrait-oriented buttons in, say, Chinese...) I'm abbreviating everything where I can, but for a lot of the layouts on Android, I'm starting to reach the point where I'm putting no more than two buttons in any single row, just so I can fit usable labels onto them.

I've looked at some of the other IR software available on Android, and pretty much all of them just dump loads of tiny tiny buttons with tiny tiny icons onto the screen. They do look a lot like real remote controls, but I have no idea how people manage to use them... Anyway, end of rant. :)

Yup, I've been discovering that myself. :)

Yes, thanks! But I have to admit I've been doing quite a bit of "wordwrap" on the Android version as well. :) (I really was spoiled by doing everything in landscape mode for so long...)

Drat, thanks for catching that. I've been doing a bit better lately at trying to make sure unusable options are disabled, but the default volume controls are from way back at the start of Pierogi; I've probably got a lot of other items that need to be cleaned up hiding in the older sections of code. :(

Hmm. I could see doing that for the "Choose Panels" option; I probably need to completely re-think that concept, now that lots more panels can fit into a single set. But should the favourites control be sent away as well? I myself use that a lot more often to switch between favorites than using the volume rocker. It'd be a hassle to keep going up to the menu just to switch between them...

I agree completely. I've gotta think a little bit about how to do that in a user-friendly way, but you're right, these two need to be combined.

This is a very cool idea! (Actually, it's also possible to move the tab bar to the bottom of a standard tab widget, but for some reason I never saw any value in that.) You could never get away with this on Android, since you'd always be running into the control buttons at the bottom of the screen, but it should be no trouble on an N900. I'll give it a shot. :)

Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

Just a quick reply to your question
I see your point, I have always used the rocker switch to do this.
It seems quicker and being right handed I always seemed to hit the taskswitcher button reaching over with my thumb.
I can understand moving either of them would be controversial to people that use them.
However, bare in mind the amount of room you need to swipe the listwidget about. Currently in portrait orientation it's difficult to swipe at the listwidget, my idea was to free this up more by relocating the icons either side.

Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

you could also use vertical like tabs, but I think it will look weird though. Faircrack is using that in landscape mode, scroll to the screenshots to see what I mean.
http://talk.maemo.org/showthread.php?t=69009

Also I think sixwheeledbeast suggestion is a good idea: about placing them on a seperate line, so you have more space for the scrolling tabs.

And I always use the rocker to switch keysets too. I hold the N900 with my left hand and I use my right hand to control the screen...

Before you make all the effort of trying to get portrait working, is it any useful? As the way I hold my phone in portrait then my hands cover the IR-thingy.

Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

Hmm. Are those actual text buttons, or has he rotated some text in a paint program and turned them into icons? Not that I couldn't do that as well, but that introduces lots of problems... But yeah, putting the panel selector controls on the side rather than on the top or bottom can provide lots more valuable screen real estate.

Hmm, I never really thought the rocker control would be that popular. :) I really do need to at least make the on-screen button optional, if folks just aren't using it...

Yeah, that was my excuse for putting it off. I didn't think it'd be useful enough to warrant the time and effort. But, now that I'm doing it for Android (and I think I'm like 80% - 90% there), there's no reason not to just copy the files back into the N900's source code.

Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

Agreed

But surely your just moving the issue to the other orientation?
In fact wouldn't it make less space in the main panel?

It's not about where the port is for me, it's about the feel of the UI.
The port could be moved, you could get a uUSB IR device working or maybe Neo900 will be in a different/multiple location.
If all applications worked in both orientations this would mean forcedrotation could be disabled and locking the UI can be done via the CSSU h-d widget.

Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

Well, if I could get the text to rotate 90 degrees, that really would take up a lot less space. :) (Although it would provide fewer visible tab labels -- basically, the same problem I was facing in portrait mode.)

Yeah, this is basically the argument that finally got me -- I have in front of me now a piece of hardware with a port in a different location. So, I finally have some serious motivation to do the hard work. :)

Well, this is the thing, isn't it? Some apps were only designed to be used in one orientation (and, honestly, I think I had a good excuse for mine). So, they set the flag to force a single orientation. (BTW, I'm setting the "portrait-mode only" flag on Android, since all the hardware I've seen have CIR ports on the portrait-top of the phone. So far, the other Android IR apps I've seen do that as well.)

Along comes the CSSU, with the ability to invalidate the flag, and poof! Your app now "doesn't work." :(

I can just imagine that, once the portrait mode goes in, instead of receiving complaints that "your app looks horrible in portrait mode!", I'll be receiving the complaint that "I'm pointing the phone straight at the TV and nothing is happening!" ;)

Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

As I am sure we have spoke about this before forcedrotation was never recommended, it was to be used by devs to locate and potentially fix none portrait compatible applications only.
Unfortunately it seemed to be adopted by some as a userland feature at that time.

Well there will always one :rolleyes:, I am sure a nice "Make sure the path between your IR port and the device is clear" initial dialog message would sort that out :)

Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

I've just updated...one of my favorite keysets, Magnavox set top box, is gone from my list of favorites. It looks like there is now "Magnavox STB", so I guess you deleted or renamed the one I had favorited?

Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

Ah, well, it was pointed out to me a little while ago that I was not using a standard naming pattern for keysets. In some places, I was spelling out "Set Top Box", in others I was shortening that to "STB". So, I'm trying to start using a more consistent naming scheme. But yeah, I still haven't figured out a way to make changes like this without disrupting everyone using the keyset. Sorry about that. :(

Probably the best thing, I think, would be for me to get back to pushing stable versions up to extras, so that I can at least keep the instability limited to extras-devel. I just need to clean up the UI a bit, clean up the macros a bit, and finally update the documentation, and I should have something worthy of extras...

Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

@Copernicus

I'know i have already asked this a few months ago...
But, i still hope you could find some reference to add support for the Majestic/Audiola remotes. Thanks!

Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

Well, I've done another search of my usual sources, but I'm only coming up with the same thing as before -- just that single DVD config file in the LIRC archive (which is in Pierogi now, for what it's worth). There seems to be very little discussion of their products on the web... I also went and looked at both their US and NZ websites (assuming that we are talking about "Majestic International Corporation" here, I might have the wrong "Majestic" company), but neither seem to offer much in the way of technical specs. :(

Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

Just thinking out loud again....
I know I probably gave you too much of my opinion to absorb last time in the wall of text post. :)

Anyway I had a thought about the whole finding a keyset issue.
What about having another option that walks you through finding your keyset. Like a "Keyset Wizard"
It will probably take a bit of work but you could have a screen with a list of only manufactures that links to a window with three buttons. I am thinking of a flow diagram idea so press "Go" and ask did your device switch off? Yes/No, if yes go to the usual save preset dialog. If no rinse and repeat for all the keysets available for that manufacturer. If all fail dump you back in the select keyset menu or loop to try again.

I suppose it's a similar idea to the current power search option but maybe it would help people find keysets easier.

Anyway as I say just a thought.

Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

You know, I've been trying out various Android IR control apps, and most of them have already stolen your idea. :) In fact, HTC's default IR app works in exactly the manner you describe (perhaps you've already seen it?). I'm not sure how much effort it would take to implement, but I'd love to give it a try. :) (I'm still knee-deep in fighting Qt-Android UI issues, but once I get over those, I should be able to get back to serious work...)

Talking about UI issues, I've been spending far too much time trying to get Qt Stylesheets working on Android. For the most part, they work fine, but for a few items (particularly for my finger-flickable tabs), I just can't get them to lay out borders correctly. However, I think I could separate tabs in a different way -- say, by color-coding them. I'm not really sure about this idea; I think people might find it useful, but I also like the fact that the generally monochrome color scheme used currently by Pierogi allows you to concentrate on the target device rather than having the phone distracting you. (Also, it seems less likely to interfere with the theme you choose for your phone.)

I guess my question (to anyone reading this) is, would you find the addition of color to the UI useful?

Also, while I'm here, let me post my latest iteration of the Pierogi icon; please tell me what you think about it. :)

EDIT: Added the N900-sized icon for comparison purposes. :)

Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

Well, for sure it's big ;) Seriously though, I think it's as nice as it gets for all icon needs for Pierogi and you can adapt it ASAP.

Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

Not really. I like the current "monochrome" look.

Looks nice. However, will the colours be like that? I'm assuming the white background is transparent. Then the black symbol will blend with most people's mostly black screen. I would go for red, green or blue, but admittedly I would need to try it out to see what works the best.

Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

I'm fine with UI right now, look "official" and well integrated with theme by choice, no need for extra effort.

Tnx mata again for great app!

Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

Cool; let me keep fiddling with the stylesheets a bit more, then. :)

As for the icon, I've got it surrounded by a fuzzy white border. I'll attach some copies of it up against a black background. (I also fiddled with the power symbol a bit last night, to make it easier to recognize at lower resolution.) But yeah, maybe it'd be better to use something other than basic black here...

Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

I like the black with white fuzzy border look. Perhaps a teeny-weeny wider border might make it more stand out but that would require playing with various settings to find a good compromise between standing out and looking too clunky/obtrusive.

Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

Just a heads up to say I had to temporarily make the Requests wiki page protected due to excessive spam from multiple IP's over the last month.
You can still edit this page if you have a login.

Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

Hi Copernicus,
Do you think you could make keyset for Yundai wall fan?
It only have 3 button:
1. off
2. on/speed (speed: low, medium, high)
3. swing (swing on/off)

Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

Hmm, not finding much on Yundai. My usual sources don't mention that manufacturer, and in fact, I'm not getting anything at all from a general Google search (although it does keep trying to switch the search to Hyundai on me :) ).

However, the hifi-remotes website does have about a dozen config files for various types of fans. Let me try and add them in; with luck, maybe one of them will work with the Yundai...

Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

I don't know where my father got that fan, because when I google it I also suggested to search Hyundai :(
Could you add it to Pierogi before Sunday afternoon?
I don't mean to be disrespectfull, but I only stay in my father's house until Sunday and I want to test your new config immidiately.

Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

I'll give it a shot. :) No promises though, as I've got bits and pieces of Pierogi lying all over the place right now; I've been messing around with trying to piece together something of a keyset selection wizard... I'll see if I can get it back into a usable state. :)

Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

Pierogi 1.1.35 is now making its way up to Extras-Devel. This is something of an interim build; I am in the process of adding some new features and removing some old ones, but that process isn't quite finished yet. So, this build is going to look a little rough around the edges...

In particular, the new flickable tab bar means that every panel that can be used with a given keyset can be placed into the same tab bar. So, there's really no need to force the user to keep switching between groups of panels in order to access every key. And so, the whole concept of choosing groups of panels is obsolete.

Instead, each keyset now identifies which panels are to be used with it, and therefore, the panels are now chosen automatically. (Well, what that really means is that the panels were chosen by me, so if I've got some of them wrong, please tell me.) And so, the panel group selector button has been removed from the main screen. I've gone ahead and removed the favorites button as well, and instead added a new "favorites" entry into the menu. (I'm in the process of working on a "keyset administration" window, that should make managing favorites a bit easier...)

Also, the tab bar can now be displayed at the bottom of the screen instead of the top. (This is controllable from the preferences window.)

And, I've gone ahead and added in the new (scaleable-friendly) Pierogi icon. Please tell me what you think about it.

Lots of changes again this time, so beware new bugs!

For sLumPia: I've added a handful of new fan keysets -- Airtech, Lasko, Russell Hobbs, and Sylvania. As it turns out, a lot of manufacturers seem to be using the same protocol; hopefully, I've set it up correctly. I found one that is using the ubiquitous NEC protocol as well, so you might just try the "automated keyset search" and see if an existing keyset for something else can switch on the Yundai...

Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

Copernicus,
I am very sorry, but something come up, so I have to left early.
I only notice your update after I got back home, so I can not test the new fan keyset on my father's fan.
I will test it when I go to my father's home (not likely in the near future).

Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

Ah well, no problem. :) (I kinda thought there wouldn't be enough time to get the fan keysets working completely -- I'm not 100% certain I implemented the new fan protocol correctly, as the data I've got on it is a little sketchy.)

In any case, this was a good excuse to get a new build of Pierogi out with a few new features. :)

Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

Is there an IR sensor on dx.com that I can use for learning IR codes? Have some small spare money and I am the only one with paypal of my friends so I am appointed to order their stuff from there. Then I suddenly thought, maybe I can get an IR sensor too...

Re: [Announce] Pierogi - a universal infrared remote control app
 

Curious behavior:

1. make Magnavox STB keyset 1 one of the favorites
2. select it
3. exit Pierogi and start it again, Magnavox is selected
4. press right volume button to go to the next favorite - it stays on Magnavox
5. press the same button again, it goes to the next favorite

If instead another favorite is the starting keyset, right volume button makes Pierogi switch to the next favorite.