Jump to content
Flirc Forums

Some ideas (mouse support, profiles, advanced automation tool support)


yawor

Recommended Posts

Hi,

I really like the idea of Flirc. Up until now I've been using a remote made by a polish company ELMAK which is dedicated to use with PC. It comes with USB receiver which operation is very similar to Flirc because it also works like HID keyboard. Unfortunatelly it is preprogrammed to emit specific keycodes for every key on the remote (as it works only with this remote). It is possible to remap keycodes, but only when a dedicated software is running (only windows is supported). Now I'm seriously considering getting rid of it and buying Flirc :) as it gives much more freedom.

Now some features that would be nice to have (but even without them it is still great device):

1. ELMAK's USB receiver emulates both HID keyboard and mouse. If Flirc doesn't have this functionality yet it would be awesome to have this in the future. I know that this would require to change USB code to register two devices istead of one and this isn't probably easy thing to do. After that one could just record remote key to move mouse in each direction (8 directions would be great for remotes that can do left/right/up/down and diagonals). This would also require to set specific mouse speed and accelleration over time (the longer key is pressed the faster mouse is moving).

2. Ability to create and switch profiles (or presets). A profile could contain recorded keys. Some keys could be assigned to switch profiles. An example involving above idea (HID mouse) would be to have direction keys mapped to up/down/left/right keyboard keys in one profile and to mouse in another.

An extension to profiles would be to define globals keys. If global key is recorded it would be used if current profile doesn't also have the same key assigned. It would save space if some keys are shared between profiles.

A second extension to this idea would be to provide ability to change profiles from the OS (some kind of API).

3. I don't know how Flirc stores each recorded key right now, but maybe this could be useful. It would require a change to both firmware and configuration software. Add ability to record and name all the keys on the remote and then just assign keys by name (name would be only a helpful label, key assignment would actually be by internal key id).

4. Not everything can be done by the device itself. I know that primary objective is to have easly configurable and usable remote control receiver but I know that there will be a lot of more advanced users out there that would like to do more. The idea is to either provide an additional software for advanced functions like key combos or key sequences, or add ability to map remote key is such way so it could be intercepted by such a software.

As I don't see a need for another automation tool (there is a lot of them right now) the latter idea is probably better. It could be implemented as second (third if counting with HID mouse), HID device which neither keyboard nor mouse (generic HID device). Such a device can emit arbitrary codes which are not recognized by OS as keypresses or mouse moves. Such events can be intercepted by third party software (like EventGhost) and then trigger some advanced actions.

So, to implement 1 and 4 Flirc should be recognized by system as 3 devices (which probably shouldn't be a problem - there are a lot of devices which register more than one device in system like mentioned ELMAK receiver or Logitech Unifying which also registers mouse and keyboard and some other devices as well) and each recored key would have one of the 3 modes (keyboard, mouse or generic for advanced users).

I hope that I presented my ideas clearly. Whether I buy Flirc or not doesn't depend on these features but still would be awesome to have at least some of them. I hope that you ship to Poland :).

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 3 weeks later...
  • 7 years later...

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

×
×
  • Create New...