[muzikoverdose]

1,000 pardons if this has been answered elsewhere, but I can't seem to find a clear guide.

I recently bought a generic MCE remote (the bottom of it says Vista MCE remote control model number VRC-1100) to use with XBMC. Most of the buttons work except the fast forward and rewind buttons.

I'm an utter beginner with this kind of thing. I had a look at Event Ghost and IR Server Suite but I may as well try and read ancient greek for all the sense it made to me.

Would anyone have the patience to tell me hwo to get the remote power button (currently logs me out of windows) or the big green button labelled Start (currently open Windows Media Centre) to open XBMC and how to get the fast forward and rewind buttons happening?

currently running windows 7 and the latest xbmc (the brand new one with the Confluence skin)

cheers in advance and many thanks.

[Brad P]

That remote is useless, especially with Windows XP. I had the same one and half the buttons didn't register. You need a Windows Media Center remote.

[muzikoverdose]

Thanks for replying Brad. As stated, i'm using Windows 7 and that the only buttons that don't work are the fast forward and rewind. I'm interested in learning how to remap the other buttons as well.

[AzzX]

IR Server Suite is fantastic for these issues: http://forum.team-mediaportal.com/ir-ser...1-a-33512/

[jhsrennie]

Hi muzikoverdose. See http://forum.xbmc.org/showthread.php?tid=62966 for my general rantings about remotes. Then go to http://www.ratsauce.plus.com/xbmc.htm where you'll find custom builds of XBMC that will work with your remote.

JR

[muzikoverdose]

Thanks heaps John. The showkey app is a great help. Would you know a way to use the information i've gleaned from this app to remap the buttons on the remote? All i really want it to be able to launch XBMC from the remote. i can't seem to find a way in IR Server Suite of Eventghost, but I may be looking in the wrong spot. as said earlier, i am not a particularly technical person, so thanks for the help

[muzikoverdose]

when i press a button, showkey gives me 2 things. the top bit everything is prefixed with VK. the bottom bit has things like

<play_pause>Put action here</play_pause>

which xml would i edit to make xbmc recognise the other keys?

[jhsrennie]

when i press a button, showkey gives me 2 things. the top bit everything is prefixed with VK. the bottom bit has things like

<play_pause>Put action here</play_pause>

which xml would i edit to make xbmc recognise the other keys?

I assume you've just used the pause button as an example since you report only the ff and rew buttons aren't working. What do you get when you press ff or rew? Does it show a keystroke, an appcommand message or nothing?

JR

[muzikoverdose]

When i presss:

rewind
VK_B
<b mod="ctrl,shift">Put action here</b>

fastforward
VK_F
<f mod="ctrl,shift">Put action here</f>

green "Start" button
VK_MENU
<key id="18" mod="alt">Put action here</key id="18">

[jhsrennie]

When i presss:

rewind
VK_B
<b mod="ctrl,shift">Put action here</b>

fastforward
VK_F
<f mod="ctrl,shift">Put action here</f>

green "Start" button
VK_MENU
<key id="18" mod="alt">Put action here</key id="18">

OK, the rewind key is sending ctrl-shift-B and the ff key is sending ctrl-shift-F. These are the standard keyboard shortcuts for Microsoft Media Center. The current version of XBMC does not support these shortcut keys, but the next version will and the custom builds on my website do. You need to download one of my custom builds from http://www.ratsauce.plus.com/xbmc.htm and follow the insrtructions to install it. Copy the keyboard.xml included in the zip into C:\Program Files\XBMC\userdata\keymaps, or if you're not using portable mode into the XBMC\userdata\keymaps folder in your profile.

If you open the keyboard.xml from my download with notepad you'll see it contains:

<keymap>
<global>
<keyboard>
...
<f mod="ctrl,shift">FastForward</f>
<b mod="ctrl,shift">Rewind</b>
...
</keyboard>
</global>
</keymap>

This configures the ctrl-shift-F key to execute the action "FastForward" and the ctrl-shift-B key to execute "Rewind". The are some extra key definitions in there, but they aren't doing any harm so there's no need to delete them.

JR

[muzikoverdose]

you sir, are an absolute champion. Thanks for all the help. I think I see how it all works now.

i'm assuming that there is no way to reprogram the other buttons I mentioned?

[jhsrennie]

i'm assuming that there is no way to reprogram the other buttons I mentioned?

The power button is probably sending alt-F4. Does ShowKey give you anything when you press the power button?

The problem with the green button is that obviously if you want it to start XBMC then you can't do it by playing with XBMC key mappings! Alt + Key 18 is Windows-Alt, i.e. hold down either Windows key and press Alt. If you do this on the keyboard you should see ShowKey show the same as you get from the remote. If you have a look at http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windo...-shortcuts you'll see that Windows-Alt-Enter is a standard Windows shortcut key to start Media Center (I'm not sure why ShowKey doesn't see the "Enter"). I don't know of any way to change the action of Windows-Alt-Enter, and a quick Google didn't reveal anything. There's probably some cunning registry hack to do it if you have the time and patience for a heavy Google session :-)

JR

[Tito]

OK, the rewind key is sending ctrl-shift-B and the ff key is sending ctrl-shift-F. These are the standard keyboard shortcuts for Microsoft Media Center. The current version of XBMC does not support these shortcut keys, but the next version will and the custom builds on my website do. You need to download one of my custom builds from http://www.ratsauce.plus.com/xbmc.htm and follow the insrtructions to install

JR

That will be cool if we could also make it work in Linux..
I got a mce remote in linux that didnt work.
It sends also ctrl-shift commands..

[jhsrennie]

That will be cool if we could also make it work in Linux..

Just build XBMC from the latest SVN version and it will work in Linux :-)

JR

[sddt]

Hi there. I tried to use the ShowKey app to get the code for the info button on my eHome (MCE wannabe) remote but nothing is registered. I know this button does something since it is registered in EventGhost and IRServer. All other remote functions seem to work just fine, its just the info button that I cannot use which is one of the most important features in deciding which movie I would like to watch. Does anybody have any suggestions as to what I could try to get this button working in XBMC?

Here is a link to the remote I own:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.as...6880125001

Thanks for any help!