stevech
October 13th, 2002, 12:55 PM
My first project with Girder... Perhaps useful to others. Family-friendly project!
Girder is (free) software running on a PC which inputs infrared remote control button-pushes and in turn causes button-dependent actions to be taken by the PC. See HOWs, below.
Objectives:
- From living room TV, using its normal remote...
- Hit a button and view whatever my always-on web server PC is showing
- Use the remote to change what's displayed on this "TV Info Channel"
- TV displays a Girder pop-up menu. Push buttons on TV remote to choose what to view - whatever you want to put into the menus.
- Use the TV remote to do simple web page navigation: scroll up/down and select web page links to other web pages.
- Also use web pages to interact with the home automation system.
To begin with, my menu offers the following
- Display TV program listings and show summaries for the next 3 hours, for channels of my own interest. - Weather channel and other weather information.
- Weather displays from the internet - forecasts, satellite photos, etc.
- Local events from the internet - what-to-do-this-weekend, etc.
- Info and status from my home automation system which uses software from WWW.HOMESEER.COM. Includes current and overnight temperatures, humidity, rainfall, and X10 lights, etc.
HOWs...
- Girder (www.girder.nl) is freeware. Hard to learn. Very hard. I'll help anyone who attempts this.
- I use Girder with irMAN. This is a $35 little box which receives infrared and outputs serial RS232 data depicting what remote control button was pushed. irMAN's serial data goes into Girder.
- I've configured Girder to cause certain buttons on the TV remote to control the pop-up menus, web browser, etc. This is done with a visual "logic" programming technique and graphics, rather than software coding.
- PC's SVGA output goes to a "tvator" box which converts SVGA to TV video - composite and S-video. The video runs on a cable to the TV set's AUX video in S-video or composite (RCA jack) input. Push the AUX VIDEO button on the TV's remote to switch to the Personal Info viewer. Push "PREV CHAN" to return to normal TV.
- The Tvator could connect to an RF modulator to change the video to a TV signal on a particular channel. CHannel 3 and 4 modulators are $5. Cable TV modulators are $75 if you shop hard.
- I prefer the S-video direct to the TV as the quality is much higher.
- TV audio - I haven't done this yet. It could be from the PC or a radio tuned to something appropriate.
- Girder running on web server PC in one room. Remote is in living room. IR is carried from Living room to PC room via "ezRemote" product. This puts IR signals on home power wires to get signal from room to room.
- To reformat downloaded TV listings, I download personalized set of channels from GIST.COM/mypage and I reformat that web page to what I want using some VB Script. The newly formated web page, displayed on the TV, omits all advertising and uses large contrasting fonts, and so on. The VB script is within the HTML. My PC runs a web server which supports server-side scripting; it is NOT Microsoft's infamous IIS server. Could be Java Script - this server (built into HomeSeer) uses Microsoft's WSH.
- The PC behind this currently runs Win98 (because it is an old 120MHz laptop with only 32MB). But it's fast enough for this. It's connected to the typical home cable modem and Linksys router.
Stevech@san.rr.com
Girder is (free) software running on a PC which inputs infrared remote control button-pushes and in turn causes button-dependent actions to be taken by the PC. See HOWs, below.
Objectives:
- From living room TV, using its normal remote...
- Hit a button and view whatever my always-on web server PC is showing
- Use the remote to change what's displayed on this "TV Info Channel"
- TV displays a Girder pop-up menu. Push buttons on TV remote to choose what to view - whatever you want to put into the menus.
- Use the TV remote to do simple web page navigation: scroll up/down and select web page links to other web pages.
- Also use web pages to interact with the home automation system.
To begin with, my menu offers the following
- Display TV program listings and show summaries for the next 3 hours, for channels of my own interest. - Weather channel and other weather information.
- Weather displays from the internet - forecasts, satellite photos, etc.
- Local events from the internet - what-to-do-this-weekend, etc.
- Info and status from my home automation system which uses software from WWW.HOMESEER.COM. Includes current and overnight temperatures, humidity, rainfall, and X10 lights, etc.
HOWs...
- Girder (www.girder.nl) is freeware. Hard to learn. Very hard. I'll help anyone who attempts this.
- I use Girder with irMAN. This is a $35 little box which receives infrared and outputs serial RS232 data depicting what remote control button was pushed. irMAN's serial data goes into Girder.
- I've configured Girder to cause certain buttons on the TV remote to control the pop-up menus, web browser, etc. This is done with a visual "logic" programming technique and graphics, rather than software coding.
- PC's SVGA output goes to a "tvator" box which converts SVGA to TV video - composite and S-video. The video runs on a cable to the TV set's AUX video in S-video or composite (RCA jack) input. Push the AUX VIDEO button on the TV's remote to switch to the Personal Info viewer. Push "PREV CHAN" to return to normal TV.
- The Tvator could connect to an RF modulator to change the video to a TV signal on a particular channel. CHannel 3 and 4 modulators are $5. Cable TV modulators are $75 if you shop hard.
- I prefer the S-video direct to the TV as the quality is much higher.
- TV audio - I haven't done this yet. It could be from the PC or a radio tuned to something appropriate.
- Girder running on web server PC in one room. Remote is in living room. IR is carried from Living room to PC room via "ezRemote" product. This puts IR signals on home power wires to get signal from room to room.
- To reformat downloaded TV listings, I download personalized set of channels from GIST.COM/mypage and I reformat that web page to what I want using some VB Script. The newly formated web page, displayed on the TV, omits all advertising and uses large contrasting fonts, and so on. The VB script is within the HTML. My PC runs a web server which supports server-side scripting; it is NOT Microsoft's infamous IIS server. Could be Java Script - this server (built into HomeSeer) uses Microsoft's WSH.
- The PC behind this currently runs Win98 (because it is an old 120MHz laptop with only 32MB). But it's fast enough for this. It's connected to the typical home cable modem and Linksys router.
Stevech@san.rr.com