Help with crazy idea (booting iphone straight to XBMC via Bluetooth)

[Alucard77]

Hi All,

So I have been searching and searching and have not found anything yet. With ATV3 not being anywhere close to being hacked, the next best thing is an iPhone 4s. The only problem currently is, how do you turn on your 4s without having to leave the couch (besides forcing the kid to do it). What I want is to make this wife and child friendly, so I don't get the dreaded "Honey, how the hell do I work this thing" or "Daddy, I need your help!"

What I ideally would like is to:
1- Have 1 centralized remote with 1 easy interface that controls the TV, Receiver, iPhone 4s and XBMC (I was looking at the Harmony Ultimate Hub)
- I wonder if tthe Harmony Ultimate Hub can even communicate with XBMC, I am hoping it can.
2- Have it communicate with the iPhone to turn it on (I hear this can only be done via bluetooth, so again I am defaulting to the Harmony Ultimate Hub)
- Does BTStack recognize the Harmony Hub and is there any way to have it send a BT command through the Harmony Hub?
3- Have the iPhone launch directly into XBMC
- I was hoping activator would have this functionality, but I don't see any activity for turning on from bluetooth. Since I don't have a bluetooth mouse, I cannot test to see if the command At home screen> Device unlocked via slide unlock will work or not. Could some one test this for me?
- If not, is there a way to setup this command?
4- Have it control XBMC (I believe Harmony Ultimate Hub can already do this)
5- When done shut down XBMC (I think there is a button map I can make to do this in XBMC, so this one is the least of my worries at this point).

I am hoping this forum can help as this is an active forum. If it cannot, is there an active Cydia forum you guys can point me in the direction of.

Thanks again for any help you may be able to provide. I think this will help a lot of people long term and help recycle a lot of those 4s' as those are on expiring contracts anyway.

 

[willerz2]

There's still a requirement of having your device within the vicinity. Unless you're constantly USB tunneling your device for on-screen interaction, and the computer is ran side by side with your other entertainment units. The level of sand boxing does not allow for remote access of your device outside of tunneling.


Sent from my iPod touch using Tapa

 

[Alucard77]

Is this for this thread? Or was this intended for a different thread.

The only reasoning I am asking this, is because the Harmony Ultimate hub works through your wireless router and communicates both BT and IR controls. So the device wouldn't have to be within the vicinity. The Harmony hub takes care of that for you.

 

[willerz2]

Sorry, tunnel visioned on the 4S, but control of the 4S would still remain the same. You'd need physical interaction or tunneling to control the device. The XNU Darwin ARM allows for external control, but does not run XBMC

You'll have to possibly tweak your XBMC settings to allow for access of immediate controls. It should be port 2020 that has to be enabled for network controls. By default, XBMC does allow for a variety of control methods, just that you need a specific port which emulates the same effect as XBMC Remote on your handheld device.

Depending on which remote you're using, you may need to change the keyboard mapping for specific keys and actions. If you don't have a keyboard/keypad-like Remote, you'd need to modify the keyboard actions to simulate on-screen keys (unless you want to use the arrow keys for typing, which is pretty irritating at times when typing long strings). I know for a fact that the RII Mini works with XBMC, but is a bit sketchy at times, particularly when outside of about 20 feet.

 

[Alucard77]

That is an excellent point. I am actually trying to figure out if the Harmony iphone app does support xbmc through network controls. If not, can it learn to? I am hoping that it does, especially since that looks like how the whole Harmony Hub works. You send a message to your router, it sends it back to the hub, the hub then relays the message.

 

[Alucard77]

Okay, so I am hitting more brick walls on this. There doesn't seem to be a way for the Harmony Hub to send XBMC controls throught the network. This is a HUGE miss on their part. HUGE. I don't even understand how that is possible.

What I have asked on the XBMC boards is for a wake on bluetooth command for the iphone through XBMC Remote. I am hoping we can get that some how.

Shouldn't it be possible to:
- Pair 2 iphones (know this is possible with p2p apps)
- wake the iphone via a BT command (know this is possible with bt keyboards and mice)
- Automatically launch XBMC at wake (know this is possible through the slider command in Activator)

All I need is for those 3 to be put together in the XBMC Remote. If I get that, then I can at least continue to use my Harmony One Remote and then just switch to my xbmc remote on my iphone. Not ideal, but I could teach that to wife pretty easily.

 

[Mickey330]

I've moved this discussion over to our Off Topic area as it pertains to the iPhone. Thanks.

Marilyn

P.S. Another good place for this discussion is at our sister forum, www.iphoneforums.net. There are a lot of iPhone experts there (including willerz2! ). Maybe someone there can also help in the discussion...?