64-bit compatible replacement for STBKeepAlive

[214b1]

Sure would be nice if someone would post a simple plug-in that learns the OK button on my U-verse remote to send keep alive signal every 6 hours to my STB.

Seriously, does anybody have solution for keeping the STB alive, since the 32-bit version doesn't work under 64-bit Windows? A step-by-step would be greatly appreciated!

[Slugger]

Originally Posted by 214b1

Sure would be nice if someone would post a simple plug-in that learns the OK button on my U-verse remote to send keep alive signal every 6 hours to my STB.

Seriously, does anybody have solution for keeping the STB alive, since the 32-bit version doesn't work under 64-bit Windows? A step-by-step would be greatly appreciated!

If you use a USB-UIRT with Sage and Sage can learn that button then you can write a script against the Sage API that can trigger any remote button anytime you like. In theory, it should work with any remote that works with Sage, but in practice only people with UIRTs have ever had success with it.

I can go into details if you have a USB-UIRT...

[214b1]

Yes - i'm using the USB-UIRT. Please share some details. Thank you Slugger!

[Slugger]

Well, I'm going to add this utility to my sageg environment and release that way. That means you're going to have to wait a little longer, but I'm sure you'll survive. If you happen to have SJQ installed and operational, I have an SJQ groovy script example that will do exactly what you want, but requires the full SJQ environment to run. I assume you don't use SJQ otherwise you probably would have found the script already. I was going to explain how to get this functionality via SJQ, but for this simple task, SJQ is overkill.

You might argue that sageg is overkill for this task as well, and maybe it is, but besides installing some kind of scripting environment to invoke the Sage API, there really is no other way to gain access to the UIRT without writing some native app against the UIRT device driver or writing a full blown Sage plugin, which is way more work than setting up sageg. And besides, my script adds additional functionality like skipping the keep alive operation if the stb is currently recording, etc.

What is sageg? A sort of toolbox. I'm prepping the release of the toolbox and the (partial, incomplete) docs are here. I will add the stb keep alive utility as an example and include it in the release. So when I finish the docs, you'll have your keep alive utility that you can then setup to run as often as you like via Windows Task Scheduler, etc.

The secret to getting the keep alive util in your hands will be to gently nudge me if you notice no updates to that doc by, let's say, the end of next week.

[KryptoNyte]

With my setup, I usually just send the ENTER code to the STB prior to the channel numbers. I noticed that took care of the sleeping STB situation.

[Slugger]

I do this same thing to handle the case where my stb is left on a ppv channel (Sunday Ticket, NHL Centre Ice,etc.). after the game is over my stb will pop up a "this even is over" box. Prefixing the enter button on all channel changes solved all these headaches.