Usage Patterns

[Watter]

I'm a former Tivo user. Being a tweaker at heart, when my Tivo's hard drive failed after almost three years, I decided to give SageTV a try. I've been pleased. It's good and it seems to be getting better.

The one area that I feel needs the most improvement is also the one area that is going to be so subjective there there will never be two people who completely agree on it. The area I'm talking about is how the user interacts with the software.

Perhaps I'm wrong, but it seems like Sage TV was designed with a particular user in mind. This is the person who uses Sage TV in their home office, bedroom, or dorm room. They likely use the computer for things other than just Sage TV (although even if they don't they may still fall into this usage pattern) and they probably have a monitor hooked up to the computer that SageTV runs on in addition to, or instead of, a television.

These users typically navigate some or all of the functions of SageTV with a mouse and keyboard instead of a remote. The fact the the OSD has a dozen little pressable buttons for FF, RW, HOME, etc. is pretty evident of this fact. Navigating the current Sage TV UI with a keyboard and mouse is a breeze. It's well thought out (even if certain users disagree with those thoughts) and it's amazingly powerful and flexible.

Unfortunately, I'm not one of those users.

I want to use SageTV primarily as a standalone PVR and DVD appliance. My primary, and in fact only, viewing device is my television and my only control device is a remote (although I do have a wireless kb and mouse hooked up, I'd prefer not to have to use them). If I want to work with the desktop of the SageTV computer, I use VNC. 97% of the time that I'm interacting with the SageTV UI, I want to be able to do so with my remote. So why am I using SageTV instead of Tivo or ReplayTV? It's that other 3% of the time. I LOVE the fact that with SageTV running on a standard windows machine I have the flexibility to do just about anything!! I like that whenever someone release a new video codec, I can give it a try and see if it improves my picture quality. I like that I can take a MPG file representing a show I recorded and move it to a DVD or CD. I like that because it's running on a standard computer, I can perform whatever hardware upgrades I want at any time using standard parts. Want to record more shows? Easy! Pop in a new HD (you could do this in Tivo as well, just not as easily). Menus seem slow? No problem, increase the CPU power.

Anyway, I guess the point I'm getting at is that there appears to be two very distinct ways of interacting with the SageTV software and I'm not sure if those two different usage patterns are compatible. The current incarnation of SageTV is too difficult to use for us PVR appliance type users. It's not nearly as intuitive as my Tivo and trying to teach others to use it is a pain in the tushie. Teaching them to use the Tivo was generally a breeze.

I'm not sure if this a good idea or not, but if the two different usage patterns I described above aren't compatible with a single UI, perhaps there should be a toggle somewhere that switches the UI between an “Appliance” and “Computer”mode. The Appliance mode would be squarely aimed at the user who wants to do most things with a remote control. The Computer mode wouldn't necessarily need to be that different than what exists today.

A long post for a simple point, I guess. Sorry about that.

-Watter

[dkardatzke]

Watter,

We actually designed the application to be used with a remote control from the couch (but also had to keep in mind keyboard/mouse use). I've been using SageTV through a MX-500 remote for over 7 months. My wife finds it very intuitive so I'm confused by what is causing the difficulty for educating someone new. I actually used my TiVo remote to program my MX-500 to use with SageTV because most of the commands are the same.

We offer full support to link just about every command for SageTV to a remote control in Detailed Setup. (You can even navigate Detailed Setup with a remote although we'll make it more user friendly later). What exactly are you finding out to be the most difficult to associate for TV usage?

Dan

[Watter]

Sorry - I hope I didn't come across too negative. I really love SageTV. After my HD went bad in my Tivo I went ahead and replaced it, yet despite that the Tivo is sitting next to the TV unplugged and silent. I'm happily using Sage TV and have no intention of going back.

Maybe I just haven't lucked upon the right mapping for my remote, but as my Tivo remote was more than enough to do everything I needed in the past (and I really like the way the remote feels) I have tried to use it with Sage TV. I can do most of the really basic stuff, but not nearly as easily as I could in Tivo. It usually takes me at least one extra click, and often two. I certainly don't expect (and wouldn't want) to be able to navigate the advanced setup items with a remote. I guess I wish that some buttons were reuable depending on which screen you were on.

I don't know. I'm not sure which direction is the way to go. I just know I'm often a tad frustrated because I'm having to put down the remote and reach for the keyboard.

As an example of what I'm talkign about, in Tivo, basically there was only one action you could perform against an item in you list of shows. That action brought up an information screen that allowed you to play the show or perform other operations on it. SageTV has (that i can think of) at least three actions that can be performed against a listed show: play, info, and options. All three are useful, but i simply don't have enough buttons on my remote to dedicate one to each; espcially since that button couldn't be reused elsewhere in the UI to do something else.

Anyway, as I said, these are minor issues that I only really care about because I'm so enamored with the application as a whole and want to either learn what I'm doing wrong or do what I can to make it even better than it already is.

Thanks for such a great product!!

-Watter

[White94Cobra]

I'm trying to use my MX-500 remote with Sage but have run into some problems. I'm using the Hauppauge remote to program the MX-500, but it seems that about 60% of the time it registers a button press on the MX-500 as two. For example, trying to navigate menus and shows is difficult because if I hit the down button, it moves down twice about 60% of the time. Do you have this problem or are you using a different IR device? Thanks.

[salsbst]

Originally posted by Watter
...I guess I wish that some buttons were reuable depending on which screen you were on....

You may not want to hear this, but this is possible if you put Girder into the mix. It would certainly be nice if Frey spent a little time to make the application more girderable.

Examples

• discrete codes
• raise events in girder to reflect the activation of different menus and pages

But, as it stands, the application can be controlled by girder, and thus, you can have Girder determine which commands to issue based on which page is probably active.

But I do agree that it isn't as easy as it could be. I hope these issues can be addressed relatively soon... personally I'd put this in front of HD support but I'm sure many wouldn't concur.

And I also agree that it's a great product!

Thanks,
Stuart

[dkardatzke]

Originally posted by White94Cobra
I'm trying to use my MX-500 remote with Sage but have run into some problems. I'm using the Hauppauge remote to program the MX-500, but it seems that about 60% of the time it registers a button press on the MX-500 as two. For example, trying to navigate menus and shows is difficult because if I hit the down button, it moves down twice about 60% of the time. Do you have this problem or are you using a different IR device? Thanks.

I haven't seen problems like that but I use the MX-500 through an IRMan. Are you using the IR receiver from the Tuner card?

[Mark Lamutt]

Staurt, I'm definitely not a Girder guru. I know just enough about how to use it to be using it on a basic level to control my system. I have girder running my SageTV setup through my pronto using all of the sendmessage commands that are implemented in SageTV.

With that said, would you explain what you mean my "raise events in Girder to reflect the activation of different menus and pages"? I don't know what you mean by the "raise events in girder" part of that.

Thanks,

[salsbst]

Mark, thanks for your interest.

You're already part-way there: the EXE Tuner Plugin can execute event.exe for Girder, but only when sage wants to change channels on the tuner.... if it would also do this for "SetupPageActivated" and "OSDShow", "OSDHide" and "SageSleep", "SageAwake" and so on then it would be much easier to have Girder react to events in Sage.

An example. I use the MCE remote which has a "MS Windows" button on it. My use of that button is as a "Go to the menu" type of thing. If Sage's setup window is active, then that button should cause sage to sleep and myHTPC.exe should come to the foreground. However, if Sage is on LiveTV, that button should cause Sage to go to setup.

As it stands now, I must track, in Girder, what screen Girder has asked SageTV to go to, and it must definitely not "miss", if I am to be able to do this context-sensitive-response-type-thing. If, however, sage were to raise an event to girder (through the tuner plugin would be fine), saying "I've just gone to the Setup window", then it would be easier to do the context-sensitive stuff.

And while we're on the subject, it would be even better if, in addition, Girder were able to query SageTV for status (e.g. "what page are you on?", "what channel are you on?", "is the OSD active?").

These features would make it possible to develop much more robust and rock-solid Girder control. As far as timing goes, there's a subtle distinction. The "SageSleep" event, for example, should be different from the "SageNowSleeping" event. The former raised when Sage first get's wind of the request to sleep, the latter raised when the "going to sleep" process is finished.

Obviously, there are a ton of events that Girder users might be interested in, and I'm not suggesting that SageTV needs to raise them all tomorrow, just pointing out what some of the steps would be should you guys decide to try to keep us Girder users from whining. Believe it or not, I think that's possible -- eventually

Regards,
Stuart

[Mark Lamutt]

Wow, I had no idea that Girder could do all of that...Sounds like a good idea to me. Of couse, Jeff'll have to be the one with the final say, as he's the master coder around here.

[salsbst]

I'm no Girder expert, either!

For receiving events from SageTV, Girder would be using the same technology that makes the EXE Tuner Plugin work today: event.exe raises an event in Girder and commands that have that event string get fired.

For querying SageTV from Girder, I believe one would use the SendMessage plugin, which has parameters of Message Number, wParam, lParam and the option to save the result in a Girder variable.

[pawn]

Originally posted by dkardatzke
Watter,

We actually designed the application to be used with a remote control from the couch (but also had to keep in mind keyboard/mouse use). I've been using SageTV through a MX-500 remote for over 7 months. My wife finds it very intuitive so I'm confused by what is causing the difficulty for educating someone new. I actually used my TiVo remote to program my MX-500 to use with SageTV because most of the commands are the same.

We offer full support to link just about every command for SageTV to a remote control in Detailed Setup. (You can even navigate Detailed Setup with a remote although we'll make it more user friendly later). What exactly are you finding out to be the most difficult to associate for TV usage?

Dan

I agree most of Sage can be controlled by a remote, but there are key items which, as far as know, can't be.

Examples are deleting recorded shows, moving recorded shows to the library and a I think a couple of other things only available in the right click context menu in the guide view.

[olyar15]

Originally posted by pawn
I agree most of Sage can be controlled by a remote, but there are key items which, as far as know, can't be.

Examples are deleting recorded shows, moving recorded shows to the library and a I think a couple of other things only available in the right click context menu in the guide view.

All of these can be accessed by pressing Options, which is the equivalent of a mouse right-click.

I control SageTV exclusively with a Pronto remote and Girder. Although I do wish there were some more commands available directly, such as delete, and move to library, I find that it is quite straightforward to navigate with a remote. Of course, having a completely customizable remote also helps.

[mlbdude]

Yes, the Options menu works great. It would be nice, however, to have all commands bindable so we could use a one-click remote button instead.

[salsbst]

agreed.

[Watter]

Originally posted by mlbdude
Yes, the Options menu works great. It would be nice, however, to have all commands bindable so we could use a one-click remote button instead.

Oddly enough, that exactly what I'm advocating against; at least for those of us who want a simpler control scheme. I'm sure being able to bind every conceivable option to a button makes sense for folks with remotes that have dozens and dozens of buttons, but I've found that in my household, I'm the only one who ever uses such a remote. I have a Maranzt RC200 Mark 2 that no one except me ever touches. My Tivo remote, on the other hand, is used by everyone.

Navigating Tivo was easy. Double click the tivo button and there was a list of shows. Select a show and see the list of all of the actions that could be performed on it.

If anything, I'd love to see the "options" action that currently exists for SageTV listings be the default action and then "Play" being the default selection in the options menu. That way I could get to every action that could be performed on a listing with only one button, "Select", but still be able to play a listing easily. Just click the select button twice.

Guess I'm just rambling here. What I really want (and I'm grinning evilly here even though you can't see it) is an API to the magnificent work that the Sage guys have done with the hardware side of things. I'd love to take a crack at building an a custom interface.

-Watter

[salsbst]

Watter, I think you guys are close to being on the same page. The key is that the UI needs to be avoidable. If the Options page has to be active for the options to be set from (for example) Girder, then we are not in good shape. If every option/setting/mode is accessible via an API (such as Windows messages) without need to go to a settings page in SageTV, then we are in good shape.

To make interaction from other programs even more robust, I think that the event-raising and state-querying features that I mentioned earlier would be the next logical step.

At that point, a command-line-based interface, for those applications that cannot issue or retrieve the result code from custom Windows commands, would be a walk in the park.

Regards,
Stuart

[pawn]

Originally posted by olyar15
All of these can be accessed by pressing Options, which is the equivalent of a mouse right-click.

I had no idea: thanks.

I control SageTV exclusively with a Pronto remote and Girder. Although I do wish there were some more commands available directly, such as delete, and move to library, I find that it is quite straightforward to navigate with a remote. Of course, having a completely customizable remote also helps.


I use a Palm IIIc and IRAssistant. And the options method is good enough for me. As far as I'm concerned, Sage is completely controlable with only a remote.

[justme]

I think salsbst has the right idea. As he lays it out, users who are currently happy with the UI would continue to be so. Also users that use Girder's simpler methods should similarly be unaffected. But the act of allowing accurate feedback to Girder(or any other program for that matter)would allow for a level of control logic that can only be dreamt of today. This feedback and discrete commands would allow some many possiblilites for intergration.

I have always found that a program that allows users to get at its internals will always be better than one that doesn't. The reason the former is always better(IMO) is because 90% of the time you want to do something , someone else has already done it. I can't program to save my life, but I have very often benefitted from the work others have done. Many peolple make their customizations available to all. This makes the root program all the more versitile. As far as SageTV goes it very obvious Narflex has always tried to keep cutomization as a key feature. However no one person can think of everything. Look at myHTPC it's really nothing more than a shell, yet there are hundreds of great little user created jewels that can be added to it.

It seems like Narflex is planning to open up many programming hooks from reading some of his recent posts. This added to what salsbst suggests would allow the user base to control what has always been SageTV's achelles heel, it's UI. It works great for most but you can't make everyone happy. But if you allow the users access they have alot less right to cry, if they aren't trying to "fix" it their selves. This frees Narflex to work on what he does so well, writing a good solid code base. Instead of trying to draw pictures in some graphics program.

[Narflex]

I just can't wait until you guys get your hands on the full-blown UI customization stuff.....it's capable of doing essentially everything that's asked for in this thread. I'm sure there'll be some amazing things people will do with it.

And for you Java programmers out there....you'll be able to hook a custom call in to the UI anywhere you want. Gotta love dynamic class loading and reflection. Go Java!!!!

[fasttech]

Oh man I can't wait! Will it be coming in the next release? Just curious.

Thanks