Generic HID Remote Driver for XBMC

This is a generic hid driver for use with XBMC if your computer came with a hid remote or you bought one. The base code was provided by coldsource

After having successfully used this for a while, I started having trouble when I upgraded my OS to Ubuntu 11.04 and later to Ubuntu 11.10. I debugged it a bit and provided this slightly hacked version that made it work for me.

This is provided asis and without any guarantee. Please see LICENCE for more details.

Usage

http://forum.xbmc.org/showthread.php?tid=88560 contains the details...

Compile the drivers

$ make

Make sure your HID remote is recognized (listed)

$ sudo ./hid_mapper --list-devices

Run with learn mode so you can create your map file

find out the manufacturer and product of your device using

$ cat /proc/bus/input/devices

replace 1d57 and ac01 with the values of your device

$ sudo ./hid_mapper --lookup-id --learn --manufacturer 1d57 --product ac01

This will display the key codes for each key-down and key-up event

Pipe the output into a file to save some typing and push every button on the remote that you want to map (remember the sequence you pushed the buttons :-) )

$ sudo ./hid_mapper --lookup-id --learn --manufacturer 1d57 --product ac01 > mydevice.map

Now edit mydevice.map, remove the key codes of the key-up events (usually only zeros), remove the blanks and assign the keys as you like. The result should look like this:

010000520000000000:KEY_UP  
010000510000000000:KEY_DOWN  
...

Valid key names are defined in /usr/include/linux/input.h

Run with the map file to use it

$ sudo ./run_remote

to run this on every system start, put this into /etc/rc.local

Blacklisting the device in Xorg

It is necessary to blacklist the device in Xorg so it does not conflict with the mapper. Create a new file in /usr/share/X11/xorg.conf.d/. I have named it 50-remote.conf and it contains:

# see output of lsusb for the USB id
Section "InputClass"
        Identifier "Remote blacklist"
        MatchUSBID "1d57:ac01"
        Option "Ignore" "on"
EndSection

Restart Xorg and you're done.

At this point the remote is not recognized anymore.

Extra steps if you need autostart

TODO