Cynical Caché: Manage Global Caché Devices for CIR & more

Getting this setup this weekend...

I got the network device setup with it's static IP in indigo as a device.

I believe I need to create an IR emitter device next? However, when I do that and edit device settings, hit the dropdown for address, the only address I see is --invalid--

Does the itach need to be directly connected to the mac during setup for indigo? Right now I have it just as a stand alone device with an ethernet cable.


I believe I'm on the right track here... then I would choose that emitter from an action, edit the device settings, learn, save that code and then be able to access it via indigo.

Am I way off track here or just running into issues?

Below is the event log during reload:

Starting plugin "Cynical Caché 1.1.0b8" (pid 782)
Started plugin "Cynical Caché 1.1.0b8"
Cynical Caché mapping device "Living Room AV" 1951616333(gcnet)
Cynical Caché Living Room AV starting
Cynical Caché Living Room AV connecting to network device 10.0.1.19
Cynical Caché plugin starting asyn operation
Cynical Caché using no IR database
Cynical Caché STDOUT: VERSION 710-1005-05
Cynical Caché Living Room AV ready with 3 device(s)


Update: Updated to Beta 9 (can we please get rid of the "b" so it's a simple double click to install?) and I can now see the three ports.

Does the itach need to be directly connected to the mac during setup for indigo? Right now I have it just as a stand alone device with an ethernet cable.

The plugin talks to the network device to ask it about its contents and configuration, in order to present the proper lists of onboard devices. So yes, you need to have your device up and on the network when you create devices in Cynical Caché.

Update: Updated to Beta 9 (can we please get rid of the "b" so it's a simple double click to install?) and I can now see the three ports.

Good. Things got a little wobble with the early Indigo 6 betas. And yes, I'll get rid of the "b" notation. We just realized a few days ago that's why Indigo has trouble upgrading my plugins.

Cynical Caché STDOUT: VERSION 710-1005-05

You have one of those (rare?) iTachs that report a weird version number. Double-check that you've got the latest firmware; if not, consider upgrading (you can do that yourself).

Cheers
-- perry

Cynical Caché STDOUT: VERSION 710-1005-05

You have one of those (rare?) iTachs that report a weird version number. Double-check that you've got the latest firmware; if not, consider upgrading (you can do that yourself).[/quote]

Stupid question, how do I find out what the firmware is for it?

Stupid question, how do I find out what the firmware is for it?

You can see the current firmware version in the "network" section of the device's webpage.

And never mind, actually - I double-checked and your version looks fine.

Cheers
-- perry

Two dumb questions:

#1 when I hit learn on emitter 1, can I change that in the future to fire from say emitter 3 or is the code somehow tied to that specific emitter?

#2 certainly there is an easier way to enter the IR commands than to learn every single one of them? The receiver on that itach is minuscule! On top of that... 5 components have a LOT of commands... that could make things... tedious

Thanks.

When I hit learn on emitter 1, can I change that in the future to fire from say emitter 3 or is the code somehow tied to that specific emitter?

The symbol data is independent of the emitter, or the device. Just switch the emitter popup in the sending action. (It's even designed to be independent of the device type, but we won't know how that goes until the plugin actually supports another type of device. )

In case that's not obvious, you can also copy and paste those symbol strings around. They're just strings. Back them up in a spreadsheet if you're feeling paranoid. You could even store them in Indigo variables and use plugin formulas.

#2 certainly there is an easier way to enter the IR commands than to learn every single one of them? The receiver on that itach is minuscule! On top of that... 5 components have a LOT of commands... that could make things... tedious

On the Internet, you may find libraries of IR codes in "hex" format (invented for the Pronto line of remotes long ago, and thus sometimes called Pronto hex codes. You can copy and paste these hex codes directly into the dialog fields in Cynical Caché, and they'll get converted into internal form. See the documentation for a bit more information.

If you are stuck learning lots of codes from devices, GC makes a serial dongle (the GC-IRL) that is much better at receiving IR codes. You plug that into a serial port. But it won't save you from laboriously learning them one by one.

I designed the ability to create libraries of IR codes into the plugin (that's what the "database" setting is for), but that's not implemented yet. Don't hold your breath.

Cheers
-- perry

Thanks Perry. I figured their were emitter independent, but thought I saw in the ilearn software that you had to identify the emitter.

If you were to get a database together, that would be awesome, however I heard the harmony line from logitech will be for sale soon... I think that would probably be an easier task than getting that all together Although maybe that is something you could leverage the community to collaborating on in some way. That would be a place for all the paranoid people to store their codes and also allow others to grab them and use them for their own setups.

After googling a bit, I was able to stumble upon some of the hex codes but hadn't gotten back to the forums.

Lot's of codes on this site: http://www.remotecentral.com/cgi-bin/codes/

Carl

First of all I want to thank Perry for his great work!
You make a lot of people very happy!

I installed the Cynical Caché plugin and it works perfect!
One question:
The iTach goes automatic off when the TV is not used
(alarm system on -> whole AVset (including iTach) off)

But when the the AVset is powered again (including the iTach), the plugin keeps saying;
"state unavailable" (even when the checkbox Keep Alive is not on).

The only way to make the plugin live again is manual reload.

Anybody a solution for this "problem"?
(even when the iTach has a power failure, the Plugin will not work automaticly again and that's not the intention of a remote control )

Kind regards,

John

But when the the AVset is powered again (including the iTach), the plugin keeps saying;
"state unavailable" (even when the checkbox Keep Alive is not on).

From the plugin's point of view, powering off an iTach means it's failed. An ordinary failure (which includes the device just "disappearing" from the network) will be retried periodically - eventually the plugin will try once a minute to see if your iTach is back. This will happen whether keep-alives are on or off - the keep-alives just help determining that recovery is needed at all.

If your iTach is successfully rebooted (which takes a while; these are not fast devices) and more than a minute has passed after that, if your plugin device still has not recovered, you may see a bug. Turn on debug logging, reload the plugin, go through your demonstration cycle, and send me the resulting Indigo log.

The easiest way to manually reset the Indigo device is to disable and re-enable the network device, either by toggling the "enabled" checkbox in the UI or by scripting this (using Indigo's generic enable/disable device script operations). Note that you must cycle the network device (the one whose configuration has the IP address in it), rather than the individual IR/relay/etc. devices.

Cheers
-- perry

Hi Perry,

Thank you very much for your fast feedback (and the manually reset hint).
I have sent you the log.

Kind regards,

John

Hi Perry,

Thank you very much for your fast feedback (and the manually reset hint).
I have sent you the log.

John

Looks like your disappearing device managed to look like a network failure, and the plugin mis-diagnosed that as a permanent error. Try version 1.6.7, which should classify the problem better.

Cheers
-- perry

Hello Perry,

Thanks again for the fast update. I think this will work.
For certainty I disabled and enabled the Indigo Communication with the GC-100 when the power is off and on again (with a Trigger delay time from 20 seconds).

2 strange things I discovered last days;

- when the iTach and the GC-100 are at the same time connected at Indigo, the Plugin is very slow and I got errors and errors.
(When one of them are disabled the learning proces with the iTach goes perfect).

- The GC-100 is more sensitive with the Hex codes. Before I saw your great! learning feature in the plugin, I used the Mac iLearn program.
These codes are working prefect with the iTach but when I used the GC-100 I got errors;

Below some details of the log. I can send you the total log via mail (The maximum number of allowed characters at the forum is 120000).

Kind regards,

John

ps; everything is working great now, I'm a fan of your work!




2014-01-17 21:06:10 Cynical Caché Error GC-100 unavailable: [Errno 60] Operation timed out
2014-01-17 21:06:10 Cynical Caché Error GC-100 connection lost - resetting
2014-01-17 21:06:10 Cynical Caché GC-100 connecting to host
2014-01-17 21:06:10 Cynical Caché GC-100 is now exploring
2014-01-17 21:06:14 Cynical Caché Error GC-100 unavailable: (15, 'invalid pulse count')
2014-01-17 21:06:44 Application Reloading plugin "Cynical Caché 1.6.6"
2014-01-17 21:06:44 Application Stopping plugin "Cynical Caché 1.6.6" (pid 29012)
2014-01-17 21:06:44 Cynical Caché shutdown sensed
2014-01-17 21:06:45 Application Stopped plugin "Cynical Caché 1.6.6"
2014-01-17 21:06:47 Application Starting plugin "Cynical Caché 1.6.6" (pid 33384)
2014-01-17 21:06:47 Cynical Caché mapping device "GC-100" 1848935002(gcnet)
2014-01-17 21:06:47 Cynical Caché GC-100 starting
2014-01-17 21:06:47 Cynical Caché GC-100 connecting to host
2014-01-17 21:06:47 Cynical Caché mapping device "AV Receiver" 116669406(iremitter)
2014-01-17 21:06:47 Cynical Caché AV Receiver starting
2014-01-17 21:06:47 Cynical Caché mapping device "Caché iTach" 1723058988(gcnet)
2014-01-17 21:06:47 Cynical Caché Caché iTach starting
2014-01-17 21:06:47 Cynical Caché Caché iTach connecting to host
2014-01-17 21:06:47 Cynical Caché mapping device "DVD player" 1456318141(iremitter)
2014-01-17 21:06:47 Cynical Caché DVD player starting
2014-01-17 21:06:47 Cynical Caché mapping device "JVC-TV" 749492120(iremitter)
2014-01-17 21:06:47 Cynical Caché JVC-TV starting
2014-01-17 21:07:00 Action Group JVC TV aan/uit
2014-01-17 21:07:00 Cynical Caché send <Symbol/generic:38000 [(319,160), etc. etc.
2014-01-17 21:07:01 Cynical Caché Error GC-100 unavailable: (15, 'invalid pulse count')
2014-01-17 21:07:01 Cynical Caché Error AppleTV unavailable: host device GC-100 is unavailable

2014-01-17 21:07:01 Cynical Caché Error GC-100 unavailable: (15, 'invalid pulse count')

That's the GC-100 complaining that the plugin somehow messed up the format of an IR code it's trying to send. My plugin is of the paranoid sort and takes itself offline in this case.

In the plugin configuration, set the Debug Modules field to ir.gcache.gcnet, reload, and try to the sending again. Then send me the resulting log. If you think that your learning step contributes to the problem, do that too.

Oh, and you're welcome.

Cheers
-- perry

Any ideas? I’m running Indigo 5.1.6 with plugin v1.1.0b7 and have an ancient GC-100-12 running firmware 2.0.8-12r2.. i did upgrade to indigo 5.1.6 a few days ago so that MIGHT coincide with the issue.. but i’m not 100% sure.

Woah! Talk about a blast from the past!

Your device has somehow lost its "state" state entry. Since the entire operation of the device depends on this state, you're not going to make any headway with it. (No, the plugin does not expect state keys to just gratuitously disappear. I have no idea how that happened.)

By far the easiest answer is to delete and recreate the affected device. That should fix it. But you should also consider upgrading the version of your plugin - anything with a "b" (beta) in it is by definition incomplete and to be used only with caution...

Cheers
-- perry