kyl416 wrote: ↑Sat Nov 21, 2020 1:28 pm
The Info, Guide, LiveTV, RecordedTV and Green/Windows buttons you're complaining about doing nothing on the WMC remote are the ones not available to
any 3rd party apps, even Kodi can't use them. If you have a model with the teletext keys, those buttons also don't function with 3rd party apps. They're hardcoded by the OS to only launch functions within Windows Media Center and doesn't send commands that can be interpreted by other apps like the other keys on the remote.
If you don't have WMC installed the buttons don't do anything since the ehShell and/or ehTray process that the OS sends the commands to isn't available. But if you do one of those community hacks to get WMC on Windows 10, they would lauch those functions on Windows Media Center and bring it to the foreground no matter what application you're currently using.
The on/off or "PC Power" button is hardcoded, depening on how the OS is setup, it might put it in "away mode" where it stops all multimedia playback and disables the sound and video output, but leaves the OS and hard drive running so background functions like recording still work. Similar to what happens when you "turn off" a cable box or satellite receiver. On non WMC OS's I think its behavior varies depending on what you setup the power key to do in the settings.
The volume keys are also hardcoded to control the system volume.
The "clear" button thing they might be able to address, the thing is its behavior varies by app. It sends a "clr" command, which most apps interpret as the "Backspace" key which deletes the character behind the cursor, but when it's not in a text box the key doubles as the "back" shortcut in many apps, others interpret it as the "Delete" key which usually deletes the character in front of the cursor.
The "*" button is more complicated, it sends an asterisk command which is mainly used for wild cards when doing searches. After subchannel numbering support came with the Vista TV pack, Windows Media Center changed it to interpret "*" as "." when manually entering channel numbers while you watch live TV or browse the guide and kept it as an asterisk in most other places, but the remote still sends the command as if it's an asterisk.
@kyl416. Thank you for your very informative input. I had not realized that Windows does not post messages to apps for all the buttons on a WMC remote. I confirm that both my Dell and HP remotes do not trigger any messages for Info, Guide, LiveTV, RecordedTV. So, I will stop complaining about those buttons not working, although I do not see why Windows could not be configured to pass messages for those buttons. Maybe there is a registry setting somewhere that one could tweak to make it happen?
For on/off I am happy with the behavior except for the fact that it triggers an error message upon resuming if watching Live TV before going to sleep. I just want the error message to not show up since everything is fine.
Volume keys do control the system volume, but they also pass VK_VOLUME_UP / DOWN / MUTE and I assume this is how pressing Mute is used by SD to turn the captions on or off. No issue there.
Regarding Clear, somehow it posts VK_ESCAPE. I did not expect that but it indeed means that VK_ESCAPE should be handled specially in context where one might want to use it as backspace rather than escape. This might not be very logical from a programming point of view but that is how it works in WMC. One should note that Back posts VK_BROWSER_BACK, so certainly it is possible to handle Clear and Back differently.
"*" as you explained posts as "*". So special handling so be done when "*" is used while typing the number of a channel.
Now Channel Up and Channel Down both post as WM_APPCOMMAND with a command that needs to be extracted with GET_APPCOMMAND_LPARAM() to get APPCOMMAND_MEDIA_CHANNEL_UP/DOWN. I now understand why pressing those buttons pops up the annoying mini control bar. Somehow pressing any button that posts WM_APPCOMMAND in the app seems to pop up the annoying mini control bar. I don't know if this due to a control that is being used within the app but I really do not like it. Channel Up/Down should just go a channel up or down and not behave the way it does.
Record is also a mess because it posts as WM_APPCOMMAND / APPCOMMAND_MEDIA_RECORD so it can pop up the annoying mini control bar. Somehow the app seems to handle the message to a certain extent because it the controls at the bottom of the app are displayed at the time when the button is pressed a red circle briefly shows up around the record button. But it does not seem to do anything. Weird. And if the controls at the bottom of the app are not displayed at the time when the button is pressed then there is no clear visual feedback that record was pressed.
So, to summarize I agree to stop complaining about Info, Guide, LiveTV, RecordedTV not doing anything, but I do not see a reason for on/off, Clear, *, Channel Up, Channel Down and Record not to work properly (i.e. as they do in WMC) and I still expect a fix one day...
By the way, for Info, Guide, LiveTV, RecordedTV it would be nice to follow the great suggestion from @Garyr and agree on some codes between VK_F13 and VK_F24 so that users with a Harmony remote or with a Flirc IR receiver (assuming it can post such message) could configure their environment to mimic what was possible with WMC.
