Reply To: OSSC, Harmony Remote and Hydra

[nmalinoski]

The thing is… since it’s a Scart Switcher, there is no telling how / if the OSSC would be able to autoload the profiles I created. Since I have a view of them, it’s really tedious to always load them manually. And I already have the auto-load feature active.

I’m not aware of the OSSC being able to automatically loading profiles, except that, when powered on, it loads the last profile used. Which option, exactly, are you referring to, and where in the menu is it located?

Is it possible that the OSSC somehow sees the source and loads its profiles then? I mean, of course it is one source to the scart cable, but the hydra has all slots full of consoles, and technically every console should output another information to the OSSC. Has anyone any idea?

No; as far as I know, there’s no facility in consumer analogue video for a device to identify itself, game consoles (at least ones that you would use the OSSC with) don’t have the capability to identify themselves, and the OSSC doesn’t have the capability to read such information.

Likewise, there’s no information passed downstream from any SCART switcher to indicate which input is currently active. Some switchers, like the gscartsw, have an interface that can be tapped to read that information, but that information is not usable without some sort of intermediary controller that can understand that interface and pass that on. On that same note, there is currently no serial interface accessible on the OSSC, so precise remote control is not possible–you’d need a remote or an IR blaster to control the OSSC.

It’s been argued that individual consoles could be identified based on the video (and probably audio) output; however, to my knowledge, no one has done the research, so there’s no established list of quirks to then code into a heuristics algorithm–the information simply doesn’t exist or isn’t available.

Regarding VGA-compliant devices specifically, EDID might be possible, but I’m not sure if the OSSC would be able to read information, and the kind of consoles you’d be using with the OSSC wouldn’t support EDID to begin with.

Besides that, there is the thing with my Harmony Ultimate Remote. Has anyone used it with the OSSC? And if so, has anyone figured out how I could link different profiles to the activities inside the remote? It would be nice to just tell the Harmony to turn on the N64, after that everything else would self-load.

How would you have the Harmony remote turn on the N64? Do you have a power outlet controller that is compatible with the Harmony Hub? I wasn’t able to find any with a cursory web search.

The last thing is… Since I have a Yamaha Receiver, the harmony remotes Volume Buttons switch between phase intervals in the OSSC. I have searched around and found *some* answers to it, but even in the wiki I’m confused at how to just tell the remote to use (for example) the forward/backward buttons as the phase setting-buttons. I have a standard remote that came with the OSSC that works perfect, but I would rather like to use my harmony instead (at least if it’s possible to link the profiles with it, in case the OSSC can’t read the Hydra Switch’ informations)

I assume you’ve seen the instructions for using the Harmony remote with the OSSC, which detail how to add the OSSC as a device. At the very end of those instructions (also in the main OSSC manual) is the procedure for how to remap remote control inputs, which should allow you to remap the remote as you see fit, including moving phase controls to fast-forward/rewind.

Speaking more generally, right now, there really isn’t any good way to automate or remote-control the OSSC. Most SCART switchers don’t have any interface to tap in order to read which input is currently active (I’m only aware of the gscartsw and gcompsw; might be something on the Hydras, but I’m not aware of any); and then, like I said, the OSSC doesn’t have a serial interface for remote control, so any remote control will need to be done using an infrared transmitter; and then you need a controller device that can tie all that together, and, chances are, that’s not going to be a Harmony Hub.

That device would need a physical interface to the switchers, it would need to understand what kind of device it’s connected to, so it can understand how to read any output from it; it would then need an IR blaster, so it can send commands to the OSSC, which is going to be slow, because it can’t just pass it a setting ID and a value, it needs to navigate the menus; and then it needs a profiling software that would present you with a list of inputs from the connected switcher, label them (so input 1 is PS1, input 2 is Dreamcast, etc), and then allow you to create an OSSC profile that it can program into the OSSC via IR.

Where that might connect with your Harmony remote might simply be switching the input on your AVR to OSSC, and possibly toggling a couple power outlets to turn on the OSSC and N64, if there are compatible power outlet controllers. (Not sure it makes sense to power off the intermediary controller, especially if it’s running on something like a RasPi.)