MythTV iMON server - alpha release 1

As I mentioned before, I've been working on an LCD server for mythtv in my spare time with the intention of making full use of the iMON LCD's icons. I'm happy to say that I'm ready to release the first alpha version. Its a little rough around the edges, and very basic in functionality at the moment, but it's a decent start.

Note: this application is specifically for the iMON LCD...NOT the VFD. If your display doesn't look like the photos at the bottom of this page, you have the VFD, and this program won't do you a bit of good.

How to get it
First, you will need to download 2 separate archives. The first is the application specific archive, and the second is an archive of perl libraries I've written.

mythimon:
http://www.ronfrazier.net/mythtv/downloads/mythimon.tar.gz

RFLibs:
http://www.ronfrazier.net/mythtv/downloads/RFLibs.tar.gz

Make sure the RFLibs folder exists as a subdirectory of the folder where you put the mythimon files.


Running it

The first thing you want to do is to disable any other software that is outputting to the lcd (including LCDproc). The only thing you want to keep loaded is the lirc imon lcd driver.

Next, the simpler test is to try running testAnimations.pl and make sure you get output on the LCD. If you have the older version of the iMON LCD, you will need to edit the code and change '15c2:0038' to '15c2:ffdc'. Also, if your device is setup somewhere besides /dev/lcd0, modify that setting too. If it works, you are good to go for the next test. If not, check for things like perl libraries, and make sure you are using at least perl 5.8 (needed for the thread support).

Next, you can try the mythimon.pl application. First you need to open it up and setup a few config variables. Specifically, the port numbers for the lcd server and the network control, the location of the frontend log file, the location of the lcd devices, and the iMON version.

If you don't have logging enabled for your frontend, you will need to add logging by adding the necessary paramters to the script that launches mythfrontend (ex "-l /var/log/mythtv/mythfrontend.log"). You will also need to have enabled both the network control port (found under setup->general) and the lcd port (under setup->appearance). You may need to restart the frontend for these changes to take effect.

Once that's all setup, you want to kill the existing instance of the mythlcdserver (so you can steal the port from it) and quickly start up the application. You can do this with the command:

killall mythlcdserver; ./mythimon.pl

You should now be looking at a screen with a clock. Next, you need to wait up to 10 seconds for mythfrontend to connect to the lcdserver port. When it does, you will see the output "FIRST COMMAND RECIEVED FROM MYTHLCDSERVER" appear on the command line (not on the LCD).

Now, when you go to watch TV or listen to music, you should get info on the screen and icons lit up. If not, again, check for perl libraries. Make sure you have the mythtv perl bindings installed.


Known Limitations

Being a work in progress, there is (by definition) a lot of stuff to be added or improved upon. Here are some of the known limitations, and what I plan to do:

Menu Support - This will be added most likely in the next version. I plan to integrate it with the front panel controls of the case via lirc. This way the menu's won't pop up whenever there is a menu change in myth (as mythlcdserver does). Instead, it won't display the menus until you hit the specified button on the front panel to enter menu mode. Then the menu display will override everything else until you hit the specified exit key or you let the menu timeout.

Volume Support - This will be added eventually. I plan to add a bit of configurability here...perhaps with plugin modules. One of the things I want to do for my specific setup is to integrate it with my TV, so it controls the volume via the serial port. I prefer this to adjusting the volume within mythtv. However, that's not going to work for most people, so I'll make it work both ways. With a simple plugin architecture, I'm thinking people could customize it to work with their setup (such as controlling an AV receiver).

Generic Info - This is info like photo names in the photo gallery, etc. Hopefully this will be in the next verison also.

Pausing/Stopping - There are times when myth doesn't send progress updates (like when playing music in the background). As a result, I've taken it upon myself to continuing calculating the progress on the assumption that playback is proceeding as normal. However, since myth sends no pause events, I have no way to track them. Thus, when you pause, my script doesn't know it, and keeps going. A similar problem exists with not knowing when music playback has stopped. I haven't yet figured out an ideal way to handle this. Probably some hack of monitoring the IR codes, cross reference that will the current location as reported by the network control port, etc.


Ideas for future expansion

I welcome feedback on ideas for what other types of things to do. There are some things I'm not sure about:

Uses for icons/display features - Anything interesting I can do with the top progress bar, other than just duplicating the bottom progress bar? When I add menu support at a later time, I was thinking I could use it to track progress through the menu (like a scrollbar on the side of your browser). How about the spinning disk, and the tray icon right below it? And the vol and time icons (one use is obvious, but also kind of pointless)? How about the source icons? I've taken advantage of TV and HDTV, but not SRC/SRC1/SRC2/FIT (and while we are at it...what the heck is FIT for anyway?).

Any good way to get the recording status out of the backend for the rec icon? I could also try monitoring the backend log, but that won't always be available on the remote frontend.

Anyone know a way to get codec data out of the music player to light up those icons?

How about getting weather data out of mythweather?

Is there any easy way to get spectrum analyzer data out of myth or the linux audio system?


Custom Fonts

I've created 2 different fonts for the application. The first is a normal font, 16 pixel tall (currently used for the clock). The other is an 8 pixel tall font with small caps instead of lowercase letters. OK...technically I made a 3rd font, but it only consists of 1 charachter (space), and is only meant as a vertical spacer in the display.


If you would like to make your own fonts, you can use this utility
http://www.ronfrazier.net/mythtv/imon_fontedit.html

If you come up with some good fonts, please feel free to share them with me.


Screenshots