Russound and HomeSeer Music Integration

[RJ]

Hey Gang-

I have attached the latest build of the Russound plugin. This provides functionality to integrate your HomeSeer Media Player and iTunes plugins with Russound. Please note: In order to use this plugin you need the latest versions of all three from the updater (except this one, just use the DLL below).

Setup

• Create or Modify a source on the Russound config page. You will notice 2 new source types, HomeSeer Media Player and HomeSeer iTunes.
• Set the source as the specified music player and click update.
• Make sure that the output from your computer is connected to your Russound controller. For example, your audio out from your computer connects to the audio in on Russound.

Use

• The Russound plugin automatically detects when the plugin has been enabled. Please note that only 1 stream is supported, so if two zones are tuned to HomeSeer they will both see the same data.
• When the source is selected at the Russound Keypad, it will display a menu. This contains "Genres", "Albums", "Artists", "Playlists", and "Tracks."
• Use the "+" and "-" keys to scroll through options, and the "Play" key to select an option. The "Stop" key returns to the parent menu.
• During Playback, press "Pause" to pause music and "Play" to resume. "Stop" stops music and returns to the parent menu. To select new music without stopping the current music, press "+" or "-"
• The "+" and "-" keys can be held to rapidly scroll through music.

The UI is fairly intuitive, but if you are still confused after playing with it a bit just ask. Otherwise, happy testing!

New Version Posted on 1/6

[pkoslow]

Excellent RJ... I'll take it for a test drive and report back.

Cheers,
Paul

[pkoslow]

Hi RJ,

Some intitial feedback for you...

• When I select the Media Player source from the UNO keypad, the plug-in doesn't seem to recognized that I selected the source as I can't access any of the controls (pressing (+) and (-), etc. It may pick this up if I'm patient enough, but it wouldn't be usable for someone walking up to the keypad. If I select the Media Player source from the HS web interface and then walk to the keypad, it seems to always work.
• I can't seem to select anything except for playlists. Sometimes I'll see "Genre" or "Artist" appear for a brief fraction of a second on the display, but all I've been able to toggle through are playlists.
• The display itself is making me dizzy... changes from playlist to title to artist sometimes several times a second. It seemed to work for the first minute or so that I tried the plug-in. After hitting a few buttons the display changes seemed to get wacky.
• When I hit stop, the playlist, title & artist continues to change rapidly on the display making it very difficult to scroll through the playlists (maybe this is also part of the reason I can't scroll through genre, artist, ect?).
• If I change the UNO keypad to another source, the Media Player text continues to be passed to the display overwriting the XM or AM/FM meta data. This is a big problem as it messes up interaction with the other sources... I've waited 5mins on the XM source to see if it would straighten out, but it's still displaying Media Player metadata.
• Even after selecting a playlist and while listening to music, other random playlists seem to flash on the Keypad display (not just the one you are listening to)

I've shutdown HS a couple times after running for 5 - 10mins just to reset things and received tons of errors in the log each time(I'll attach a file showing these). I'm running HS Beta 2.1.143 and the latest Media Player plug-in Beta and the plug-in polling is set to the default 15secs.

Cheers,
Paul

[RJ]

HI Paul-

Thanks for the feedback. I think I am still missing some try/catch loops somewhere.

To disable this, edit the Russound.ini file. Look for the line under [Sources] that matches your source, and change the 4 to a 3 or 2. Start up HomeSeer again and it should do the trick.

[Mael]

Wow

I've been waiting for something like this. It has the potential to solve several problems for me. I'm currently using the J River Media Player connected to my Russound through the JRMC plugin. This approach has sever drawbacks for me since both Homeseer and JRMC are running on the same server:

1. Both Homeseer and JRMC can't both use the serial port at the same time which means I've been forced to choose between Russound/Homeseer integration or MP3 functionality and accessibility via the UNO keypads.

2. In order to use JMRC with the plugin, you need to stay logged in to the server in order to keep it running. JMRC is not a true client/server application, you also can't create playlists or control MP3's through the Russound without being logged on the console of the server through a VNC connection. I would like people to be able to create playlists without exposing the console of the server.

It sounds like the plugin still has a few bugs to be worked out, but this is very promising. It appears the plugin will resolve issue #1, but what about #2? Can I create playlists remotely and do I need to stay logged into the console? I also wanted to know when/if the new plugin will support multiple streams with multiple sound cards?

Keep up the good work

[RJ]

Hi Mael-

Creating playlists remotely seems a bit extreme for right now... If you wanted to create a playlist, this wouldm be done through either the Media Player or iTunes plugin within HomeSeer.

I am not familiar with the JRMC plugin or what integration it provides, so I can't give you a firm answer as to how the Russound plugin will enhance it. In a nutshell, this plugin allows you to play music from either HomeSeer Media Player or iTunes using the Russound keypad interface.

[Dino]

RJ:

Great job on the update, but......some minor things came up...

Current setup:
Controller 1 - CAM 6.6 Keypads 1-6
Controller 2 - CAM 6.6 Keypads 7-12
Controller 3 - CAV 6.6 Keypads 13-18
Source 1 - Russound Radio Tuner
Source 2 - Media Server with HomeSeer installed

1. Keypads 1,2 and 3 were able to control media player

2. Keypads 4-18, no response from media player, but could hear what was being played.
I'm sure this was the error when hitting +/- keys:
~!~Russound~!~Error in SendCMD: Conversion from string "FFFFFFFF" to type 'Byte' is not valid.

3. While scrolling between Artist, Genre, etc... (Parent menu) a "4" came up on the display, but did nothing except return you to the Parent Menu.

4. When turning on a keypad and/or selecting the source for Media Player, if something is already playing, that should be displayed on the keypad, not the parent menu.

5. I also noticed that media player continues to play when all zones are off.

6. As Paul pointed out...if I change the keypad to another source, the Media Player text continues to be passed to the display overwriting the AM/FM meta data.

We are so close....

Thanks.

Dino.

[Mael]

Hi Mael-

Creating playlists remotely seems a bit extreme for right now... If you wanted to create a playlist, this wouldm be done through either the Media Player or iTunes plugin within HomeSeer.

I am not familiar with the JRMC plugin or what integration it provides, so I can't give you a firm answer as to how the Russound plugin will enhance it. In a nutshell, this plugin allows you to play music from either HomeSeer Media Player or iTunes using the Russound keypad interface.

Thanks for the response, I can probably figure out a way to create playlists remotely.

Are there any plans to support multiple streams (assuming multiple sound cards of course) or is this a limitation of Media Player or iTunes?

[RJ]

Hi Mael-

There are plans to create multiple streams for iTunes and Media Player, but until those are implented the plugin will probably not utilize them. To the best of my understanding, this will stream music to a specific speaker client instance, which will then stream to the sound card.

Dino-

I have fixed 3, 4, and 5. For 1 and 2, can you trigger events based on a keypress on Zones 4 through 18? I think the multi-controller setup might be doing something strange. The outgoing code was fixed, but I don't think incoming is handled right now. I will take a look at this.

One thing I forgot to mention - did you guys disable Tom's script before testing? I think what might be happening is that the two are conflicting, which is causing the extra text. Make sure that that is disabled first before using this functionality.

There is a new version posted at the top of this thread. Please check it out!

[Dino]

RJ:

Thanks for the update. I'll test it out.

With HomeSeer, I can still turn on/off, select different sources on Zones 4-18, actually Zone 6 doesn't work properly for some reason.

I have removed Tom's script before doing the updates and testing.

Thanks.

Dino.

[pkoslow]

Hi RJ,

Sorry, but I can't get this latest version to do anything?

I can still control the CAV through the web interface and Russound Keypad screen so know that the serial connection is good.


I've verified that Tom's script was pulled out and that my source was set for "Media Player" but absolutley no control or display on the UNO keypad.

Still seeing LOTS of errors in the log... will try to be more specific with some examples in the next couple days.

Thanks,
Paul

[Dino]

RJ:

I noticed some more things with the latest dll.

1. When you turn off a keypad, it should not stop media player, unless all keypads are off.

2. Minor - text is still being pushed to a keypad that is off. If a keypad is off, nothing should be displayed on it.

3. Also, with the HomeSeer status pages, and Russound keypad pages, it does not update properly. I had a couple of zones turned on, and the status pages, still said it was off.


4. Zones 4-18 still do not work from the keypads.

Thanks.

Dino.

[RJ]

Hi Guys-

There have been some minor changes in the build just posted (1.0.2558.27614). Please let me know if this resolves any issues.

Dino-
On #2, how can text be pushed to a zone that is turned off? I guess this is just confusing for me to understand.

[pkoslow]

Dino-
On #2, how can text be pushed to a zone that is turned off? I guess this is just confusing for me to understand.

RJ,

The UNO keypads never really turn off, they just kind of go to sleep and the backlight goes out. I think this is done so the keypad can still pass IR signals from handheld remotes, respond to pages, etc. while off.

While it doesn't hurt anything functionally, it's going to be concerning to customers who also think the keypad is off and wonder why it's still displaying data.

I'm still dead in the water but will load up the new build to see what happends...

Thanks,
Paul

[pkoslow]

Hi RJ,

Sorry, but I can't get this latest version to do anything?

I can still control the CAV through the web interface and Russound Keypad screen so know that the serial connection is good.


I've verified that Tom's script was pulled out and that my source was set for "Media Player" but absolutley no control or display on the UNO keypad.

Still seeing LOTS of errors in the log... will try to be more specific with some examples in the next couple days.

Thanks,
Paul

RJ,

I grabbed the latest version this morning and I'm finally back in business! Have only spent a few minutes with it, but functionality from the keypad looks great so far.

One thing I don't like is the "Now Playing:", "Album:", "Artist:", etc. that preceeds the metadata... it takes up too much room on the display and this isn't how the XM Tuner or SMS3 display the info which simply shows the Artist, Title, etc. Since the beginning of the line is where the UNO will pause the text for a second or two before scrolling, most of what you see is "Now Playing", etc and the actual title or artist get truncated until the scrolling starts. Can these please be pulled out?

I have one zone with three UNO-S2 keypads connected using the SA-ZX3 keypad splitter (Living Room, Kitchen & Dining Room). Only the keypad in the Kitchen is displaying any meta data, but I can control from any of the three keypads? I've never tested to see if I can send text to all three keypads before so may be a Russound limitation? I'll do a little more testing with this and report back.

Will use the system some more this weekend and report back...

Great work RJ! Pleased to see HST take on this integration between plug-ins.

Cheers,
Paul