HomeSeer and CDJ- Able to control CDJ with Voice

Thanks to Tim (Tim@playful.com (Tim Fraley) we have figured out a way for HS to communicate with CDJ and slinke without any problems.

Tim set up a device ir file in both HomeSeer and CDJ. He used the Hiatachi VCR device file (c:\program files\nirvis\cdj\device files\hitachi\vcr.cde) supplied by Nirvis which will work fine.

I renamed the device to hscdj.cde and used ezlearn to change the command names (e.g. changed "Play" to "Playlist_play" (not necessary but easy to keep track of things).

Now the cool part- load the device file into both HS and CDJ but select an sl port (e.g. SL0) rather than an ir port.

Then make add commands to your CDJ map file.

Now when HS sends an ir command from hscdj, CDJ will do the corresponding map command. No ir is actually sent since HS and CDJ are communicating via the SL port not ir.

When previously trying to get HS and CDJ to communicate via active X control, the slinke would always crash.

Definitely my coolest HS feature! I have the output of my computer video modulated to the TVs. I can watch CDJ or the screen saver with the current album cover on the bedroom TV (or living room TV). I also have a 5" LCD with the modulated output on it by my bed.

I have a HS routine "Start the CD player"- HS starts CDJ, waits 15 seconds and then says "The CD player has started, What kind of music would you like to hear?"

I respond "Jazz" (or blues or rock or artist's name" HS say "Cool, I am always in the mood for Jazz" and a random jazz playlist starts.

I can always switch to another type of music by say "Play some rock" etc.

I can also say "what CD is playing" and HS responds with the artist, title and track info.

No crashes with the new method. I will need more commands to add to the device file but shouldn't be a problem. If I wanted to get really slick, I could map a command for every artist. (I have ~ 1000 cds in 3 Sony players.)

I don't care what anybody says - but this beats any 10K $$$ system.

Here is a sample CDJ map file:

homeseercdj:jazz{cdj:playlist_stop cdj:playlist_mode[manual] cdj:playlist_clear cdj:search_mode[track] cdj:playlist_clear cdj:search[kw=jazz] cdj:playlist_clear cdj:playlist_mode[random] cdj:playlist_pointer[top] cdj:playlist_play}