using firewire to control power to STB

[thisisnotadrill]

I have a box with firewire and I have it set up to change channels but not for recording (the video is fed through my HD-PVR).

Unfortunately, I missed a recording last night because i accidentally turned my STB off.

Is there a set of commands and a way to implement it in gbpvr to have GBPVRrecordingservice check to see if the STB is on and if it isn't turn it on via firewire?

i tried searching but didnt come up with a relevant topic.

i figure worst case scenario once everything is perfectly set up i can just block the IR receiver of the STB but for now I do need to switch over watching television directly from the STB when i am not testing.

[carpeVideo]

http://home.comcast.net/~timmmoore/firewire/readme.htm

Looks like you can send a power command - but not sure how you would know what state it was in before you send the command.

[thisisnotadrill]

theoretically it wouldnt be too hard since i think you could use the -v flag to monitor any response from the STB and if it were off there wouldn't be response. ill have to check on that at some point today.

is there a place where i can specify a script to be run before recording starts?

writing a script is at the moment a little beyond my knowledge but whats a better way to learn?

[whurlston]

If you create a batch file, you can call it as your channel changer.

[thisisnotadrill]

and then just call channel.exe as needed inside the batch. i like it.
now i just need to find some way to monitor the STB's response...

[carpeVideo]

Unfortunately using the -v I got the same response with the STB on versus off - maybe yours will vary.

If there is something different you can pipe the response to a file and use find on it to check the results.

[zehd]

http://home.comcast.net/~timmmoore/firewire/readme.htm

Looks like you can send a power command - but not sure how you would know what state it was in before you send the command.

I was wondering: The Tim Moore page states often that his little package is for MCE only, and that you must have a working IR Blaster.

I'm not sure why. If the program can change channels via Firewire, why is it dependant on IR...?