Netremote 2 with hsGirder and Homeseer 2

[jwilson56]

Just to let people know... I have tested a new Netremote 2 build that fixes the Girder 3 setting used to communicate with the free hsGirder plugin available for Homeseer 2 (see HS updater) and I have confirmed it will work with the latest HS2 build.

This new NR2 build should be out soon. I have the dll that was fixed so I could email it if you need it sooner.

Other news is that Netremote Designer 2 is free of charge and greatly improved. Also Netremote is currently on sale for $29.99

Netremote will integrate with several music players (although JRMC is the best IMHO) and with hsGirder you can do just about anything you want as far as a GUI frontend for Homeseer (as well as get two way communication with HS). At $30 this is a far less expensive GUI front end for HS than what is currently offered.

Although I have not been using HS recently I have given it some thought and if there is a lot of interest I might convert my last Homeseer Netremote skin to Netremote 2 or maybe come up with some other skin.

Let me know.

 

[DeLicious]

i am unfamiliar with this product. is it customizable? does it run on mobile devices? is $29.99 the only startup cost?

 

[SnyperBob]

i am unfamiliar with this product. is it customizable? does it run on mobile devices? is $29.99 the only startup cost?

Check it out. John (jwilson) pretty much pushes the envelope with this software. Yeah it's totally customizable. Because it interfaces with Homeseer, it can control hardware, software on the computer, etc... You can interface tons of hardware with it to do anything imaginable.

John has a whole house audio setup, all done thru custom skins he made himself. It supports multiple audio zones, so you can have each room playing different music if desired.

You'll have to pay additional money depending on what you want to do. You'll have to pay extra for J River Media Center if you want to use that. J River is a content management system as well. You add in your media and you can instantly search for anything you want.

It's really cool software to play around with. IIRC, they have a full demo that you can try before you buy. I highly recommend it, I just wish I had more time to play with it for my house

 

[DeLicious]

jwilson, let us know when the new NR2 comes out that works... i'd certainly like to give it a try.

 

[jwilson56]

Will do. I will let you know when he posts the next build of Netremote 2.

As for what Netremote can do. It is a very robust graphical front end that can be used to control either Homeseer via the free hsGirder plugin (available viw the Homeseer updater) or the new Girder 5 which is also a full blown home automation package.

I used to use Homeseer 2 but last spring I migrated over to Girder 5 when I bought my Elk and Ocelot hardware. With hsGirder you can easily fire off Homeseer events (with a payload that can be used for 'case' statements), update images on the NR screen, change NR variables as well as an advanced variable watch system that works great for sliders to update the screen while dimming. To be honest I don't think there is much you can't do with Netremote to be used as a GUI frontend.

Beyond whichever back-end home automation package you use one of the nice things about Netremote is its 'Media Bridge' server which can interface with many player/database application. JRMC is the best IMHO and makes setting up true multizones a breeze. My current setup has six zones that can each have its own playlist being played. Any NR client running either on a Win32 machine or a PPC (WinCE) device can be set to view any 'zone'.

Check out these links to see what some of my skins looked like for the Homeseer integration.

The hsGirder forum on Homeseer

http://board.homeseer.com/forumdisplay.php?f=681

My Now Playing 2005 showcase (that was Homeseer based)

http://board.homeseer.com/showthread.php?t=100339

My Now Playing 2005 thread on Cocoontech

http://www.cocoontech.com/index.php?showto...ow+playing+2005

My Now Playing 2008 showcase on Cocoontech which is now Girder 5 based (long but worth reading through as it contains some history of the project)

http://www.cocoontech.com/index.php?showtopic=2444

A snapshot of the new Netremote Designer interface

http://www.cocoontech.com/index.php?act=at...ost&id=1968

 

[jwilson56]

The new build for Netremote 2 is up now.

Build 138 - 2.0.15
December 4, 2008

* Girder Plugin Instance Fix
* Girder 3 communication fix (hsGirder / ievents)

You can use it for 30 days on the trial.

http://www.promixis.com/forums/showthread.php?t=17302

 

[123]

John,

Are there any tutorials available for Netremote Designer? I couldn't find anything at the Proximis site or on Youtube.

You've generated a very slick UI and I'd like to explore the possiblity of building a Premise plugin (along the lines of hsGirder). But before I can even think of writing a plugin, I need to learn how to work with Designer and Netremote. Designer's built-in help is "reference-based" and I learn faster using tutorials with examples.

 

[electron]

It comes with some great examples, you can find them in the "My Documents" folder.

 

[123]

Yes, thanks, I saw the samples ("Flat Style and DM", "new-pro_480x640", etc). I was hoping there'd be a step-by-step tutorial explaining how to build one of the examples from scratch ... either a written description or a video.

 

[RonB]

There currently isn't a good instruction video available showing you how to do Device Manager controls, however I have a very brief message up on our forum showing step by step on how to create them

http://promixis.com/forums/showthread.php?t=19169

This video shows you how to create a simple NetRemote interface
http://promixis.com/screencasts/sc1/

I will try to put a new video together next week showing off the great new Device Manager components.

 

[123]

Ron,
Many thanks! Exactly what I need; a little brief but it's a start.

 

[jwilson56]

As someone who started creating skins using Tonto and then moving over to Netremote Designer I have to first say that using NRD is light years ahead of Tonto....hahahaha

And second I find that most people learn from diving into someone else's CCF. I know thats how I learned.


Learning LUA on the other hand was a bit steeper for me.. still learning....too many years programming Labview... my text based language skills got rusty.

In the end Netremote lets you do some amazing things for a GUI frontend. I am very happy with its performance as well.