IRene

IRene is a smart home enhancement to replay TV remote signals on a Raspberry Pi. It it based on a german guide and is enhanced with my own soft- and hardware experience. This guide uses concrete version numbers, since with different (new) ones it didn't work for me, so I had to downgrade...

Requirements

• Raspberry Pi (I use Raspberry Pi 1 Model B+)
• IR Sender & Receiver (I use Ils - Mini 38KHz IR)
• Female2Female Jumper Wire
• Raspbian Jesse (2017-07-05)
• lirc-0.9.0-pre1
• PHP 7.0.27
• Apache 2.4.10

Hardware

Add IR Receiver to PIN 23 (receive) & and IR Sender to PIN 24 (send). For Pi >=3 do it accordingly.

Raspbian OS

It is mandatory to use Raspbian Jesse since in Raspbian Stretch and newer versions of LIRC a few things changed and are not working for me.

Install & Configure LIRC

1. Install LIRC

   sudo apt-get install lirc
   

2. Edit modules file and set pins for in and out

   sudo nano /etc/modules
   
   Add following lines:
   lirc_dev
   lirc_rpi gpio_in_pin=23 gpio_out_pin=24
   

3. Enable lirc-rpi module

   sudo nano /boot/config.txt
   
   Add or uncomment:
   # Uncomment this to enable the lirc-rpi module
   dtoverlay=lirc-rpi,gpio_in_pin=23,gpio_out_pin=24
   

4. Set device & driver

   sudo nano /etc/lirc/hardware.conf
   
   Set following lines:
   DRIVER="default"
   DEVICE="/dev/lirc0"
   MODULES="lirc_rpi"	
   

5. Reboot system

   sudo reboot
   

Test

sudo mode2 --driver default --device /dev/lirc0   

Aim your remote at the IR Receiver and press some buttons. Incoming signals should be displayed in the console.

Record signals

1. Stop LIRC service

   sudo /etc/init.d/lirc stop
   

2. Look up key mappings

   irrecord --list-namespace
   
   I use:
   - KEY_POWER
   - KEY_TEXT
   - KEY_VOLUMEDOWN
   - KEY_VOLUMEUP
   - KEY_MUTE
   - KEY_CHANNELDOWN
   - KEY_CHANNELUP
   - KEY_MEDIA
   ...
   

3. Record signals from device you want to replay

   irrecord -d /dev/lirc0  
   
   Enter name of remote (only ascii, no spaces) :tv
   Using tv.lircd.conf as output filename
   

4. Stash old lircd.conf

   sudo mv /etc/lirc/lircd.conf /etc/lirc/lircd_original.conf
   

5. Copy your recorded signals to the lirc folder to replace the default

   sudo cp ~/tv.lircd.conf /etc/lirc/lircd.conf
   

6. Start the service

   sudo /etc/init.d/lirc start
   

7. Test it

   SEND_ONCE tv KEY_POWER
   

Setup Webserver for WebGUI

1. Install apache
2. Install PHP 7
3. Copy content of gui folder in "/var/www/html" on raspberry pi
4. Add Fontawesome-Pro OR replace with free version and change linking in index.php
5. Finish! The GUI should be accessible on Port 80

Demonstration

• The WebGUI with Channel Up&Down, Volume Up&Down, Mute, Power, Videotext and Source: Mobile Remote TV
• IRene in live action: https://vimeo.com/306541515