Hi Lou, I find this very interesting, partly because I've wanted something like this for a while and partly because I'm making something that does the exact same thing, although my solution would need much more technical knowhow than the average user has in its current form.
I think the best root for you to take is to make a device that is able to learn IR codes from any device that a user already has; this way you're not limiting yourself to any particular device like a virgin media box or a sky box. I've spent the past 2 or so years searching for a Freeview box that is controllable over WIFI or has firmware that is open enough that I can just write the functionality myself, but apart from one very old PVR from topfield which has some community based firmware modifications, there wasn't really anything that came close to providing what I (And I think you) also want. Even if you did manage to get one model working, there are so many different Freeview boxes around in the UK that the chances are that potential customers wouldn't have one of the boxes that your system works with. A few months ago, a company called Tvonics came out with some talking Freeview recorders in partnership with the RNIB. Unfortunately, just over a month later, Tvonics went into administration and as far as I know everyone at Tvonics was left unemployed. Because of this, it's very unlikely that you will be able to control these boxes without some form of device that sits in-between the box and an iPhone because the team that writes the firmware for them simply doesn't exist anymore. I mention this company because if you are working with the RNIB, it would at least to me look quite strange if a RNIB approved device such as yours was unable to work with the only widely used accessible Freeview recorder on the market which was also created in conjunction with the RNIB. The EPG information is an interesting problem although when I started developing my solution I thought it would be fairly easy to solve. Out of interest, where are you getting the EPG data from? I am aware of the radio times listings for Freeview that are available in XML, but if EPG data for *every* Freeview channel is downloaded, this amounts to hundreds of MB's of data that need to be searched when a user is looking for a program for example. In my experience, this doesn't happen quickly enough on commodity hardware for it to be a nice enough experience for the end user. I'm toying with the idea of offloading this functionality to a server which would store the listings using MYSQL and then allow access to it through an API although I currently don't have time to develop this. One thing that I found out that you might not know (Apologies if you do) is that not every Freeview box will have the same numbers for each channel - E.G. channel 4 +1 will not always be number 13 on every box. This makes it quite hard to create a program guide that changes the channel, since for it to work correctly, the user needs to manually specify the number that each channel uses on their own box. Lastly, I'll end with a big question: Why are you targeting this at blind people? There are lots of people who have multiple remotes that want something like this; even people who have a universal remote such as a Harmony will surely like the idea of being able to control their devices from an iDevice; partly because you're getting rid of the range problems associated with IR and replacing them with packets sent over WIFI which obviously has a much longer range. There are a few devices that already do this but it's very hard to find them in the UK plus none of them are overly good value; how about you make an amazing solution targeted towards the technical consumer that just so happens to be accessible with voiceover? I'd be really interested to speak with you off list about this; my email address is replacewithfirstn...@benmr.com. Regardless of what you do and how you do it, good luck!! Ben. On 9/30/12, paras shah <parasha...@gmail.com> wrote: > Hi, my name is Paras, I live in united states. I have dish network, > and would like to be your tester when u start on united states > market. > > On 9/30/12, Louis-Joseph Auguste <lou....@gmail.com> wrote: >> The talking programming guide is one of our key features. >> >> On Sunday, 30 September 2012 23:16:11 UTC+1, Robert Fenton wrote: >>> >>> One feature I would like to see is the ability of the remote to speak >>> the >>> >>> program listings. This would allow us to select a program to watch or >>> record independently. >>> >>> Bob Fenton >>> >>> Sent from my iPhone >>> >>> On 2012-09-30, at 2:12 PM, Louis-Joseph Auguste >>> <lou...@gmail.com<javascript:>> >>> wrote: >>> >>> Hello VIPhone Group >>> >>> We are building a new television remote for the VI and Blind in >>> association with the Royal National Institute for the Blind in London. >>> >>> This remote will be a mobile application for the iPhone and iPad >>> platforms. We have just secured a partnership with TiVo and are now >>> moving >>> ahead with the design. >>> >>> I'm interested in knowing what features would be the most useful for the >>> members of this group. >>> >>> Please tell me what would make the TV controller experience better for >>> you. >>> >>> I'll keep everyone updated on our progress. Our website will go live in >>> about a month with me more details. >>> >>> Look forward to hearing from you. >>> >>> Lou Auguste >>> >>> -- >>> You received this message because you are subscribed to the "VIPhone" >>> Google Group. >>> To search the VIPhone public archive, visit >>> http://www.mail-archive.com/viphone@googlegroups.com/. >>> To post to this group, send email to vip...@googlegroups.com >>> <javascript:> >>> . >>> To unsubscribe from this group, send email to >>> viphone+u...@googlegroups.com <javascript:>. >>> For more options, visit this group at >>> http://groups.google.com/group/viphone?hl=en. >>> >>> >>> >>> >> >> -- >> You received this message because you are subscribed to the "VIPhone" >> Google >> Group. >> To search the VIPhone public archive, visit >> http://www.mail-archive.com/viphone@googlegroups.com/. >> To post to this group, send email to viphone@googlegroups.com. >> To unsubscribe from this group, send email to >> viphone+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. >> For more options, visit this group at >> http://groups.google.com/group/viphone?hl=en. >> >> >> > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the "VIPhone" Google > Group. > To search the VIPhone public archive, visit > http://www.mail-archive.com/viphone@googlegroups.com/. > To post to this group, send email to viphone@googlegroups.com. > To unsubscribe from this group, send email to > viphone+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. > For more options, visit this group at > http://groups.google.com/group/viphone?hl=en. > > > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the "VIPhone" Google Group. To search the VIPhone public archive, visit http://www.mail-archive.com/viphone@googlegroups.com/. To post to this group, send email to viphone@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to viphone+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/viphone?hl=en.
