Use of the EP121 as a remote control

[lblb]

Hi all,

I have two computers. I often scribble on my EP121 while my main computer is used to play movies in a home entertainment system (by that I mean: a monitor and speakers!) or while it is used with iTunes in another room in the house. I’ve recently decided to try to learn programming in AutoHotkey and thought that it would be useful to be able to use my EP121 as a remote control for my main computer.

After searching around on the internet, I found a few commercial solutions (and no good free alternative) so I decided to try my hand at it. Maybe there are programs that allow one to do this easily, but I couldn’t find any. If you know of any, I'd be happy to hear about it! So I thought I’d share what I’ve come up with. For anyone interested, below is a link to v. 1.0 as a zip file that I have uploaded on mediafire.com.

What this does:
When this is launched, a panel like the one in the picture below opens up on Computer 1 (I use my EP121 here). This allows you to control the volume and play/pause on Computer 2 that is connected to the same wireless network. (You connect to Computer 2 by using its IP address). The buttons are large enough to be easy to use on a tablet with touch input. Pretty simple, pretty useful (if you’re looking for something like this)!

I am very much at the stage of developing this so I’ve kept it very simple but I’d be happy to modify it if anyone has useful suggestions or finds bugs. Right now, I’m really just trying to see if it actually works on computers other than mine! So I apologize in advance if it doesn’t work correctly for you.

Note: Contrary to many of the other scripts that I have shared here, this does not use the fabulous touch script that was developed for the EP121. Since it only uses a simple AutoHotkey script, you will have to turn touch on if you want to use touch input.

Anyway, just thought some of you might be interested! I’d be happy to hear any suggestions and comments!



Download:
Tablet_As_Remote_Control_1_0.zip

Disclaimer 1: This app is essentially just my customized version of a AutoHotkey script that someone else developed. They did all the work, I just adapted it to what I needed. See AHK Remote - TCP/IP based remote control:
AutoHotkey Community • View topic - AHK Remote - TCP/IP based remote control

Disclaimer 2: Because of what’s in the first disclaimer, this means that I am just using someone else’s code and am not completely familiar with all the code. As it turns out, I am mostly interested in learning AutoHotkey and know very little about wireless connections and TCP/IP.

Disclaimer 3: I can’t guarantee that it will work on every system and, obviously, you use it at your own risks. It should work (hopefully) with any two PC’s, not just the EP121. I’ve only tried it with the following setup:
On EP121: Windows 7 Home Premium with both AutoHotkey basic and AutoHotkey_L.
Other computer: Windows 7 Home Premium with AutoHotkey basic.


Instructions:
IMPORTANT: Both computers need to be connected to the same wireless network. This works very well for me at home, but it doesn’t function at work because the network doesn’t allow it. I guess you’ll just have to try.

1) Make sure Autohokey (or AutoHotkey_L) is installed on both computers. It’s available here:
AutoHotkey Downloads
IMPORTANT: The computer that is remote-controlled needs to have AutoHotkey basic installed and not AutoHotkey_L. The computer that controls (i.e. EP121) can have either AutoHotkey basic or AutoHotkey_L installed.

2) Extract the content of the zip file above anywhere on both computers.

3) On the computer that will be remotely-controlled, launch the file Server_(Use_With_Other_Computer).ahk. (As noted above, this will only work if the computer that is remotely-controlled has AutoHotkey basic installed and not AutoHotkey_L.)

4) On the computer that controls (i.e. EP121):
If AutoHotkey_L is installed, launch the EXE file named Client_(Use_With_Tablet).exe.
If AutoHotkey basic is installed, launch either the AHK file or the EXE file named Client_(Use_With_Tablet).
Note: If you have been using the super touch script for art programs for the EP121, you most probably have AutoHotKey_L installed.

5) This should open up a window where you need to input the IP address of the computer that will be remotely controlled.
To get the IP address of that computer, you can:
- On the computer that will be controlled, browse to the following site: What Is My IP Address? Lookup IP, Hide IP, Change IP, Trace IP and more...
- Alternatively, in the Windows tray, click on the WiFi icon, then right-click on the network that you are connected to (i.e. this needs to be the network over which you will use the remote control), and choose “Status”. Click on “Details” and the IP address should be next to something like “IPv4 Address”.
- If you don’t write anything, 127.0.0.1 will be the default (and likely wrong) address that will be used.

6) In the same window that opened up in 5) above, there is an input box for the port used. The default value will most likely be the correct one (at least for the EP121) so just click OK.

7) If the connection is successful, the panel shown in the attached picture should now appear on your EP121. Just use the buttons on it to control the remote computer.

8) Notes on the buttons:
- The Play button sends play/pause to any media player (VLC, Windows Media Player, etc.) ONLY IF IT IS THE ACTIVE WINDOW on the remotely-controlled computer.
- There are two more play buttons (one for iTunes and one for VLC player) that will send play/pause to these two programs whether they are the active program or not (i.e. even if they are running in the background).

[kamikaze458]

Congratulations, you really are developing good things with AHK!

I'll try this as soon as i'm free of my exams. This would be very handy for me too.

Thanks for sharing it.

[Steve S]

lblb: Excellent work, and thanks for sharing it...

[lblb]

Thanks for the good words.

Something I forgot to mention in the first post:

You can change the volume increments for the Volume Up and Volume Down buttons in the following way:
- On the remotely-controlled computer, open the file Server_(Use_With_Other_Computer).ahk in a text editor.
- If your text editor numbers the lines (for that I use Notepad++), just change the multiplication factor (I put it to 3 by default) on lines 363 and 367.
- If your text editor doesn't number the lines, just use the Find function for "Volume_Up", and change the multiplication factor in the parenthesis (by default it's 3) and also the one for Volume_Down a few lines below.

[smithderek76]

Hey this sounds like it's cool but not quite what I was hoping for I'm looking for something that will mirror the display of my HTPC on the ep121 and allow me to use the touch input as the means to control my computer. Anyone have an ideas also it could double as a wireless pen and tablet for another computer seems like this should be possible.

[lblb]

Hey sd76,

What you describe has been discussed many times over on TabletPC Reviews and, as far as I know, is still not possible. But maybe I'm wrong, so I'd be glad to hear what anyone else has to say!

The only way that I know to reliably mirror a PC screen onto another PC is to use the program (not free) called MaxiVista. While this works beautifully, it does not allow you to use touch/pen input on the second screen to control the first screen. That's a feature they've claimed (for quite a while) that they were trying to develop, but their support forum makes it clear they aren't there yet.

The idea of controlling another PC with the pen has been discussed in the context of using a Tablet PC as a drawing board for another computer. Again, no success there (just use the Alternate Search Site and look for something like "use a Tablet PC as a Cintiq" and you should find quite a few threads). First bottom line is: It can't be done if you are looking to transmit pressure sensitivity. Second bottom line is: If you are not looking for pressure sensitivity being transmitted from the Tablet PC to the other computer, it should be much easier. The only program that does this that I know of is Tableau, which a forum member shared here (see post #9):
Using Tablet PC as Input Device for Desktop
The main window of Tableau can be used as drawing board, while the strip on the right side can be used to move the cursor around.
It does the basic stuff but was left at a quite preliminary stage (so it's actually not very useful for my needs). Maybe you will be able to do something with it if you revive the thread, or contact the developer, or get your hands on the original code.

By the way, AutoHotkey scripts like the one I shared here could potentially be used as Tableau above. But for that, I need to learn way more about AutoHotkey!

[lblb]

sd76,

I just revisited a software that didn't work the last time I tried but now it seems to work quite well on my EP121. If I'm not mistaken, it does exactly what you mentioned and it's free for non-commercial use. You just have to install the streamer and the app on your two computers. See SplashTop here:

Main product page for Splashtop Remote Desktop