JPH0297196A - Multi-remote controller - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To check a reception miss, which is not noticed at the time of batch transmission, by adding a mode to execute the transmission while it is successively confirmed by observing a remote control display and the response condition of an equipment whether respective operation commands are exactly received in the equipment side or not in addition to a mode, with which the plural operation commands can be totally transmitted. CONSTITUTION:When a transmitting buffer 9 is in an idle condition, a butter idle signal F is returned from the transmitting buffer 9 to a control circuit 7. When the buffer idle signal F is received by the control circuit 7, remote control data taken through a selecting circuit 39 into the control circuit 7 are converted to code data and accumulated in the transmitting buffer 9. Then, when the reading of these remote control data is completed and a read completing signal K is returned to the control circuit 7, the conversion is finished and the accumulated data of the transmitting buffer 9 are transferred to a transmitting circuit 30. After that, the data transmission is executed to the equipment side by infrared rays and the equipment receives these code data and executes operation to correspond to the contents of the command.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION (a) Industrial Application Field The present invention provides a method for performing various operations on multiple devices with one device.
This invention relates to a so-called multi-remote control device.

(b) Conventional technology Various operations of multiple electronic devices, such as turning on the TV,
, 10FF, VTR power supply 0N10FF and PL, AY
, operate REC, etc., turn on the video disc player.
10 FF Multi-remote controllers that issue commands for operations such as F and PLAY using a single remote controller have been widely used in recent years as the number of devices to be controlled has increased.

An example of this multi-remote control device is the magazine "Television Technology"
(Published by Denshi Gijutsu Publishing Co., Ltd.) March 1988 issue P
It is disclosed in 22.

In the above-mentioned conventional technology, individual operations based on various operation commands for a plurality of devices are treated as a series of operations, and the operation commands are sent to each device at once to control a series of various devices with a single operation on a remote controller. The so-called "-band movement"
has been realized.

(C) Problems to be Solved by the Invention According to the prior art described above, multiple operation commands to multiple devices are sent at once, so if a reception error occurs on the device side of one of the operation commands. Moreover, there is a possibility that the user may not be able to recognize this reception error.

For example, when performing a series of operations based on the above-mentioned prior art, such as displaying the playback output of a video disc player (VDI'?) on a TV and recording this playback output on a VTR, it is necessary to display the playback output on the TV ( It sends (a) power on, (b) operation commands for transition to video input mode to the VDP, (c) power on, (d) playback operation commands to the VTR, and (e) power on, (f) recording commands to the VTR. The operation command is stored in memory in the remote control device in advance as one operation command, and when the user selects this command, the remote control device executes the above-mentioned (a).
The commands from (a) to (f) will be continuously sent to each device, but if a mistake in receiving the VTR recording command signal (f) occurs on the VTR side, the commands from (a) to (f) will be sent to each device continuously. The operations based on the command e) are executed in each device, but only the recording operation of the VTR is not performed.

On the other hand, the user can confirm that all three devices are powered on and that the playback output from the VDP is displayed on the TV, but he does not notice that the VTR is not in the recording state, and the playback output is not recorded. Operational mistakes that are not performed cannot be prevented.

(d) Means for Solving the Problems In addition to the batch mode in which a plurality of operation commands are continuously transmitted all at once, the present invention also has a mode in which the plurality of operation commands are sequentially transmitted one by one according to step operations. , and is characterized by a switchable step mode for sequentially displaying the transmitted contents at this time.

(E) Function Since the present invention is configured as described in -L, while checking each time whether or not a reception error of an operation command has occurred on the equipment side,
Multiple operation commands can be sent.

(F) Example Hereinafter, an example of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings.

The Nomocon device (2) has a TV (3),
VTR (4), VDP (5), AUD 10 equipment (6)
It is used to control four devices, and by directing the light emitting part toward the light receiving part on the device side and transmitting code data using infrared rays, it is possible to put each device into the desired operating state. .

FIG. 1 is a circuit block diagram of the remote control device (2),
In FIG. 1, reference numeral (1) denotes a key manual unit consisting of operation keys having a plurality of various functions, and specifically, it is constituted by operation keys as shown in FIG.

In FIG. 2, (11), (12), (13), and (14) are single function keys when the remote control device (2) is used as a normal single function remote control, and is 7V, VTR 1VDP.

It is possible to select four AUDIO devices, and when one of the four devices is selected, the type of operation for each device is displayed on the LCD touch panel (17).

For example, when an operation key (12) is pressed, the display section itself becomes a push button on a touch panel (17) as shown in Figure 4 (VT).
Operation types related to control of R are displayed, and when one of these is pressed to select, a single function operation command signal (A) related to this operation type is input to a control circuit (7) to be described later. The operation type of the touch panel (17) is the operation key (11).
(12), (13), and (14), and the function is configured to change each time even if the touch panel is the same. (19) is a channel key used to select a TV channel, and (18) is a power switch of the remote control device.

(15) is a selection key for selecting whether to use the remote control device (2) as a single-function remote control or a multi-function remote control. ) to (14)
, if input of the single function command signal (A) to the control circuit (7) by the touch panel (17) and channel key (19) is allowed, and if the multi-remote controller A mode is selected by the selection key (15). , System key (Sl) described below
The system command signal (B) from (S6) to (S6) is allowed to be input to the control circuit (7).

(st) (S2)...(S6) is the remote control device (2)
This is a system key when used as a multi-remote controller, and is used to specify remote control data stored in advance in the remote control device as a single system command for multiple single function operation commands across multiple devices.For example, the system key (51) i: From, TV, VTR1\/DP, AU
The system command to turn on all four DIO devices turns on the TV and VTR from the system key (S2).
mode and set the TV to video input mode, ~'T
The system command to display the playback output of the VTR on the TV with R in the playback state is further transmitted to the TV using the system key (S3).
, VTR1VDP is turned on, the TV is set to video input mode, the VTR is set to recording mode, the VDP is set to playback mode, and the playback output of \/DP is displayed on the TV and recorded on the VTR at the same time according to the system command. The system command signal (B) can be input to the control circuit (7).

(16) is a batch mode in which the system commands selected with the system keys (Sl) to (S6) are sent to each device all at once, and one operation command for each single function that makes up the system command. This is a changeover switch that emits a mode changeover signal (C) for changing the mode of the step mode in which data is transmitted one by one.

(21) displays the contents sent to the device by operating various keys! , is a CD display.

Key human power section (1) consisting of each operation key as described above
The input signal from is input to the control circuit (7). When the single-function remote control code is selected with the selection key (15) and the single-function operation command signal (A) is input, the data memory access signal (D) is sent to the single-function data memory (
8), and the single-function remote control data corresponding to this command is read out from memo) (8). At the same time, the control circuit (7) sends a transmission request signal (E
) is input and no data is recognized to be stored in the transmission buffer (9), that is, the transmission buffer (9) is in an empty state, the buffer empty signal (F) is sent from the transmission buffer (9) to the control circuit. (7) and is sent back to the control circuit (7)
When receiving this buffer empty signal (F), the selection circuit (3
The remote control data taken into the control circuit (7) via the control circuit (7) is converted into code data and stored in the transmission buffer (9), and when the reading of this remote control data is completed, a readout completion signal (K) is sent to the control circuit. (7), the conversion is completed and the accumulated data in the transmitting buffer (9) is transferred to the transmitting circuit (30), the data is transmitted to the device by infrared rays, and the data is sent to the corresponding device. receives this code data and executes an operation corresponding to the command contents.

Incidentally, when the single-function remote control mode is selected, the selection circuit (7) operates to allow passage of remote control data from the single-function data memory (8). Also, in Memo J (8),
Turn on the TV in advance...1, turn on the VTR...
2, VTR PLAY...3, . . . data settings are made in accordance with each operation command.

By the way, the code data is a well-known communication signal that is normally used when communicating using infrared rays, and is composed of a leader code + custom code + a signal of "1" and "0".
Consists of inverted custom code + data code + inverted data code + continuous code.

Further, the remote control data transmitted from the transmitting circuit (30) is displayed on the display (21), for example, the PLA of the VTR.
When the Y operation is executed, a display as shown in FIG. 5 is displayed.

Next, the operation in multi-remote control mode, in which the remote control device is used as a multi-remote controller, will be explained.

First, before inputting the system command signal (B), the mode switching signal (C) is switched to the control circuit (
7), this mode switching signal (C) is input to the state memory (31) and set, and thereafter the contents of the state memory (31) are changed.

That is, until a new mode switching signal (C) is input,
The mode held in the state memory (31) is maintained.

When the system command signal (B) is input from the key control unit (1) after the mode switching signal (C) specifies the -batch mode, the control circuit (7) requests the transmission buffer (9) to transmit. When the transmission buffer (9) receives this transmission request signal (E), if it is in an empty state with no information stored internally, the buffer empty signal (F) is sent to the control circuit (7). ). When the control circuit (7) receives this buffer empty signal (F), it reads the remote control data corresponding to the input system command signal (B).
A bulk data memory access signal (G) is input to the bulk data memory (32). - The collective data memory (32) stores in advance remote control data of a plurality of single-function operation commands, which are the constituent elements of the system command signal (B), as one set of data; - the collective code memory access signal (G ), the remote control data of the first command of the plurality of operation commands corresponding to the system command signal (B) is input to the control circuit (7) via the selection circuit (39). In addition, the selection circuit (39
) is in multi-remote control mode, - bulk data memory (3
Only the remote control mode from 2) is allowed to pass.

The control circuit (7) converts the remote control data obtained from the batch data memory (32) one by one into code data and stores it in the transmission buffer (9), and when the conversion of the operation command bone is completed, the stored data is transmitted. The signal is sent to the circuit (30) for transmission. When this transmission is completed, a transmission completion signal (H) is sent back to the control circuit (7). Further, the control circuit (7) causes the display (21) to display the remote controller data being converted at the same time as converting the remote control data into code data. The display device (21) returns a display completion signal (1) to the control circuit (7) after performing this display for a predetermined period of time (0,55 ec).

When the control circuit (7) receives the transmission completion signal (H) and display completion signal (2), it takes in the remote control data corresponding to the second operation command in the system command signal (B), converts it into code data, and transmits it. In the same way, the reading, conversion, and transmission of remote control data corresponding to multiple operation commands, which are components of the system command signal (B), are continuously performed.Then, the input system When the readout of remote control data for all operation commands of the command signal (B) is completed, a readout completion signal (J) is input to the control circuit (7) and all transmission operations are completed.Therefore, the system command signal (B) The remote control data corresponding to a plurality of operation commands, which are the constituent elements of ), are converted into code data for each -operation command and are sequentially and continuously transmitted.

Furthermore, the transmission operation in this batch mode will be specifically explained. Press the system key (S3) to (a) turn on the TV, (b) shift the TV to video input mode, <c
) System command signal CB consisting of six operation commands: turn on the VTR, (d) move \/TR to the recording state, (e) turn on the power to the VDP, and (r) move the VDP to the playback state.
is input to the control circuit (7), first, the control circuit data corresponding to the operation command (a) is read out from the batch data memory (32), converted into code data by the control circuit (7), and sent to the transmission buffer (9). This operation command (a
) When the conversion of the remote control data into code data is completed, the data is transmitted to the four devices, and the TV (3) receives this code data and turns on the power. When this transmission is completed, the transmission completion signal (H) is sent to the control circuit (7).
The remote control data corresponding to the next operation command (1)) is read and transmitted in the same way, and the TV sets the channel to "l" and enters the video input mode. Subsequently, the same processing is performed for operation commands (c), (d), (e), and (f). As a result, by simply pressing the system key (S3) once, the operation commands (a) to (f) are executed all at once, the TV (3) is turned on and enters the video input mode, and the VTR ( 4) turns on the power and executes recording, VDP (5) turns on and executes playback, and at the same time the playback output of VDP (5) is displayed on TV (3). Recorded on VTR (4).

Next, the operation when the step mode is selected by the mode changeover switch (16) will be explained.

In this step mode, the system command signal (B)
When inputting , the remote control data corresponding to the first operation command among the multiple operation commands of the components of the system command signal (B) is stored in the batch data memory (32) as in the batch mode.
The code data is read out, converted into code data, stored in the transmission buffer (9), and displayed on the display 6 (21).

In this step mode, even if the conversion of the operation command bone into code data is completed, the transmission buffer (9) does not exit to the transmission circuit (30) and the accumulation state is maintained, and the display (21) Display completion signal (Riga control circuit (7)
When it is returned to , it enters a step transmission standby state. In this standby state, when the same system key is pressed again and the same system command signal (B) is input, the control circuit (7) outputs a transmission request signal (E) to the transmission buffer (9) and transmits the signal. When the buffer (9) receives this, it transmits it by infrared rays through the stored data transmission circuit (30). When this transmission is completed, a transmission completion signal (H) is sent back to the control circuit (7), and upon receiving this transmission completion signal (H), the control circuit (7) sends the remote control data corresponding to the next operation command in the system command. is captured, stored in the transmission buffer (9) and displayed in the same manner as above, and when the same system command signal (B) is input, transmission is executed, and by repeating this, the input system command signal (B) When the reading of the remote control data of all the operation commands included in the data memory (32) is completed, a reading completion signal (J) is returned. The control circuit (7) always checks the presence or absence of this reading completion signal (J) when the transmission completion signal (H) is input manually, and if it is present, the transmission is completed. Therefore, when transmitting remote control data for each operation command in a system command signal, the data is stored in the transmission buffer (9) for each operation command and is not automatically transmitted. By pressing the button, the accumulated remote control data for the operation commands will be transmitted.

Furthermore, the transmission operation in this step mode will be specifically explained. In this step mode, when the system key (S3) is pressed, the system command signal (B) consisting of the six operation commands described above is input to the control circuit (7).
First, the remote control data corresponding to the operation command (a) is read out from the batch data memory (32), converted into code data by the control circuit (7), and stored in the transmission buffer (9), but the storage is not completed. However, no transmission occurs. At the same time, the content of this operation command (a) is displayed on the display (21).

Next, when the system key (S3) is pressed, the accumulated data is input from the transmission buffer (9) to the transmission circuit (30).
The operation command (a) is transmitted, and the TV (3) is turned on. At the same time, remote control data corresponding to the operation command (b) is read out from the transmission buffer (9) and stored as code data in the transmission buffer (9). The remote control data regarding this operation command (b) is not transmitted until the system key (S3) is pressed again.

As a result, the operation commands (a) to (f) are transmitted by pressing the system key (S3) a total of seven times, and each press executes the operation command <a) in order, and the user can perform each operation. It becomes possible to execute the system command while checking the operation of each device in accordance with the command (a).

The functions of the control circuit (7) in the circuit block diagram of FIG. 1 can be processed by software using a microcomputer, and a flowchart at this time is shown in FIG. 6. In this FIG. 6, in the - bracket mode, S T E
S T E P even without the key human power of P (102)
A loop from (100) to S T E P (103) is automatically executed, and in step mode, 5TEP (
102), S T E P (
The loop from S T E P (100) to S T E P (103) is not executed.

(G) Effects of the Invention According to the present invention, as described above, in addition to the mode in which multiple operation commands can be transmitted at once, the remote control display and the equipment display can display whether each operation command has been accurately received by the equipment. By adding a mode that allows sending while checking the response status one by one, it is possible to check for reception errors that may be overlooked during bulk sending, and it is possible to prevent erroneous operations.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

The drawings all relate to one embodiment of the present invention, and FIG. 1 is a circuit block diagram, FIG. 2 is a schematic explanatory diagram between a remote control device and equipment,
Fig. 3 is an explanatory diagram of the key input section of the remote control device, Fig. 4 is an explanatory diagram of the touch panel, Fig. 5 is an explanatory diagram of the display section, and Fig. 6 is an explanatory diagram of the touch panel.
The figure is a flowchart. (2)... Remote control device, (16)... Changeover switch (switching means), (7)... Control circuit (switching means)
, (21)...display section.

Claims (2)

[Claims] (1) In a multi-remote control device that transmits multiple operation commands to multiple devices, there is a batch mode where the multiple operation commands are continuously transmitted all at once, and a batch mode where the multiple operation commands are transmitted one by one according to step operations. A multi-remote control device characterized by comprising a switching means for switching to a step mode in which transmission is performed sequentially. (2) The multi-remote controller according to claim 1, further comprising display means for sequentially displaying the contents of each operation command to be transmitted in the step mode.