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Adding Functionality to Digital Cable Boxes?
Marqis asks: "I have a Motorola DCT-2000 (info here) and supposedly it supports 3rd party software. I would like to be that 3rd party but I can't find any information about programming this unit or how the data port can be used. After phoning Motorola I was told that the data port hasn't been activated yet. Not sure how that works. Anyhow, I really hate my cable company's layout of the on screen tv listings as it only shows a 1/2 hour time block. I would much prefer a 1 hour (or even 1.5 hour) time listing that should be possible if the gigantic 'Push here for help' buttons were taken out.
Also, I know from reading news groups that lots of people would like the ability to change channels through the data port so their Tivo's wouldn't have to use a sometimes flaky IR blaster. Web surfing, email checking, tv listing download, mpeg streaming to a pc and the like are also theoretically possible. Any info on the data port, protocols, compilers, etc would be greatly appreciated."
I know this isn't exactly what you are asking, but you should get a TiVo, if you already don't have one. It has a very nice display of programming that is far superior to any that I've seen on a cable box.
If tits were wings it'd be flying around.
Heres a training class from Liberate.
It states: This course provides the basics for developing Java applications for the Motorola DCT-2000 set-top box running Liberate's Compact client software.
Now I don't know if thats what your looking for, but it sounds like it may be a new lead to chase down at the very least.
Even if your box doesn't use the Liberate software, they may be able to give you some helpful info. Call em a few times if you need to. It's been my exp. that if guy A doesn't know/can't help/won't help you usually need to call back no more then 4 more times before someone out there will give you a new lead to chase. Check it out.
/me Kisses his DirectTiVo
Looking for hardware (Currently need: Large Etch-a-Sketch) Have one? See my journal!
Be sure to post anything you know. I have one of these units from the cable co. It would be nice to have an operational data port so that my tivo could change it without it taking forever. Altho, I don't have any channels in the digital range.. It would be nice to have the capability for it.
yeah well, I got the box with the understanding that I was getting digital cable.. meaning that I'd at least have digital versions of the analog channels that I was subscribing to. I don't, what a rip off.
It is a proven fact in the US that a percentage of people who are exposed to television (or any other form of broadcast media) are prone to suicide, homicide, and collecting Pez (though, not necessarily all three).
It seems to me that any box that facilitates television viewing can only be evil as well...
As much as my hacker mentallity tempted me to start messing around with my DCT-2000, after I read the leasing agreement from my cable company, I decided not too...I guess someones gotta take the chance, but make sure you know what you are getting into, my cable company has some pretty hefty fees for messing around with it...
KidA
"Karma can only be portioned out by the cosmos." -Homer Simpson
What we need is a credible cable box emulater to experiment on.
Probally starts with a cable modem on one end and video out on the other.
What's in the black box in the middle?
SD
âoeWho knew something as harmless as willful ignorance could end up having real consequences?â
if anyone has any programming info for the telewest digital decoder (made by pace), for some reason it has an ethernet port on the back. And anything interesting to do with the motorola surfboard cable modem?
maybe linuxtv will sort it all out
This article should be called, "Getting The Data Port To Work on your Digital Cable Box". Mine has a dataport too, but I'll dammned if I can find any information on how to make it do something useful.
The problem is that these set top boxes are very proprietary, and these companies aren't going to just let any old person start mucking around in them. I'd love to be able to do that, but it's just not going to happen.
The way the set top is designed, you have different layers of functionality. The 3rd party software is built at the highest, most abstract layer. So, if you're a cable company with 10 million subscribers, Motorola or whoever the set top maker is will work with you and your software group to develop a user interface for all the set tops on your network. This requires a lot of lawyers, contracts, and politics though, and like I said I don't think you'll be getting any support in that area any time soon. There is, however, a project for open source TV, but I don't know how much progress they've made. I agree with you though, it would be nice to be able to program your STB however you wanted it, especially since cable companies are usually going to do the quickest cheapest thing they can do to get it out the door.
~ now you know
Not to be discouraging, but what Motorola has in mind is that the first party is Motorola, the second party is a cable company (the purchasers of the vast majority of the digital boxes) and the third party is a commercial software company like Liberate or TV Guide. Said third party buys a development license from Motorola, at which point they get actual API documentation, and they write software that they hope to sell to the cable operators for serious amounts of money. Terms of the Motorola license will be onerous; for example, revealing the API information to anyone else will carry heavy financial penalties.
Most cable company digital boxes are programmed at a very low level to accept new software only over the cable itself. The downloads are heavily encrypted, and must pass other authorization checks. I'm not saying that you can't work around all of this and load your software into the box, just that it's going to be difficult and/or expensive. Also, unless your software conforms to your local cable company's box authorization scheme, the box with your software running may no longer be able to decrypt digital channels.
Cable companies are anal about controlling the software on their boxes for a couple of reasons. First, customer care in the case of messed-up boxes is expensive: people to answer the phones (no jokes, please), sending a tech to the house, inventory and handling expenses on box exchanges. New software releases from those third parties is tested very heavily before it is deployed to the field. Second, content contracts require the cable company to go to extremes to "protect" copyrighted material. This includes not only content such as Hollywood films, but other data such as program listings and plot synopses that go into the online program guide.
Fairly recently a couple of companies have begun producing "middleware" that runs on the DCT2000 boxes. In terms of capabilities like Java, these middleware are quite restrictive. For the reasons given above, applets written for such environments are unlikely to be able to access either the tuner or the program guide data. At best, such access would be severely limited.
I don't have the motorola cable box so I can't be much help there. But In Columbus, Ohio, Time Warner uses Scientific Atlanta Explorer 2000 cable boxes that seem very similar in functionality. It also has some nifty hardware, USB, some type of card slot (PCMCIA?), another port marked as 'serial', it supposedly supports ethernet, also. I know they have some type of developer page on their site, but it looks like you need a membership?
I do know how to get into the diag mode though: hold down the diamond button for 5 seconds then hit select (or maybe both at the same time). You can see DETAILED information about the box, tune channels, etc... quite interesting!!
If anyone else is interested in this box, post or mail me, because I have been wondering what I could do to this box for over a year, I just never got around to messing around with it.