Broadlink RM Mini 3 and Google Home Voice Control Quick Notes

Broadlink RM Mini 3 by Broadlink

You can refer to this unboxing and setup guide, especially the section on the "Scenes" feature mentioned towards the end of the article.

https://playsmarthome.com/broadlink-rm-mini-3-review/

If you have linked "Broadlink" to Google Home, the newly added scenes will appear in the Routines section, allowing them to be used as a remote interface for the Nest Hub. The set keywords will become voice commands.

Operation Example

Adding a Broadlink scene "TTV News Channel" corresponds to the MOD remote control sequence

5-> [delay 0.5 seconds] ->0-> [delay 0.5 seconds] ->3

Then say to Google AI, "Hey Google, activate TTV News Channel," and the Broadlink RM Mini 3 will switch the MOD to the TTV News Channel. Google AI will respond with: "OK, activating TTV News Channel."

This "activate" is a mandatory call sign set by Google, but there is a way to bypass it and set more natural commands:
"Increase volume," "Show program info," etc.

The method is simple. Just go to Google Home's "Routines" and set up another routine with your preferred call sign, then correspond it to the Broadlink "activate XXXXX" command.

It is also recommended to purchase an HDMI switcher that supports infrared. This way, even switching sources can be controlled by voice!

Virtualization… According to the boss it saves the company over $5000 every month.

The company originally had over 10 servers running VB6 software 24/7 continuously, all on architectures from many years ago.
Since the company's founding in 1993 until 2021, no one had stepped up to make improvements...
So I took the initiative to introduce VMWare Workstation to the company, testing the waters on Windows, which our managers and bosses were familiar with. They were very satisfied with the Snapshot feature.

But, that wasn't enough!

Next, I introduced ESXi OS and first moved one of the original VB6 programs to a newly created virtual machine, which ran without issues for two months.
I reported this upward and further proposed the concept of VCenter, catering to multi-user management, automatic backups, performance monitoring, and more.
We assembled a machine with an AMD 5950X and 32GB (dual-channel) of RAM from a local vendor.
In early 2022, we upgraded to 64GB (quad-channel).

It has been running for over a year now and is very stable.