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Integrate Apple TV 4th Gen/Siri Remote with macOS for voice and touch control


YouTube Tutorial Video

This is the fruits of my work to integrate the Apple TV remote with macOS

If you have an apple tv 4th gen remote lying around that you have tried to pair with your mac, you quickly realize you have to use external tools like SiriMote to extend the functions of the remote on your system however SiriMote does not allow you to use the mic function on the remote with your system and as far as I know no other tool allows you to do this.

This application is the second of the two whois purpose is to decode the voice packets sent from the remote to audio that feeds into the input channel of your macOS, essentially allowing you to use the remote as mic input and coupled with voice control functions of macOS can allow you to control your system.

One major hurdle to getting the voice data from the remote is having to use XCode Additional tools -> PacketLogger to capture the data as I could not find an easy way to get the bluetooth le data from the remote as the OS protects the hid uuid service. Short of having to write a kext driver or reverse engineer a private framework like Media Remote Protocol on macOS (https://medium.com/@evancoleman/apple-tv-meet-my-lights-dissecting-the-media-remote-protocol-d07d1909ad82) there is no easy way to getting this data within a standalone application.

In this repository I have also included the application TrackMagic, created by Nathan Vander Wiltand (https://github.com/calftrail/TrackMagic) and I have slightly modified it to connect to the SiriRemote. This application allows the use of the track pad on the siri remote to control your mouse pointer.

To get these applications to work you will need to follow the below steps.

Pre tasks: Make sure you mac supports bluetooth le so your siri remote can pair with your mac

Tools you will need:

a. Additional Tools for Xcode 10.1 or above (https://developer.apple.com/xcode/)
b. SiriRemoteVoiceControl app from my github repository (https://github.com/Jack-R1/SiriRemoteVoiceControl/blob/master/Release/SiriRemoteVoiceControl.zip)

Steps:

  1. Open System Preferences -> Bluetooth

  2. Hold Volume Up & Menu on your remote

  3. When you see your remote show up in Devices, click on connect

    Note if the remote fails to pair, turn bluetooth off for 30 seconds then turn back on and reattempt the previous step to put your remote in pairing mode, basically keep trying again until you pair with your mac

  4. At this point your remote should be paired to your mac and when you press volume up or down it should trigger volume control on your mac

  5. Get the bluetooth mac address of your siri remote and note it to be used later in the steps.

    One way to do this is to hold option key and select Bluetooth in menu bar and it should show the devices and their mac address, e.g AA-BB-CC-DD-EE-FF, replace any dashes with colons, AA-BB-CC-DD-EE-FF -> AA:BB:CC:DD:EE:FF

  6. Create folder called SiriRemote on your desktop

  7. Download Additional Tools for Xcode 10.1 or above

    Download the version supported by your macOS,

    for High Sierra you can use 10.1,

    for Catalina you can use 11.4

  8. Open the Additional Tools Package you have downloaded

  9. Under Hardware folder, copy PacketLogger.app to SiriRemote folder you created on your desktop

  10. Download and unzip SiriRemoteVoiceControl.zip from my GitHub repo (https://github.com/Jack-R1/SiriRemoteVoiceControl/blob/master/Release/SiriRemoteVoiceControl.zip)

    or clone and build the project to produce output files.

  11. Copy the contents of directory to SiriRemote folder you created on your desktop

  12. Open terminal (Launchpad -> Other -> Terminal)

  13. Change directory to SiriRemote folder on your desktop

    cd ~/Desktop

  14. Run the below command in terminal, replace AA:BB:CC:DD:EE:FF with the remote MAC address you obtained in the earlier steps.

    sudo ./PacketLogger.app/Contents/Resources/packetlogger convert -s -f nhdr | ./SiriRemoteVoiceControl AA:BB:CC:DD:EE:FF

    You will be prompted for your sudo password as xcode packetlogger needs to run in elevated privileges

    you can also do

    echo "password" | sudo -S ./PacketLogger.app/Contents/Resources/packetlogger convert -s -f nhdr | ./SiriRemoteVoiceControl AA:BB:CC:DD:EE:FF

    This will pipe your password to packet logger so you dont always have to type it in but I would not recommend to show your password in plain site. Note the -S after sudo.

    If you are prompted that SiriRemoteVoiceControl is written by an unidentified developer then you can either build the application in XCode or override the warning by going into System Preferences -> Security & Privacy -> Allow

  15. Press volume up or down on your remote to make sure the remote is paired to your mac.

  16. Now press and hold the mic button and speak in to the remote, it should indicate when voice data starts and ends on the console and you should hear your voice echo out of your mac.

    If it doesn't, try these options:

    a. press control + c, to terminate the command, and then press up and enter to run it again

b. leaving the command still running, disconnect your siri remote from bluetooth in
system preferences (just disconnect, dont unpair) and then reconnect

  17. If you would like to proceed further to integrate the SiriRemote for voice control on your mac then follow the below steps.

  18. Download Soundflower (https://github.com/mattingalls/Soundflower/releases/tag/2.0b2)

  19. Install Soundflower

    If installation fails to complete, go to System Preferences -> Security & Privacy and select Allow. Then rerun the installation package.

  20. Open System Preferences -> Sound -> Input and set Soundflower (2ch) as input

  21. Open System Preferences -> Keyboard -> Dictation

    a. Turn on Dictation if not already on.

b. Set Soundflower (2ch) as input to the mic.

c. Note the shortcut to trigger dictation.

  22. In terminal, stop (Control-C) and rerun the command in step 14.

  23. Press volume up or down on your remote to make sure the remote hasn't disconnected.

  24. Open Notes app and have the cursor blinking ready for typing.

  25. Trigger dictation (Press Fn/Function Key twice)

  26. Now press and hold the mic button and speak in to the remote, what you speak into the mic will be dictated on the notes app.

  27. If your running Catalina or Mojave you can have the remote open up Siri on your mac by enabling Voice Control and speaking into the mic "Open Siri"

    System Preferences -> Accessibility -> Voice Control

    or if your running Sierra/High Sierra follow this article to enable "Hey Siri"

    https://www.macworld.com/article/3096187/how-to-make-siri-activate-when-you-say-hey-siri-to-your-mac-running-macos-sierra.html

  28. Now that voice is integrated on your system, you can also integrate the siri remote trackpad by opening the TrackMagic.app that is included on your desktop folder.

    This app is slightly modified to work with the SiriRemote and was originally created by Nathan Vander Wiltand (https://github.com/calftrail/TrackMagic)

  29. You should be able to to move the mouse pointer from the siri remote trackpad, touch down (not press down) to select something and two fingers can allow you to scroll.

I have also a windows driver that I may finish working on and release if there is interest to use the SiriRemote on windows system.

Happy hacking :)