Toppy Remote Control

SMS help

As well as setting timers via the web, Toppy Remote Control allows you to control your PVR by sending text messages.

Registration

Before you can use the SMS service, you need to agree to the terms on the Account summary page, and then register your mobile phone, using the commands shown on that page. When you have registered, you will receive a confirmation message, and your mobile number and network will appear on the account info page.

The registration commands are not shown until you have confirmed your acceptance of the terms of the service, when they will appear on the Account information page.

You can unregister at any timer, by sending a text message to 60300 containing one of the following commands:

TOPPY REGISTER STOP
TOPPY RECORD STOP
TOPPY SEARCH STOP

You will receive a free confirmation message. In the examples on this page, we will always show commands in upper case letters, but the system will respond to upper and lower case. The only time uppper case will make a difference is in the names you give to recordings you schedule via SMS. All the words in your message should be separated by at least one space.

Setting recordings via SMS

Setting recordings is very simple; send a message to 60300 that starts with the phrase TOPPY RECORD followed by the name that you would like the programme to be saved with (You CANNOT use names that begin with ‘stop’). The name is followed by a special symbol to let us know it’s reached the end. To make it easy, whatever phone you’re using, you can use any of the symbols / * # or :

After the symbol, you have to say which channel you want to record, then the word AT followed by the time, using the 24 hour clock. So, the very simplest way to set a recording is to say

TOPPY RECORD CSI MIAMI / 5 AT 2200

If you don’t say how long you want the recording to be, we’ll assume that it’s going to be one hour.

Changing the duration of a recording is done the same way as changing other options - you just add them on to the end of your message. The length of a recording can be set by saying how many minutes, using FOR 30 to record for half an hour for example, or by saying the time you want the recording to stop, using TO or UNTIL and the 24 hour clock.

If you wanted to record both CSI programmes, you could say

TOPPY RECORD CSI / 5 AT 2100 FOR 120

TOPPY RECORD CSI / 5 AT 2100 UNTIL 2300

Unless you say otherwise, recordings will be set with today’s date (or rather, the date when they’re received by the server). You can choose to record on a different day by either adding the word TOMORROW to your message or using the word ON followed by at least three letters of the day of the week.

If you use the word ON and today’s day, then we’ll assume you mean a week from today. For example, if today is Friday, and you send the message

TOPPY RECORD BUFFY / 5 AT 1900 ON FRIDAY

then the recording will be set for one hour at 7pm, next Friday.

Using channel names in text messages

To make it easier to set timers, many channels have been given short SMS names that you can use instead of their channel numbers. We have tried to make these as easy as possible to use, and you can view the names for your country or region using the SMS channel names page. This allows you to say, for example,

TOPPY RECORD Allo Allo / gold AT 1700 ON SATURDAY FOR 45

to record Allo Allo from UK TV Gold. As with the rest of the system, capital letters do not matter in channel names.

Creating searches via SMS

As well as setting recordings, you can also creat searches using the SMS service, in exactly the same way. Your text message to 60300 should start TOPPY SEARCH followed by the pattern you want to search for; note that you cannot search for any pattern beginning with 'stop’.

If you want to search for any programmes that have a title matching the word or phrase in your message, at any time, on any channel, that’s it. So

TOPPY SEARCH REBUS

would find any programmes with Rebus in the title, on any channel. If you want to add extra options, use one of the punctuation characters * # / or : after the pattern, followed by search options. Each option should be separated with spaces.

Normally, the system will search for partial matches, in just the title of a programme. You can request an exact match by saying

TOPPY SEARCH er / EXACT

If you are using UK Auto Scheduler for searching, you can also search the description and extended information, using DESC and EXT ( or DESCRIPTION and EXTENDED) and use NOTITLE to stop searching in the title.

To search just certain channels, include either ON itv1 or CHANNELS 1 TO 20 - as with recordings, you can use specific SMS channel names instead of numbers.

You can search only at certain times of day using the 24 hour clock; for example, to search between 7pm and 10pm, you could say BETWEEN 1900 AND 2200.

Finally, you can specify days of the week, using WEEKDAYS, WEEKENDS or the days themselves (use at least the first three lettters). Combining all these options, you could schedule a search for the Monday morning repeat of the new ER episodes using

TOPPY SEARCH er / EXACT ON e4 BETWEEN 0000 AND 0400 MONDAY

You can view SMS messages that have been sent to and from your phone on the SMS log page.