I just upgraded my entertainment center and most things interconnect via HDMI. I discovered something rather neat: HDMI contains a common control protocol (HDMI-CEC) which allows the various components to talk to one another… in theory. In practice it’s a mess of proprietary codes, however there are certain common codes defined that are getting wider support. That said, how I’d like things to work and how the various CE manufacturers implement them tend to be very distinct. If I could send the right messages to set things up to my taste that’s a win.
I stumbled across this project in my search for knowledge: