Right now I press "menu" to activate remote buddy, then I press "back" a couple of times to go back to XBMC, then I press to chose XBMC and then I press to activate XBMC. 

1) dedicating a button solely to start / activate XBMC: 
a) go to Prefs > Mapping > Global mapping 
b) choose a button you want to use for starting/activating XBMC and *nothing else*. 
c) select the action "Behaviours > Activate XBMC Behaviour" for that button

2) always open the menu at root level 
a) go to Prefs > Mapping > Global mapping 
b) for the Menu button, pick the action that opens the menu at the root level

3) long-press left when the RB menu is open to jump right to the root level of the menu

4) create your own menu profile and place the XBMC item where you want 
a) go to Prefs > Menu 
b) press "+" and select a profile to start from 
c) select the new menu profile and press the checkmark to make it the active one 
d) use drag and drop to add new items 
e) add the "Behaviours > Activate XBMC Behaviour" to create an item that directly starts/activates XBMC (saves you the extra step of choosing "Activate Behaviour")

Best regards, 
Felix Schwarz 

I tried the 1st suggestion, which seems to be the best solution, but I can't get it to work. I tried remapping various buttons to "activate XBMC Behaviour" but the XBMC simply does not launch. I see that the harmony hub light blink when I press a button but nothing happens. Some other keys I mapped even make a "blip" sound when I click but nothing happens again. 
i use the Harmony Smart Control, with the simple remote. If that makes any difference.

I am using suggestion number 2 at the moment which works but it'd be great if I could get the first one to work. 

Have you set up your Harmony Smart Control with Remote Buddy using this How-To?

http://www.iospirit.com/blog/article/184/-/

Here's also a table that shows how every button should be configured in the Harmony app so that the Harmony sends the button code to Remote Buddy that it expects:

http://www.iospirit.com/support/faqs/remotebuddy/category/23/Hardware-Harmony-Smart-Control/entry/265/-/

Best regards, 
Felix Schwarz 

It seems I misunderstood the instructions and didn't remap the "blue" buttons. Now everything works perfectly!

Thanks for the help! :D 

Now that I have mapped all buttons correctly. 
I also mapped Vol+ to L1 and Vol- to L2. 
So now I can't control the volume on the receiver when using remote buddy.

Any suggestions on how to fix that? 

1) if you want to use them with Remote Buddy, L1 and L2 are what they should be mapped to.

2) if you want to control volume on the receiver, you'd need to go back into the Harmony app and assign the respective commands for your receiver to these buttons.

I'm afraid there's no middle ground in this case.

Best regards, 
Felix Schwarz 

All other Remote Buddy buttons continue to work as expected and now I can control the AV Receiver volume too.

Thanks again! Remote Buddy is a saviour! Thanks for making it!

Last edited: 15.08.2014 15:17:46