A weird electrical 'conundrum'.

[fossyant]

My brother had one of those digital watches that could send an IR signal. My mum was in Currys one day, and my brother was happily changing the TV channel on all the TV's. The salesman wasn't impressed !

 

[presta]

Many, many times we'd open the door only for the alarm to sound, which we could only stop by twiddling wires under the bonnet.

Not once did anyone even look at us in a suspicious way, never mind challenge us or report us for nicking it.

the continual chorus of car alarms. Nobody ever paid attention to them

This might be of interest:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bystander_effect

 

[MontyVeda]

Hi hi-fi remote turns my electric fire on and off (do we have the same Aldi flame effect fire @Dave7?) when i turn the volume up or down (even when pointing away from the fire). My fire is placed a few inches off the floor so a small ornament in front of the fire's remote sensor stops the fire from turning on or off when i want to adjust the volume. Pointing the hi-fi remote at the fire turns the fire on or off, so my hi-fi remote is dual purpose now

 

[oldwheels]

This might be of interest:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bystander_effect

True up to a point but not universal. I remember an occasion when a woman fell getting off her mobility scooter here. Everyone nearby rushed to help.

 

[Dave7]

Hi hi-fi remote turns my electric fire on and off (do we have the same Aldi flame effect fire @Dave7?) when i turn the volume up or down (even when pointing away from the fire). My fire is placed a few inches off the floor so a small ornament in front of the fire's remote sensor stops the fire from turning on or off when i want to adjust the volume. Pointing the hi-fi remote at the fire turns the fire on or off, so my hi-fi remote is dual purpose now

Yep....mine is the Aldi flame effect.

 

[the_mikey]

Yes.....how/why does it happen ?

In all likelihood it's probably a relatively cheap remote with a common chipset which shares the same signal format with many other remotes using the same chipset, the only thing that will be different is the layout of the buttons and what is printed on the remote.

 

[MontyVeda]

the remote for my Xbox also turns the fire on and off... and there have been times when my Xbox has switched itself on... probably when I've turned the fire on with the hi-fi remote. I reckon it's just a case of overlapping IR frequencies for each device.

 

[Dadam]

Not overlapping frequencies, potentially overlapping and non-standardised protocols. Or more likely as mikey said above just cheapo devices using commodity chips the same as other devices without caring about interference. Not much you can do unless you can reprogram one or other device or keep them physically separate

https://circuitdigest.com/microcont...te-decoder-using-tsop-and-pic-microcontroller
https://www.righto.com/2009/08/multi-protocol-infrared-remote-library.html