On Universal Remotes

I see in Engadget the military is looking for universal remotes for drone fleets.  I was thinking about the general idea of how to make a remote universal the other night, as I used one remote on an upstairs device, and another very different one on a down stairs device.  Leading to many mistakes and inefficiencies.  I was also testing a new software interface on a laptop and then on a tablet device.  Key differences in this case are that the use of a 'mouse over' to preview information does not work well on the tablet.  So the elements of interface are linked to the hardware, and the differences in remotes cause errors.   And more about multi-control.