Last year I bought a cheap PS2 dualshock controller to try hacking it to work with iPad via Arduino and the Redpark Serial Cable. I didn‘t really get very far, as the library I was using just wouldn’t see the controller.

However, a £3 “Neewer” adapter promised to make life much easier when using RPi. First test, was hook it up to the mac, and using the very handy USB Overdrive, I was able to ensure that the adapter was indeed working, and the controller was sending data. So far so good … next up RPi.

(I used the instructions from this forum post to get it working: HOWTO : Joystick/Gamepads under Ubuntu)

First install the “joystick” application

sudo apt-get install joystick

Then running these two commands:-

jscal /dev/input/js0
jstest /dev/input/js0

Allows us to calibrate and test that the controller is working:-