User’s guide

First run

Open Joystick control, by accessing your desktop environment’s main menu, multimedia (sound/video) group, Joystick control. A window like this appears:

Joystick control should have autodetected your gaming device (typically /dev/js0 or /dev/input/js0). js0 represents the first joystick device. If you have another joystick or gamepad, just select it from the drop-down (js1 or type the path to the device.

If no device appears, or you see an error message, see the troubleshooting guide below.

Once it’s running, you can safely close the preferences window, and it will remain running on the notification area (see below for more information). If you log out, Joystick control will open again once you log back in.

Controlling your applications

Joystick control automatically keeps tabs on the currently open media applications. Whenever one of them is open:

  • Gamepad/joystick left will rewind to the last song. If you are watching TV, it will change channel down.
  • Gamepad/joystick right will skip to the next song. If you are watching TV, it will change channel up.
  • Button 1 will toggle play/pause. If you are watching TV, it will jump to the last channel.
  • Button 2 will stop playback

Currently, Joystick control lets you control:

  • Rhythmbox
  • XMMS
  • Beep media player
  • amaroK
  • tvtime

Some actions are not supported on all applications.

Application priorities

You can define which application takes precedence, when controlling them via your joystick. This is useful when you have several media applications open, and you want to control one of them, but not the other.

The preferences window contains a list of all controllable applications. Use the Up/Down buttons to put your preferred applications first on the list. For example, if you have Rhythmbox and tvtime open, and tvtime is higher on the list, the joystick commands will be directed to tvtime; once you close tvtime, Rhythmbox will be controlled.

You can see which application is running by checking the Running? column in the preferences window.

Showing and hiding Joystick control

As nice as it may look, it gets kind of tiresome to look at the same window all the time. Fortunately, Joystick control can be hidden out of view. When it’s running, a small joystick icon will appear on your notification area. Either click it once, or click the Close button on the Joystick preferences window to hide it.

To show the preferences window again, click the joystick icon on the notification area again. Do not reopen Joystick control, as this would open another instance and command your applications twice, without prejudice.

Exiting Joystick control

If you need to use your joystick for other purposes, such as gaming, and Joystick control interferes, bring the preferences window up and click the Quit button.