[SOLVED] how can I get the connected joypad names?

mediamogul

@meleu said in how can I get the connected joypad names?:

I want to start playing with some bash code to let the user choose what controller will be the player1, player2, etc. (at least with libretro cores).

Very cool idea. Recalbox does this very thing right inside of the Emulation Station GUI. It's very slick. If you get stuck, you might try looking at how they achieved this.

Rion

I have the same problem sort of.

I have two 8bitdo controllers, SFC30 & NES30.

I want to have the NES30 as player 1 and SFC30 as player 2.

This works 5 out of 10 times if I do it in this order. Start SFC30 first then NES30.
But the other 5 times retroarch decide SFC30 is Player 1 and Player 2 is NES30.

So an emulator specific change for what controller is p1 & p2 would be the best solution using the run command.

Something like a joystick/gamepad hierarchy.

Example:
NES30 is always p1 if it's connected.
SFC30 is always p2 if it's connected & Nes30 is connected.
Nes30 is off = SFC30 is p1.

@herb_fargus was talking about something like this as part of the Retropie Setup in this thread usb-controller-player-order

mediamogul

@Rion

Any finer solution to this would be welcome as it seems to be a constant user query on how to achieve this. I personally use the RGui & have the option selected to save on exit, but not everyone likes that approach.

meleu

@Zigurana said in how can I get the connected joypad names?:

What are you trying to achieve?

My inspiration is the recalbox controller settings.

I wanna get the controller names and their respective index (js0, js1, js2...) to show a list on a dialog (like the retropie_setup does)and let the user choose what will be the input for player1, player2 and so on (using the input_playerxx_joypad_index variable on retroarch.cfg).

Currently I don't have enough skill to play with C++. But I think I can do it with bash script.

mediamogul

@meleu said in how can I get the connected joypad names?:

Currently I don't have enough skill to play with C++. But I think I can do it with bash script.

I'm right there with you. I hope to free up enough time at some point to learn.

meleu

I'm thinking on a dialog box like this (or something closer):

dialog \
	--title 'Input selection' \
	--checklist 'What player you want to control with "8Bitdo Zero"' \
	0 0 0 \
	player1 '' off \
	player2 '' off \
	player3 '' off \
	player4 '' off

input selection

Once I get the controller names/indexes and the user selection, I think it's simple to change the input_playerX_joypad_index on retroarch.cfg using the sed command.

I read in other topics that some users wants to, for example, play NES games with their NES-like controllers, and play SNES games with their SNES-like controller. I think it's also feasible.

mediamogul

Very nice! Considering multiple use cases like you are will be greatly appreciated.

Rion

@meleu said in how can I get the connected joypad names?:

I'm thinking on a dialog box like this (or something closer):
dialog \
	--title 'Input selection' \
	--checklist 'What player you want to control with "8Bitdo Zero"' \
	0 0 0 \
	player1 '' off \
	player2 '' off \
	player3 '' off \
	player4 '' off
Once I get the controller names/indexes and the user selection, I think it's simple to change the input_playerX_joypad_index on retroarch.cfg using the sed command.

I read in other topics that some users wants to, for example, play NES games with their NES-like controllers, and play SNES games with their SNES-like controller. I think it's also feasible.

Just what I was looking for!

meleu

@Rion said in how can I get the connected joypad names?:

I have the same problem sort of.

I have two 8bitdo controllers, SFC30 & NES30.

I want to have the NES30 as player 1 and SFC30 as player 2.

This works 5 out of 10 times if I do it in this order. Start SFC30 first then NES30.
But the other 5 times retroarch decide SFC30 is Player 1 and Player 2 is NES30.

So an emulator specific change for what controller is p1 & p2 would be the best solution using the run command.

Something like a joystick/gamepad hierarchy.

Example:
NES30 is always p1 if it's connected.
SFC30 is always p2 if it's connected & Nes30 is connected.
Nes30 is off = SFC30 is p1.

@herb_fargus was talking about something like this as part of the Retropie Setup in this thread usb-controller-player-order

As a workaround you can change this all on-the-fly inside RetroArch. Go to the RGUI (Select+X), Settings -> Input -> Input User X Binds -> User X Device Index.

Be aware that the change is done immediately! It's a really weird behavior. If you change this field on RGUI using a controller, this same controler stops to control the RGUI and the chosen controller at the "User X Device Index" takes its place!

Rion

@meleu

I think I will hold off on that until you made some progress on the run command script.

But thank you for pointing it out for me :)

meleu

@Zigurana You are amazing!!! :D

You pointed me out that SDL stuff and I did my research on that topic.

I can't play with C++ but I can remember my teenager hacking days with C language!

I wrote this small program to get the joystick names and indexes:

/* jslist.c
 * This little program just list the joysticks connected to the system.
 * The ouput format is "index:JoystickName".
 */

#include <stdio.h>
#include "SDL.h"

int main(void) {
	int num_joy, i;

	SDL_Init(SDL_INIT_JOYSTICK);

	num_joy = SDL_NumJoysticks();

	for(i = 0; i < num_joy; i++)
		printf("%d:%s\n", i, SDL_JoystickNameForIndex(i));

	SDL_Quit();
	return 0;
}

The command to compile this code (as pointed in SDL Wiki):
gcc jslist.c -o jslist $(sdl2-config --cflags --libs)

This was my first step. The jslist needs some little improvements to avoid problems with controllers with the same name. It's easy to solve, but I will work on that later. Now I have to play with my children! :D

Zigurana

Good work! interested to see where this ends!
Have fun with the little ones!

meleu

This post is deleted!

meleu

Hey guys! I think I did it! Or, at least, started it!

Let's talk about it at a proper thread:
https://retropie.org.uk/forum/topic/1167/here-is-a-way-to-select-input-for-retroarch-players-1-4

BuZz

from shell

for js in /dev/input/js*; do path=$(udevadm info --name=$js | grep DEVPATH | cut -d= -f2); name=$(</$(dirname sys$path)/name); echo $name; done

meleu

@BuZz said in [SOLVED] how can I get the connected joypad names?:

from shell

for js in /dev/input/js*; do path=$(udevadm info --name=$js | grep DEVPATH | cut -d= -f2); name=$(</$(dirname sys$path)/name); echo $name; done

pretty awesome! :)

It perfectly answer the topic question. But another problem arises for my application...

The problem is how to find out the proper SDL2/RetroArch index. The SDL2 gives to my jslist.c the correct index, and it doesn't always happen to be the same number after the /dev/input/js.

Example: I have 3 usb controllers (as js0, js1 and js2) and one bluetooth controller as js3. The js-RetroArch equivalence is:
js0 = 0
js1 = 1
js2 = 2
js3 = 3

Then I unplug the second usb controller. Now the the relation is:
js0 = 0
js2 = 1
js3 = 2

I think it's hard to find the proper index with "pure" shell script.

BuZz

thats ok, you just go through them and increment the index in the loop.

BuZz

i=0; for dev in $(find /dev/input -name "js*" | sort); do path=$(udevadm info --name=$dev | grep DEVPATH | cut -d= -f2); name=$(</$(dirname sys$path)/name); echo $dev $i $name; ((i++)); done

/dev/input/js0 0 USB,2-axis 8-button gamepad
/dev/input/js1 1 8Bitdo SFC30 GamePad Joystick

then unplugging the USB

/dev/input/js1 0 8Bitdo SFC30 GamePad Joystick

(switched to find to avoid an error if no joysticks connected, but just for this quick one line example)

meleu

@BuZz
Initially I was excited with this solution and went for the tests...

Then I realized that the SDL algorithm index assignment isn't that simple...

The scenario: 4 usb joysticks (js0, js1, js2 and js3) and one bluetooth controller (js4). And then I disconnected the 1st and 2nd usb joysticks (js0 and js1), and the bluetooth controller also. Several minutes later I reconnected the bluetooth controller and it took the js0 "slot". Look at the output differences:

[prompt]$ jslist 
0:Twin USB Joystick
1:Twin USB Joystick
2:8Bitdo Zero GamePad
[prompt]$ bash buzz-jslist.sh
/dev/input/js0 0 8Bitdo Zero GamePad
/dev/input/js2 1 Twin USB Joystick
/dev/input/js3 2 Twin USB Joystick

meleu

I think my current dilema is: C or Python?

The C solution is great because the SDL2 is installed by default in RetroPie. The only doubt I have is "where to put the binary?". Maybe /opt/retropie/supplementary?

The Python solution requires the installation of python-pygame. It means 15.2 MB of additional disk space just to list the available joysticks.

For the moment I think the C approach is the winner.