Recently I had a birthday where I was given a new Sony Playstation 5 Dualsense controller [1] (not an affiliate link). I actually don't have a Playstation, but the idea behind it was that it should work well with Ubuntu, and possibly Ubuntu Touch. This was a really cool gift, because the giver read my blog, saw what I was working on and how I commented about emulators and my lack of a controller, and made that happen! Well, I'm happy to report, not only does it work on my desktop computer, but also on Ubuntu Touch!

If you can see the above screenshot, then you can see me playing Dune, the NES version, or hack? It was made after Dune2 came out and allowed you to play a Dune2 remake on the Nintendo. Pretty cool stuff, though the controlls were a bit cumbersome, even with my awesome Playstation controller. One of the game's shortcomings is that you have to remember what you had selected last, because that will determine what the "A" button does. E.g., you thought you clicked on the light duty vehicle factory, then you click on and move some troops, and then mash the A button to build a trike, but you actually last clicked on the construction yard, and now you are going to have to figure out where to lay that 4 square yards of concrete!

Of course, the Playstation controller is Bluetooth capable, as well as having a USB-C connector so you can cable up or wirelessly connect to your computer or phone. Once I performed a pairing with my Ubuntu desktop, the controller immidiately was working for emulators that supported gamepads. No need for extra drivers or anything, which was really cool. Likewise, when I paired it with my Ubuntu Touch phone, it immidately started working.

However, it only works in Ubuntu Touch with apps that support gamepads/joysticks/controllers. For instance, my emulator I made, NesJs, does not support them, and that was a bummer. However, I downloaded the snap version of SNES9x-QT, which did support it! So, super cool! Super neat! And now I need to go figure out how to add that support to my apps.....

Linux - keep it simple.

[1] https://www.walmart.com/ip/Sony-PlayStation-5-DualSense-Wireless-Controller/188140087