Feature request: Virtual joystick device

[mathiasgredal]

I would like to use my Xbox-360 wireless controller on my MacBook, however the wireless reciever doesn't work with MacOS, but it does work on Linux using xboxdrv. Since this driver runs in userspace on top of libusb, it should be quite easy for me to port it to MacOS, as long as there is a way to forward the events to the system. Hence the need for a virtual joystick device.

[a-hurst]

Seconding this request: newer versions of macOS (especially Monterey) have broken support for older Bluetooth controllers that used to work natively (e.g. PS3 controllers, Wii controllers), and the recent changes to the driver security model and migration from kexts to dexts also mean that a lot of existing 3rd-party drivers for popular gamepads (e.g. the open-source 360controller driver for Xbox 360 controllers) are much harder to install and require disabling SIP.

A signed virtual DriverKit joystick/gamepad device driver would provide a perfect compatibility layer for this, providing 3rd party drivers a target to send parsed input events so they can get used by the system.

[kokroo]

I am doing this at https://github.com/kokroo/kokrooPAD

I sent out some e-mails to @tekezo for guidance but I have received no response, perhaps it went to his spam folder (I have received a response now).
@mathiasgredal If you would like to join me in these efforts, feel free to reach out. I know how it can be implemented but this is my first time playing with macOS APIs. I am willing to create an Apple developer account and request the entitlements to get our driver signed.

Cheers!

[LinusU]

I would love to see this as well!

@tekezo would you be open to a pull request implementing this?

[rinOfTheStars]

Thirding the feature request here. I'm also willing to take a stab at starting the process for writing this feature myself, but this is very much outside my usual area of knowledge (I'm going to have to learn a bit about both cpp and system extensions for this) so it'll without a doubt end up as a draft PR until it can be checked over by someone more knowledgeable. (I also need to set up a dev env on one of my machines with system integrity protection disabled; I'm not ready to bite the bullet on spending money on the Apple Dev Program just yet 😓)

[kokroo]

@LinusU @rinOfTheStars I had already started working on this a while ago:
https://github.com/kokroo/kokrooPAD

I got some success too. If you want, we can form a group and tackle this together.

[rinOfTheStars]

CoreHID is probably the better way to go about achieving anything like this for my use case specifically (and will be a good way to get a grasp on how virtual HIDs should work in practice), but when I have an impl working using that I'd certainly be down to colab on a system extension (and kernel extension for extra-legacy devices?) version for backwards compatibility, sure.

[golden-narwhal12]

https://github.com/golden-narwhal12/xbox-controller-macos

I've been building this driver for Xbox controllers, but as of now, it just converts the controller input to mouse and keyboard due to these CoreHID restrictions. I'm hoping to implement full gamepad support eventually and would appreciate any help!