Steam Controller

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The Steam Controller is a game controller developed by Valve. It features two trackpads (in place of thumbsticks) with haptic feedback and sixteen buttons. The Steam controller is designed not only for games supporting traditional controllers, but also for games that support keyboard and mouse.

Installation

Kernel

The Steam Controller is fully supported by Linux without the need for a specific device driver, however it does require USB and user level driver support.

KERNEL Enabling user level driver support

Device Drivers --->
   Input device support --->
      [*] Generic input layer (needed for keyboard, mouse,...)
      [*]   Miscellaneous devices --->
         <*>   User level driver support

Permissions

If Steam was installed manually or from an overlay, and ConsoleKit or systemd is not being used, create the following udev rules file:

FILE /etc/udev/rules.d/99-steam-controller-perms.rules

# Valve USB devices
SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTRS{idVendor}=="28de", MODE="0666"
# Steam Controller udev write access
KERNEL=="uinput", SUBSYSTEM=="misc", MODE="0660", GROUP="input"

# Valve HID devices over USB hidraw
KERNEL=="hidraw*", ATTRS{idVendor}=="28de", MODE="0666"

# Valve HID devices over bluetooth hidraw
KERNEL=="hidraw*", KERNELS=="*28DE:*", MODE="0666"

The above udev rules file will grant access to the Steam Controller for users in the input group:

root #gpasswd -a <user> input

If Steam was installed manually and ConsoleKit or systemd is being used, create the following udev rules file:

FILE /etc/udev/rules.d/99-steam-controller-perms.rules

# Valve USB devices
SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTRS{idVendor}=="28de", MODE="0666"
# Steam Controller udev write access
KERNEL=="uinput", SUBSYSTEM=="misc", TAG+="uaccess", TAG+="udev-acl"

# Valve HID devices over USB hidraw
KERNEL=="hidraw*", ATTRS{idVendor}=="28de", MODE="0666"

# Valve HID devices over bluetooth hidraw
KERNEL=="hidraw*", KERNELS=="*28DE:*", MODE="0666"

The above udev rules file will grant access to the Steam Controller by automatically setting an ACL entry for the logged-in user.

If Steam was installed from anyc's Steam overlay, a udev rules file that supports ConsoleKit and systemd should already be installed with the >=steam-launcher-1.0.0.51-r1 ebuild.

Note
If ConsoleKit or systemd is being used, set the USE variable to acl to have the ACL entry set for the logged-in user.

Next, reload the udev rules files and trigger a device event for the new rule:

root #udevadm control --reload

root #udevadm trigger

Once the udev rules files are reloaded, the user using the Steam Controller will need to log out/in for the correct permissions to be set.