sidewinderd

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sidewinderd is a user space daemon that enables special keys and macro recording for various Logitech and Microsoft gaming peripherals.

Hardware

Device	Vendor ID / Product ID	Vendor Name	Product Name	Supported
Logitech G105	046d:c248	Logitech, Inc.	G105 Gaming Keyboard	Yes
Logitech G710/G710+	046d:c24d	Logitech, Inc.	G710 Gaming Keyboard	Not tested
Microsoft SideWinder X4	045e:0768	Microsoft Corp.	Sidewinder X4	Not tested
Microsoft SideWinder X6	045e:074b	Microsoft Corp.		Not tested

Installation

Kernel

KERNEL Enabling user level driver and HID support

    Device Drivers --->
          Input device support --->
            [*]   Miscellaneous devices --->
                    <*>   User level driver support
          HID support --->
            [*]   /dev/hidraw raw HID device support

Software

Overlay

An ebuild is available in the fowlay overlay. For general info on overlays read here. To add the overlay do

root #eselect repository enable fowlay

root #emerge --sync fowlay

and to emerge sidewinderd do

root #emerge --ask games-util/sidewinderd

Manual

Install the required dependencies:

root #emerge --ask --noreplace dev-libs/libconfig dev-libs/tinyxml2 dev-util/cmake dev-vcs/git

Clone the sidewinderd Git repository:

root #git clone https://github.com/tolga9009/sidewinderd.git /usr/local/src/sidewinderd

Build and install sidewinderd:

root #mkdir /usr/local/src/sidewinderd/build

root #cd /usr/local/src/sidewinderd/build

root #cmake -DCMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=/usr ..

root #make && make install

Configuration

Specify the username to run sidewinderd as:

FILE /etc/sidewinderd.conf

user = "larry";

Important
It is not recommended to run sidewinderd as root.

To record macros without delays set capture_delays to false:

FILE /etc/sidewinderd.conf

capture_delays = false;

Service

OpenRC

Create the following service file if sidewinderd was installed manually.

FILE /etc/init.d/sidewinderd

#!/sbin/openrc-run

command="/usr/bin/sidewinderd"
command_args="-c /etc/sidewinderd.conf -d"

depend() {
	after coldplug hotplug modules
	need localmount
}

Make the service file executable:

root #chmod +x /etc/init.d/sidewinderd

Start sidewinderd:

root #rc-service sidewinderd start

Start sidewinderd at boot:

root #rc-update add sidewinderd default

systemd

Start sidewinderd:

root #systemctl start sidewinderd

Start sidewinderd at boot:

root #systemctl enable sidewinderd

Usage

Macro recording

Logitech G105

If sidewinderd started successfully, the MR, M1, M2, M3 and G1 through G6 keys should now be usable. Three sets of macro profiles can be switched between using the M1, M2 and M3 keys. Recorded macros are stored in their respective profile directories e.g.~/.local/share/sidewinderd/profile_{1,2,3}

To record a macro for the G1 key in the M1 profile, press M1, MR, G1, the desired key sequence, and MR again. To playback the recorded macro, press the G1 key.

Removal

Overlay

root #emerge --ask --depclean --verbose games-util/sidewinderd

Manual

Delete the following files:

root #rm /etc/init.d/sidewinderd

root #rm /etc/sidewinderd.conf

root #rm /usr/bin/sidewinderd

root #rm /usr/lib/systemd/system/sidewinderd.service

Troubleshooting

The following error message from manually installed sidewinderd has been observed after a world update of Gentoo on 2017-11-26:

sidewinderd: error while loading shared libraries: libconfig++.so.9: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory

It is probably due to the update of dev-libs/libconfig from 1.5 to 1.7.1. To fix the issue, re-sync the sidewinderd git repository, then build and install sidewinderd again.