Sometime last year I was given a laser pointer that had 3 buttons on it. One to light the laser, an up arrow and a down arrow. It came with a IR to usb receiver that showed up under linux as a keyboard device. Obviously this was meant for doing presentations using the up and down buttons to advance the slide show. I hooked it up and used it to control XMMS.

Even though the commands that the thing was sending didn’t line up XMMS’s previous(Z) and next(B) buttons. I learned that by pulling up the menu and pointing to an option then hitting the key would reassign the function to that key.

About 2 dance parties later and the remote fell out of my pocket and was damaged.

Since then I have tried a couple of different things. None were to my satisfaction. Most of the presenter remotes or IR->USB adapters are in the $60-80 range. Way to high for me.

One thing I tried was using a Playstation 2 to usb adapter and connecting that with a wireless PS2 joystick. It worked ok. But having to have a huge ps2 adapter on you just to change songs kinda sucked…. Plus it was a little clumsy to FF and REW.

Today when I was at Frys I saw a little package in the PS2 isle (sku 3638375 ). It had a wired ps2 vibrating controller, a old school ps2 vertical stand, and a IR wireless remote and adapter for $7.90, I bought it. That is in my price range. (I am sure the price was only that low because the stand in it is for an old model ps2 that Frys no longer carries.)

I hooked it up enabled the Joystick Control 1.2.10 plugin for XMMS then mapped the keys. This thing works perfectly. It is really responsive. As a plus I also have an extra ps2 controller.