ao2.it
Antonio Ospite, theorist attacks

Here are some notes about how to use the PS3 BD Remote Controller with raspbmc (raspbmc is an XBMC distribution optimized for the Raspberry Pi).

This is the software setup used in June 2014:

• Debian Wheezy (actually raspbian)
• linux 3.12
• Bluez 4.99

I use one of those tiny USB Bluetooth adapters, a Mediacom M-UDBT15M.

1. Install Bluez:

   $ sudo apt-get update
   $ sudo apt-get install bluez python-gobject-2
   

2. Associate the PS3 BD Remote Controller (only needed once):

   $ hcitool scan
   

   then keep pressed Enter+Start on the remote for at least 7 seconds, until the BT device shows up: 00:06:F5:XX:XX:XX BD Remote Control

   Then execute these commands immediately:

   $ bluez-test-device create 00:06:F5:XX:XX:XX
   $ bluez-test-device trusted 00:06:F5:XX:XX:XX yes
   $ bluez-test-input connect 00:06:F5:XX:XX:XX
   

   Now the controller shows up as an input event device (/dev/input/ps3 linked to something like /dev/input/event0). The keymap can be seen by installing and running evtest.

3. Configure lirc. This is needed because XBMC input handling is kind of weird (maybe for historical reasons), it tries too hard to differentiate between keyboards and remotes instead of just using the linux evdev API in a generic way.

   Put this in /etc/lirc/lircd.conf:

   include "/usr/share/lirc/remotes/devinput/lircd.conf.devinput"
   

   And this in /etc/lirc/hardware.conf

   # /etc/lirc/hardware.conf
   #
   # Arguments which will be used when launching lircd
   LIRCD_ARGS=""
   
   #Don't start lircmd even if there seems to be a good config file
   #START_LIRCMD=false
   
   #Don't start irexec, even if a good config file seems to exist.
   #START_IREXEC=false
   
   #Try to load appropriate kernel modules
   LOAD_MODULES=true
   
   # Run "lircd --driver=help" for a list of supported drivers.
   DRIVER="devinput"
   # usually /dev/lirc0 is the correct setting for systems using udev.
   DEVICE="/dev/input/ps3"
   MODULES=""
   
   # Default configuration files for your hardware if any
   LIRCD_CONF=""
   LIRCMD_CONF=""
   

Reboot and that's it; the default mappings in /opt/xbmc-bcm/xbmc-bin/share/xbmc/system/Lircmap.xml and /opt/xbmc-bcm/xbmc-bin/share/xbmc/system/keymaps/remote.xml are already good enough.

Remarks

Raspbmc puts its custom built version of XBMC under /opt, with custom scripts to manage updates and other tasks, why not just create Debian packages of the latest XBMC (with patches for Raspberry Pi) and set up a dedicated apt repository?

XBMC could modernize its input handling making a better use of the linux evdev API: with modern kernels more remote controls show up as input event devices, and lirc should not be needed to handle them.