this post was submitted on 11 Apr 2024
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Wondering if anyone has experimented with using controllers (PS/xbox/other) to do anything other than gaming ?

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[–] mocha_lotsofmilk@lemmy.world 69 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I heard they are great for killing billionaires in experimental deep sea rigs

[–] Catoblepas@lemmy.blahaj.zone 9 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Controllers in shoddily constructed deep sea rigs don’t kill people, billionaires piloting with controllers in shoddily constructed deep sea rigs kill people!

[–] tetris11@lemmy.ml 1 points 1 year ago

and so does microsoft , woo woo wooo

[–] ColdWater@lemmy.ca 23 points 1 year ago (1 children)

They use it to control a submarine

[–] johannesvanderwhales@lemmy.world 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

For sale: Logitech submarine controller, lifetime warranty.

[–] Hello_there@fedia.io 19 points 1 year ago (3 children)

Operating parts of multi million dollar navy ships, according to articles. Not joking

[–] ILikeBoobies@lemmy.ca 6 points 1 year ago

Because they’re designed for controlling and people are familiar with them/can learn easily

Also helps standardize when taking bids from multiple companies

[–] GammaGames@beehaw.org 3 points 1 year ago

Also submarines, when heading down to see the Titanic

[–] fogstormberry@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I wonder how many spares they keep around

[–] KISSmyOSFeddit@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago

And if you always get the shitty broken one until you're a corporal.

[–] bionicjoey@lemmy.ca 17 points 1 year ago (1 children)

The Steam Deck and Steam controller have touchpads which make them totally usable as a mouse for normal PC usage like web browsing

DualShock 4 and DualSense touch pads do this too! They even support multi touch so you can do left/right/middle click by using multiple fingers.

[–] bjoern_tantau@swg-empire.de 14 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Disneyland uses Steam Decks to remote control droids in Star Wars land.

[–] Vilian@lemmy.ca 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

ukraine was doing the same but to kill russians lol

[–] KISSmyOSFeddit@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago

"These blast points, too accurate for Russians"

[–] intensely_human@lemm.ee 9 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Actually yes.

I worked on a crew building pole barns in Colorado. For anyone unaware you basically dig a bunch of holes, set wooden columns in them and pour concrete around them, then hang the rest of the structure off those columns.

We had a dude that swore by the xbox 360 controller. We tried to get him to use a framing hammer to drive his nails but he would only use that 360 controller.

We also did a lot of acid. If you see a weird barn in Colorado, look for the microsoft logo pressed into the wood next to the siding nails.

[–] jsomae@lemmy.ml 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

So he literally, physically hammered the xbox controller into the nail?

[–] intensely_human@lemm.ee 3 points 1 year ago

He hammered the nails into the boards

[–] Anarki_@lemmy.blahaj.zone 8 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

They are the OG electric vibrators for people who can't buy vibrators.

[–] blindsight@beehaw.org 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

A vibrator was one of the very first patented electrical devices. 1880. It predates the first patent for the first electric iron by a decade.

[–] Anarki_@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 points 1 year ago

I didn't know this!

[–] CalcProgrammer1@lemmy.ml 7 points 1 year ago

In college I was on the robotics team. We used several different controllers to drive various robots. I made a little tank steering robot that was remote controlled from a PC with an Xbox 360 controller. I later rebuilt it to use a Raspberry Pi and added a pan/tilt mount for the camera controlled from the controller's D-pad. We also used a Wiimote to control our competition robot, using the accelerometer for steering which was pretty cool. This was in like 2010 when motion controls were still a relatively new and cool thing.

[–] Interstellar_1@pawb.social 6 points 1 year ago

They can be quite useful in hobbyist robotics

I do recall a gaming controller being used to pilot the titan submersible that is now on the ocean floor. May their souls rest in peace.

[–] SuperSynthia@lemmy.world 6 points 1 year ago

Several modular synth modules use joysticks for control over parameters, but one of the coolest I’ve seen is one from Delptronics that uses a wii nunchuck controller to send out control voltage. Hagiwo I believe also has a similar DIY design.

[–] zout@fedia.io 4 points 1 year ago

Some guys I used to know used them to make music, as some sort of midi controller.

[–] OuterRem@lemmy.ml 4 points 1 year ago

We had a subcontractor drive a wired camera mounted drone through the sewers with it. Some use LIDAR or SONAR instead of just cameras. Game controllers are pretty common for these.

[–] Honytawk@lemmy.zip 4 points 1 year ago

All a controller is is just some buttons on a wire in a portable form factor.

If you want to use it for Excel, you can.

I used one on a Raspberry Pi to drive a self build remote car wirelessly.

[–] runner_g@lemmy.blahaj.zone 3 points 1 year ago

I've seen some people on YouTube use them to control their CNC.

[–] numbermess@fedia.io 3 points 1 year ago

I am working on getting my XBox controller to work with a Raspberry Pi/Astroberry setup to control my telescope.

[–] Perfide@reddthat.com 3 points 1 year ago

Hacksmith on youtube uses playstation controllers for remote operation of their giant mechs.

[–] DetachablePianist@lemmy.ml 2 points 1 year ago

In Ghostbusters 2 they rigged up a Nintendo joystick to drive the statue of liberty through the streets of NYC. Does that count?

[–] hperrin@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago

I used to use a mini game controller for artwork. Like up on the dpad would zoom in the canvas. I had buttons for undo, redo, switch to eraser, rotate the canvas, flip it, etc.

[–] wazzupdog@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

I have one of mine configured as media controls when I'm wandering around the house (8bitdo controllers ftw)

[–] Cwilliams@beehaw.org 2 points 1 year ago

For FRC robotics competitions, we use Xbox controllers to control the robot

playstation and Xbox controllers make good Kodi/XBMC remotes for a laptop connected to a TV.

[–] maynarkh@feddit.nl 2 points 1 year ago

I use my flight sim gear as a fidget toy, hope that counts.

Some digital artists use Switch JoyCons for shortcuts in Clip Studio and other painting programs.

[–] KeepFlying@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago

I think it was med students who use controllers to control flash card decks for studying.

Also as PowerPoint remotes.

I would also add VR controllers to the list and I had used them for painting.

[–] packadal@beehaw.org 1 points 1 year ago

Gave a presentation last year, using a joy con as a remote for switching slides.

Nice thing is you can have mouse with the joystick as well

[–] vortexal@lemmy.ml 1 points 1 year ago

On a very old computer of mine, the "y" key was completely missing and I couldn't replace it because the contacts were broken so I just use JoytoKey and a USB SNES controller.

I've also used a similar setup for navigating some image boorus but, for obvious reasons, I wont specify anything further.

[–] Goun@lemmy.ml 1 points 1 year ago

Iirc (on the phone now,) cameractrls allows panning and zooming with a gamepad.

[–] averyminya@beehaw.org 1 points 1 year ago

I don't know if me talking about my Steam controller counts...

[–] toototabon@lemmy.ml 1 points 1 year ago

Scrolling around LibreELEC to get to my gaming folder