Controller¶

The DualSense and DualSense Edge controllers on Bazzite: their battery, their firmware and the Edge's profiles. The app gets the controllers' firmware from Sony's update server and sends it over a USB cable. It changes nothing on the system.

Linux's own hid-playstation driver drives the controller, so games and Steam see it as usual. The app talks to the controller beside the driver, through its hidraw node (/dev/hidraw<n>). It knows the controllers by their USB product IDs, 0x0CE6 (DualSense) and 0x0DF2 (DualSense Edge).

It has not been validated on PS5 hardware. Controller detection and functions depend on the system's kernel driver and controller support.

The window¶

The header shows the controller the window is looking at:

Box	What it shows
Controller	Edge for the DualSense Edge, DualSense for the plain one
Connection	USB or Bluetooth
Installed firmware	the firmware the controller runs, as the update server numbers it (for example `0x0217`): green when it is the latest official firmware, orange when a newer one is out. Its tooltip has the build date
Latest firmware	the latest official version for this controller. Orange when the controller can be updated to it, on the USB cable: a click starts the update. Otherwise a click asks the update server again. Its tooltip says why an update cannot start
Reports	how many input reports a second the controller sends now, for example `250 Hz`
Bluetooth off in	for a controller on Bluetooth, the time left before it is switched off unused (see Switch Bluetooth off when unused); any button, stick or trigger starts it over. Cable on the USB cable, Never when switched off, "—" when the optional service is not running

At the right end of the header, the battery stands as a phone shows it, with the percentage inside it: green, orange when it is low, red when it is nearly empty. The controller reports its level in steps of 10 %.

The state beside the title says whether an update is available.

With more than one controller connected, a tab for each appears under the header, for example Player 1 · Edge · USB · 100 % and Player 2 · Edge · Bluetooth · 40 %: the player number its lights show, the model, the connection and the battery. Click a tab to show that controller in the window: its drawing, firmware, light bar and profiles. With one controller there are no tabs.

Below the header, the window shows one of three pages:

Connect your controller, while no controller is connected: a drawing of the controller with a USB-C cable going into its port. The app finds the controller by itself once it is plugged in or paired. To pair it over Bluetooth, hold Create and the PS button until the light bar flashes, then pair it in the system's Bluetooth settings.
The introduction, after the first controller connects: three short pages on what the app does, the firmware update and the Edge's profiles (the battery, on a plain DualSense). Skip goes straight on; Show the introduction, at the bottom of the main page, brings it back.
The main page: the Controller box with a drawing of your controller, the firmware box and the profiles.

On the cable and over Bluetooth¶

Linux drives a controller over one connection at a time. A controller that is connected over Bluetooth and then plugged in stays on Bluetooth: the cable only charges it, and the firmware update cannot start. The window says so (On Bluetooth, not the cable) and offers Use the cable in the firmware box: it disconnects the controller from Bluetooth (with bluetoothctl, no password needed). Then unplug the cable and plug it in again, and Linux takes the cable. Switching the controller off (hold the PS button for 10 seconds) before plugging it in does the same.

The controller box¶

The drawing is the app's own, not the official artwork. The color buttons for the light bar are under it; to its right, the light bar's color now, and Test vibration. It follows your controller live: a button lights while you press it (the Edge's Fn and back buttons too), the sticks move and the triggers fill as far as you pull them. Hover over a part to see its name.

The i at the top left opens the controller's spec sheet: what it reports now (model, connection, firmware, hardware version, battery), the model's specifications with the official source of each (for the DualSense Edge its instruction manual and the PlayStation Blog: model CFI-ZCP1, a 1,050 mAh battery, about 325 g), and the parts the drawing leaves out because the controller does not report them, such as the L2 and R2 stop sliders, the RELEASE latch and the reset button. The plain DualSense has no specifications in the app: only facts from an official source go in. The sheet never shows the controller's address or serial number.

Light bar: the circles under the drawing: Blue, Red, Green, Purple, White, Off, or the color wheel for any color. The color is set at once and again each time the controller connects while the app is open; the drawing shows it. The controller does not keep it: it forgets it when it disconnects, and Steam or a game may set another. Off saves some battery.
Turn Bluetooth off switches a controller on Bluetooth off by ending its connection; the PS button switches it on again. On the USB cable it stays on: the cable powers it.
Switch Bluetooth off when unused: after 10, 30 or 60 minutes without a button pressed, a stick moved or a trigger pulled, a controller on Bluetooth is switched off the same way; Never leaves it on. 10 minutes is the setting's default. An optional service does this, also while the window is closed: see The idle-off service. Without the service nothing is switched off, and Bluetooth off in shows "—".
Player indicator: the short row of small white lights just under the touchpad. Linux lights it when the controller connects, with the player number in the order the controllers connected. All dark means the controller is off. The drawing shows the same lights, and hovering over them names the player: with two controllers connected, it is the number on the chosen tab. The app does not change them.
Test vibration runs the left motor, then the right one, almost a second each: you should feel each on its own side.

The idle-off service¶

The installer does not install or enable this service by default, and the portal installs the app without it. To opt in, run the installer from a repository checkout with:

apps/controller/install.sh --enable-idle-service

This installs and enables ps5-controller-idle.service, a per-user systemd service, not a system-wide one. It switches a controller on Bluetooth off after the time chosen in the window without use. It ignores the motion sensors, so a controller lying on a table counts as unused, and it leaves controllers on the USB cable alone. While a game started from Steam runs, every controller stays on, whether it is used or not; the wait starts over when the game ends.

With several controllers connected, each has its own wait: one in use stays on while an unused one goes off. A desktop notification says which one, by the player number its lights showed, for example DualSense Edge (player 2) switched off: Not used for 10 minutes. Press the PS button to switch it on again. If switching it off fails, the notification says so; hold the PS button for 10 seconds then. The journal keeps the same lines:

journalctl --user -u ps5-controller-idle

Uninstalling the app removes the service.

The firmware update¶

Check for an update asks the official update server (fwupdater.dl.playstation.net) for the latest version of each controller. With Check when the window opens on (the default), the window asks by itself, at most once a day (Privacy).

When a newer version is out, Latest firmware in the header turns orange; a click on it asks first, and then:

downloads the firmware from the update server (about 1 MB) and keeps it, so a second try needs no network;
checks that it fits: the firmware names the controller it is for (its USB product ID and its target), and its version must be newer than the one the controller runs;
saves a backup of the Edge's profiles (see Profiles);
sends it to the controller, with a progress bar.

The controller then checks the firmware, switches to it and restarts. It leaves USB for a moment and comes back; the header then shows the new version. The update ends the Bluetooth pairing: to use the controller without the cable again, remove it from the system's Bluetooth settings first, then pair it again.

Before it starts:

Connect the controller with a USB cable. The update does not go over Bluetooth.
Quit Steam (Steam › Exit), and any other program that reads the controller. The app names the program that has the controller open and does not start while one does, so that nothing else talks to the controller during the update.
Leave the cable connected and the system powered on until the window says the update is done.

If the controller refuses the firmware or stops answering, the window says what it reported. Unplug the controller and plug it in again: the header then shows which firmware it runs, and the update can be tried again.

The firmware files¶

The update server has one file per target and only the latest version of it. The DualSense's target depends on its revision; the DualSense Edge's is 0044. The app knows these files from the update server by their SHA-256:

Target	Controller	Version	SHA-256
`0044`	DualSense Edge	`0x0217`	`c157eec635f809232e06c255a0847e6b915b0032ca661b12ae35fb2e4eac49df`
`0004`	DualSense	`0x0630`	`861ad95a99b16805ff20f5690372988662c4f69c6ad0b266e793d7fc2292315a`
`000B`	DualSense	`0x0630`	`b66528795683d214ca06fe4672d298de75bf019bd5046442cbec63fc02974f86`
`000E`	DualSense	`0x0641`	`b9c217d8ded5f09f03034e7e5037af0c174c3c77a3cbd201ee5fd219ee448fc8`

A newer file from the update server works too; the confirmation then says the app does not know it. The controller checks its signature either way. The files are kept in ~/.local/share/ps5-controller/firmware/. The Firmware box names the kept file of the latest version with its SHA-256 check, and says whether it is a file the app knows.

Use a file… sends a firmware file you have (FWUPDATE<target>.bin), for example one kept from the update server before. The app checks it the same way and refuses a file for another controller or one that is not newer.

Profiles¶

The DualSense Edge keeps four profiles; Fn and Triangle, Square, Cross or Circle chooses one (Triangle is the default profile). The Profiles box shows them side by side, a column each, as the controller reports them: the name, each stick's curve (Default, Quick, Precise, Steady, Digital or Dynamic), each trigger's range, and the buttons that send something other than themselves (the back buttons included). The card of the profile the controller uses now says Active. Click a profile to see on the drawing what it sets; click it again to let go.

Back up… saves them in a JSON file, exactly as the controller holds them, and Read again reads the firmware and the profiles anew, for example after you changed them elsewhere. The app also saves a backup before every firmware update and before every change to a profile, in ~/.local/share/ps5-controller/profiles/.

Create, edit and clear¶

Under each card, with the controller on the USB cable:

Create… on an empty slot makes a profile there, starting from the default profile's settings.
Edit… changes a profile.
Clear removes it from the controller, after asking.

The default profile (Fn + Triangle) has none of these: the app never changes it. Over Bluetooth, and during a firmware update, the buttons are grayed out.

The editor sets:

Name: up to 39 characters.
Sticks: each stick's curve (Default, Quick, Precise, Steady, Digital or Dynamic) and its sensitivity level. A profile made elsewhere shows "as it is" next to the slider: its curve stays exactly as it was until you change the curve or the slider.
Triggers: where on its travel L2 and R2 start and stop counting, in percent. The controller keeps the range in the profile, but on Linux it still reports the trigger's whole travel.
Buttons: what each button sends, the back buttons included.

Save to the controller saves a backup of all four profiles, writes the profile, and reads the profiles again. If it did not work, the window says so and names the backup. The parts of a profile the app does not show stay as the controller holds them.

The plain DualSense has no profiles.

From a terminal¶

ps5-controller --info

prints each controller's connection, battery, firmware and profiles, without a window and without the network. ps5-controller --idle-watch is what the optional idle-off service runs.

Access to the controller¶

The app does not request root, needs no password and adds no udev rule; it relies on the system's permissions for the controller's hidraw node. When your user may not use the node, the window says so (Cannot be read); the app does not change the permissions.

Install¶

Install it from the portal, on its Utilities tab, or run the installer from a repository checkout, as your own user:

apps/controller/install.sh                         # app menu entry and Desktop icon
apps/controller/install.sh --enable-idle-service   # also the per-user Bluetooth idle-off service
apps/controller/install.sh --no-desktop-shortcut   # app menu entry only
apps/controller/install.sh --uninstall             # remove the app; keeps its settings, firmware and profile backups
apps/controller/install.sh --uninstall --purge     # also remove its settings, firmware and profile backups

It installs:

the app in ~/.local/share/ps5-controller/app;
PyQt6 in the suite's shared environment ~/.local/share/bazzite-console-suite/venv;
the launcher ~/.local/bin/ps5-controller, an app menu entry and a Desktop icon;
with --enable-idle-service only, the user service ps5-controller-idle (see The idle-off service).

Settings are kept in ~/.config/ps5-controller/ps5-controller.ini.

Credits¶

The update protocol comes from dualsense-updater-rs (nchie), the layout and writing of the Edge's profiles from dualsense-edge-profile-web-application (steffalon).

Firmware and license¶

GPL-3.0-or-later, see LICENSE. The code that comes from the two projects above is MIT; the app's README keeps their notice. The controllers' firmware belongs to Sony and is not part of the app.