Hi all — solo dev here. For the past year I've been building ControllerKeys, a macOS app that turns any game controller into a full keyboard-and-mouse for the whole system, not just games.
The short version: every button maps to any shortcut, macro, or script. Left stick moves the mouse, right stick scrolls. Hold a trigger and an on-screen keyboard appears with swipe typing, so you can write real sentences from the couch. There's a radial app switcher, chords (two buttons together), button sequences, and up to 12 alternate layers per profile, so a 15-button controller ends up with far more inputs than you'd expect.
It works with basically everything — Xbox (incl. Elite paddles), DualSense/DualShock (touchpad + gyro + light bar), the new Steam Controller (natively, no Steam needed), Joy-Cons, Switch Pro, the Apple TV Siri Remote, and 300+ generic pads via the SDL database.
People mostly use it for couch computing and media browsing, Anki flashcard review (there's a built-in profile for that), one-handed workflows alongside a drawing tablet, OBS scene switching, and as alternative input for folks who can't comfortably use a keyboard or mouse — it plays nice with Accessibility Zoom and VoiceOver.
Because it needs the Accessibility permission (it synthesizes input), the complete source is public for review, and the shipping binaries are signed and notarized. Free 14-day trial, no account needed: https://kevintang.xyz/apps/controller-keys — $19.99 one-time if you keep it, and every update has been free since launch.
Genuinely happy to hear feature requests or gripes — most of the app's best features started as user suggestions.
The short version: every button maps to any shortcut, macro, or script. Left stick moves the mouse, right stick scrolls. Hold a trigger and an on-screen keyboard appears with swipe typing, so you can write real sentences from the couch. There's a radial app switcher, chords (two buttons together), button sequences, and up to 12 alternate layers per profile, so a 15-button controller ends up with far more inputs than you'd expect.
It works with basically everything — Xbox (incl. Elite paddles), DualSense/DualShock (touchpad + gyro + light bar), the new Steam Controller (natively, no Steam needed), Joy-Cons, Switch Pro, the Apple TV Siri Remote, and 300+ generic pads via the SDL database.
People mostly use it for couch computing and media browsing, Anki flashcard review (there's a built-in profile for that), one-handed workflows alongside a drawing tablet, OBS scene switching, and as alternative input for folks who can't comfortably use a keyboard or mouse — it plays nice with Accessibility Zoom and VoiceOver.
Because it needs the Accessibility permission (it synthesizes input), the complete source is public for review, and the shipping binaries are signed and notarized. Free 14-day trial, no account needed: https://kevintang.xyz/apps/controller-keys — $19.99 one-time if you keep it, and every update has been free since launch.
Genuinely happy to hear feature requests or gripes — most of the app's best features started as user suggestions.