Connecting your Wii to Linux Ubuntu 8.10

The Wii is Bluetooth connected to its console. Matt Cutts recently hooked up his Wii to his Ubuntu computer at the same time as me. We followed basically the same instructions. He seems to stop short of showing us how to use it as a mouse.

I have my computer hooked up to my LCD TV and I am trying to determine whether I can live without the ridiculous $70 per month Comcast cable bill. So I want to set up the internet on this TV is the easiest way to be able to surf TV shows on the web.

First of all, you don't need to spend $20 on a Bluetooth receiver as he suggested. I bought one on ebay for $4 with free shipping. It worked immediately.

The rest of the info here is slightly modified from the following post on the Ubuntu forums.

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/CWiiD

It seems that the instructions for Ubuntu 8.04 worked for 8.10.

Here we go:

• Open up a terminal window.
  
• Type: sudo apt-get install libcwiid1 lswm wmgui wminput
  
• Type: sudo modprobe uinput
  
• Type: lswm to get the address ( XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX) of your Wii.
  

• Edit two files using the following steps.

• gksudo gedit /etc/rc.local

Make it look like

#
# rc.local
#
# This script is executed at the end of each multiuser run level.
# Make sure that the script will "exit 0" on success or any other
# value on error.
#
# In order to enable or disable this script just change the execution
# bits.
#
# By default this script does nothing.

modprobe uinput

exit 0

• Save the file.
  

• gksudo gedit /etc/cwiid/wminput/ir_ptr
  

• Find these lines:
  

Plugin.ir_ptr.X = ~ABS_X
Plugin.ir_ptr.Y = ~ABS_Y

and replace them with:

Plugin.ir_ptr.X = ABS_X
Plugin.ir_ptr.Y = ABS_Y

• Using the Wii address that you got above enter the following command and push buttons #1 and #2 at the same time. sudo wminput -c ir_ptr XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX
• The Wii should be recognized and all of a sudden your pointer can be controlled by the Wii. The LED strip that comes with the Wii console must be on. So I turn the Wii console on a head of time. Apparently it is simple to build one of the LED strips. I have not done it yet.

Now I can surf the internet. I have been putting together a web page that gathers a lot of the TV viewing into one page. The text is big so that it is viewable on lower resolution screens and easier to target with pointers like the Wii.

http://www.surftvee.com

Let me know how to improve things.