enricobuehlerandClaude Opus 5
b297542c4d
A controller that reaches the host by USB passthrough — VirtualHere and friends, or simply a pad plugged into the host — arrived there twice: once as the real device, once as the virtual pad this client built from the same hands. Games read both, so a stick drifts against the centred second pad and menus take every input twice. New per-client setting, "Forward controllers", default on (today's behaviour). It is tier-P, so a profile can decline what another profile forwards. On Linux and Windows it is deliberately stronger than "send nothing". Opening a controller is what CLAIMS it — SDL's HIDAPI drivers take the device node — and a claimed device is one a passthrough tool cannot bind, so with this off the session opens no slot at all and never enables the Valve HIDAPI drivers. Menu navigation is untouched: the launcher still opens the active pad, and a session supersedes menu mode whether it forwards or not, so the pad is free for the whole time a stream is up. The consequence, documented at both the setting and the chord: the controller escape chord is read off forwarded pads, so it is unavailable there. The Apple and Android input stacks claim nothing, so those clients keep their slots and their chords and only gate the wire sends — losing tvOS's only controller way out of a stream would have been the worse bug. Android does stop its DualSense and Steam Controller 2 USB captures, which do claim the device. Surfaces: GTK, WinUI, the console settings screen, Apple's touch and gamepad settings, the Android touch and gamepad settings, and Decky (which also hides the rows that now have nothing to act on). Everywhere the "which pad" and "pad type" rows grey out while it is off. Verified: cargo clippy --all-targets -D warnings + 79 tests on pf-client-core, pf-console-ui, punktfunk-client-session and punktfunk-client-linux (linux/amd64 container, gate proven non-vacuous with a planted error); swift build for the Apple clients; gradle compile + 49 unit tests for Android (likewise proven); tsc for Decky. clients/windows is UNCOMPILED — both Windows boxes were offline; its edits were reviewed against the helper signatures by hand. Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>
punktfunk — Linux client
The native Linux app for streaming a punktfunk host to your desktop, laptop, or Steam Deck.
It's a clean relm4/GTK4/libadwaita shell that finds hosts on your network, pairs with a PIN,
and manages your settings and library — the stream itself runs in the sibling
punktfunk-session Vulkan binary (clients/session), which the shell
spawns, putting the picture on glass at your display's own resolution and refresh rate.
Built in Rust end to end (no C ABI): the shell shares its plumbing with the session binary through
crates/pf-client-core, which links the punktfunk-core protocol crate and speaks the fast
punktfunk/1 protocol — QUIC control plane, GF(2¹⁶) FEC + AES-GCM data plane.
Features
- Zero-copy hardware decode — the session presenter decodes via Vulkan Video on every GPU vendor (including NVIDIA), falling back to FFmpeg VAAPI → DRM-PRIME dmabuf and then software when Vulkan Video is unavailable.
- Your display's native mode — the host builds a virtual output at exactly your WxH@Hz; no scaling, no letterboxing. Steady 60 fps at 1080p60, ~6 ms capture→decoded on the LAN.
- Audio both ways — PipeWire playback with a jitter ring, plus mic uplink to the host.
- Full controller support — SDL3 gamepads with rumble and DualSense fidelity (lightbar, player LEDs, touchpad, motion, adaptive-trigger replay). Click-to-capture keyboard and mouse, with a release chord (Ctrl+Alt+Shift+Q) and focus-loss release.
- Find hosts automatically — mDNS discovery lists hosts on your LAN; saved hosts persist. First connect does a one-time SPAKE2 PIN pairing (or TOFU on trusted LANs), then reconnects on a pinned identity.
- Per-host speed test to pick a bitrate, plus compositor and mode preferences in Settings.
- Game library browser (experimental, off by default) — "Browse library…" on a saved host shows its games (Steam + custom) as a poster grid; click one to launch it in the session. Fetched from the host's management API over mTLS — paired devices are authorized by their certificate, no extra host setup.
- Gamepad library launcher (
--browse host) — a console-style, controller-driven library view of a paired host's games, rendered by the session binary's Skia console UI: A plays the focused title, B quits, L1/R1 jump. Built for the Steam Deck plugin's "Open library" launch; session end returns to the launcher. Arrow keys/Enter/Esc drive it too (no pad needed).
Get it
Most people should install a package rather than build from source:
| Distro | Install |
|---|---|
| Flatpak (any distro, Steam Deck) | io.unom.Punktfunk — see packaging/flatpak |
| Ubuntu / Debian (apt) | sudo apt install punktfunk-client (after adding the repo) |
| Fedora / Bazzite (rpm) | rpm-ostree install punktfunk-client |
| Arch (PKGBUILD) | see packaging/arch |
Per-device install steps and pairing walkthrough: docs.punktfunk.unom.io/docs/install-client.
Build & run from source
Requires GTK ≥ 4.16, libadwaita ≥ 1.5, FFmpeg 7 or 8 (with VAAPI for hardware decode), PipeWire, and SDL3 (with hidapi) development packages.
# from the repo root
cargo run -p punktfunk-client-linux # launch the app
cargo run -p punktfunk-client-linux -- --connect HOST[:PORT] # skip the host list and connect
cargo run -p punktfunk-client-linux -- --browse HOST # the gamepad library launcher
The binary is named punktfunk-client — the relm4/libadwaita desktop shell (hosts,
pairing/trust, settings, the desktop library page). Every stream and the console game
library run in the sibling punktfunk-session Vulkan binary; the shell spawns it
for connects, and --connect/--browse on the shell exec it directly (so the Decky
wrapper keeps working unchanged). Headless flags stay in the shell:
--pair <PIN> --connect host[:port] (pairing ceremony), --wake host[:port], and
--library host[:mgmt_port] (print a host's game library).
Layout
src/
main.rs · app.rs entry point, relm4 AppModel (window, trust gate, session child
lifecycle, typed messages), primary menu, CSS
cli.rs headless paths (--pair/--wake/--library), the --connect/--browse
exec handoff to punktfunk-session, screenshot scenes
ui_hosts.rs hosts page component (FactoryVecDeque cards, saved + discovered
grids, add-host dialog, banner)
ui_library.rs game-library poster grid (per-host, launches titles)
ui_trust.rs TOFU / PIN-pairing / request-access dialogs
ui_settings.rs resolution · refresh · decoder · bitrate · compositor · mic
spawn.rs the session-child plumbing (stdout contract → AppMsg)
tools/screenshots.sh store screenshot capture (app self-capture; Xvfb fallback)
The UI-agnostic plumbing — session pump, FFmpeg decode, PipeWire audio, SDL3 gamepads +
keymap, trust store, mDNS discovery, library client, Wake-on-LAN — lives in
crates/pf-client-core, shared with the Vulkan session binary.
Related
- Documentation — quick start, pairing, troubleshooting
- Steam Deck plugin — launches this client fullscreen in Gaming Mode
- Project README — the host, the other clients, and how it all fits together