Format of /dev/input/event*

Question

What is the \"format\" of the character devices located in /dev/input/event*?

In other words, how can I decode the character stream? A Python example w

Answer 1

The format is described in the Documentation/input/input.txt file in the Linux source. Basically, you read structs of the following form from the file:

struct input_event {
    struct timeval time;
    unsigned short type;
    unsigned short code;
    unsigned int value;
};

type and code are values defined in linux/input.h. For example, type might be EV_REL for relative moment of a mouse, or EV_KEY for a keypress, and code is the keycode, or REL_X or ABS_X for a mouse.