Hi,
I thought this might be of interest to some in the Java Gaming community.
I’ve written a Crossplatform (Mac OS X, Linux, Windows) library to access USB HID devices.
It is called PureJavaHIDAPI and you can find it here:
Maybe not the way to go if you want interface with your joystick (though I’ve successfully communicated with a cheap Chinese generic USB Gamepad with it) but if you need talk to some exotic I/O device that represents itself as HID, this is an easy to deploy alternative with minimal impact for the end users, no drivers or libraries to install, just include/embed a jar or two with your Java code.
It is free in every sense of the word and BSD licensed so should good for both open source and proprietary code development.
Thanks for your attention.
br Kusti