game pad

Ok i havet worked on python for a while now.. cause i have been to busy working for some $$ to be able to pay off my bills but..
I though of what i want to do first in python.. i want to create a program that with a game pad.. for example

lets say i was to press the letter A on my keyboard.. and i wanted the button X on my gamepad to print out A like if i was pressing it off the keyboard.. how can i do this.. do i have to learn how to access the usb directly and send it some commands or what? anyone has a good tut for this?... cause i will want it to work for games as well

Have a look at Pygame, the Python wrapper for SDL, which has support for gamepads.

You certainly won't need to do any low level device work... at least not in GNU/Linux at any rate; I don't know about SDL with Windows, MacOS etc.