minarch hands every core SDCARD_PATH/Bios/<TAG> as its system directory
and opens no file in it. The scrapers read each pak's launch.sh (core,
tag, devices), each device's core makefile (the project a library is
built from: MyMinUI's dosbox_libretro.so is dosbox-pure) and the minarch
statement, at a pinned commit. The installer recognises the card from
.system/version.txt and refuses a folder inside it.
A platform can hand each libretro core a system directory of its own
(core_system_dirs). platform_layouts then gives one view per directory,
so the gap report, the builder, the manifest, slots and cross_reference
place a core's files below each folder it is handed, and a core handed
none gets no file. Resolution strips the folder again and searches the
collection by the core's own path.
AmberELEC, PAN4ELEC and EmuELEC detection now installs their own lists
at /storage/roms, the root those lists are written against; KNULLI its
own list at /userdata/bios. JELOS, KOLOS, UnofficialOS and Arch R keep
RetroArch's list with the folder their retroarch.cfg names.
The Google Play and retroarch.com builds share com.retroarch and com.retroarch.aarch64 but build their defaults under different roots (RetroArch v1.22.2 MainMenuActivity.java:182-183). The build is told by the version code it records in retroarch.cfg, else by the folder it wrote. A Google Play folder Termux cannot write is named, as for DraStic and Flycast.
Each OS publishes Batocera's systems dict (knulli-systems, and
batocera-systems at AmberELEC's newest prerelease commit and EmuELEC v4.8),
read with the shared parser. Cores come from each OS's own ES list.
AmberELEC and EmuELEC declare neogeo/ and ports/ beside bios/ from
/storage/roms, so their packs extract there and core_destination puts
core files under bios/.
extract_systems_dict, requirements_from_systems, platform_systems and
configgen_cores move to module level so the scrapers of lists with the
same shape read them with the same code.
DraStic keeps its BIOS in its private data and Flycast in Android/data,
which Termux cannot write on Android 11 and later. An installed one is now
named with the files not copied, and a writable Flycast folder is a
standalone copy target.
RetroDECK moves each of its folders on its own and records the new place
in retrodeck.json paths (api_data_processing.sh:913-935). Only
rd_home_path was read, so files went to <home>/bios after a move.
AmberELEC, EmuELEC, JELOS, KOLOS, UnofficialOS, ArchR, PAN4ELEC, dArkOS,
RetroOZ, spruceOS, CrossMix-OS, Onion, Allium, Koriki, MiyooCFW and plumOS
are found by what their builds write, named as they name themselves, and
installed to the system_directory of their RetroArch config, which follows
ArkOS and dArkOS to a second card. TrimUI stock, MinUI and a plumOS build
without a known folder are named and not installed to. Two unrelated
systems matching stop a run without a terminal.
Both branches extracted RetroBat's Flycast BiosPath: value_folders
already produces the record, so the dedicated extractor is dropped and
its test reads the generic one.
RetroArch_installCores (emuDeckRetroArch.sh) downloads flycast, mame,
melonds, mgba, mupen64plus_next, ppsspp and scummvm as libretro cores
next to their standalone apps. Listed as standalone only, they got one
layout: once Flycast's standalone files moved to flycast/bios/, the
libretro core lost dc/airlbios.zip, dc/naomi2.zip and dc/segasp.zip.
The scraper now writes them as dual_mode_cores.
DraStic opens nds_bios_arm9.bin, nds_bios_arm7.bin and nds_firmware.bin and checks their size. Its nine aliases are in none of its binaries, and neither platform launcher passes them: ROCKNIX links the two BIOS names from its bios folder, and RetroPie runs DraStic from $md_conf_root/nds/drastic (drastic.sh:48), now a passes_path record. The collection answers DraStic's names with its DS dumps in generate_db, where repository names belong.
A links record naming a file is where the emulator reads it: ROCKNIX links /storage/roms/bios/nds_bios_arm9.bin into DraStic's system folder (start_drastic.sh:37-41). $biosdir, ${biosPath} and $bios_path are the BIOS directory as RetroPie, EmuDeck and RetroDECK write it, and every place of those platforms was dropped as an unknown folder. A core name the launcher replaces is no longer packed when held: EmuDeck passes Complex_4627v1.03.bin to xemu (emuDeckXemu.sh:60-61), which never opens Complex_4627.bin.
The launcher layer now reads the Saturn emulators whose option replaces
the default path, DeSmuME's pair and firmware, the melonDS DSi files and
NAND region, jzIntv arguments, BlastEm's SetBiosPath, Dolphin, Raine,
GSplus, the DOSBox and capsimg copies, Tsugaru's folder chain, RPCS3,
EKA2L1, BizHawk's GB switches and the folders that MAME, FBNeo, Snes9x,
Flycast, ScummVM, XRoar, XM6 Pro, ArcadeDuck, Demul and B-Syndrome get.
Every line of these generators that names the bios folder must be read
by a record or a stated exception, or the scrape stops.
standalone_path is relative to the directories a standalone build
resolves it against, now declared per profile (standalone_directories).
A launcher record that links or passes a whole folder of the BIOS tree
under one of them gives that folder, and platform_layouts rebases the
standalone view once for the builder, the manifest, verify and slots
(launchers.standalone_root, common.standalone_destination).
Flycast on RetroPie and ROCKNIX reads bios/dc, on EmuDeck
bios/flycast/bios, on Batocera (FLYCAST_BIOS_PATH) and RetroBat
(Dreamcast.BiosPath) bios/dc. The ROCKNIX, Batocera and RetroBat
scrapers now record the patched data directory, the environment
variable and the setting that say so.
RetroBat's launcher layer now records the Saturn names its generators
pick. The ymir aliases are the libretro port's own kBiosFilenames, and
the SSF aliases label dumps of a slot whose file name SSF leaves free.
Both entries now say so next to their source_ref.
The -listxml names the software lists each machine and slot card
declares and the floppy drives it can instantiate. --devices now writes
one entry per hash/<list>.xml the release ships under the systems of its
placed machines (111 lists, 666 stay with hash/), and files each floppy
sample under the systems whose drives select its form factor
(floppy.cpp:1428-1473, 1759-1767).
Machines a registered platform declares under one of the profile's
systems seed the walk too: bbcb, cdimono1, cdimono2, dragon32, ep64 and
ep128. Unplaced device sets go from 903 to 861.
6eabf224..6664c602 rewrites the .rom1 extension swap and shares one path buffer between the .nvm and .mec reads (BiosTools.cpp:189-230, CDVD.cpp:194-243). The names read and the fallbacks are unchanged. profile_sync: 0 to review.
The libretro port reads sega_101.bin, mpr-17933.bin and saturn_bios.bin in that order, gives the first two the JP and US_EU regions by hash, and loads the candidate the ymir_region option or the disc area code asks for (apps/ymir-libretro/src/libretro.cpp:305-309, 596-606, 627-702, 1231-1238, 1290-1306 at 8174cbbe). Area K maps to KR, which neither image carries.
sf7000.rom is read only by the sega-sf7000 entries of blueMSX. It sat in bios/Microsoft/MSX because blueMSX keeps its machine folders together, which is a pack destination, not where the collection files a dump.
The standalone build reads BIOS files from its data directory root, not from dc/ (core/oslib/oslib.cpp:118-196, core/stdclass.cpp:95-125, core/linux-dist/main.cpp:74-99). Each entry now carries standalone_path.
# Conflicts:
# wiki/testing-guide.md
The semantic check read systems: only. mame2010 filed seven BIOS root
sets under systems its list lacked: cpzn1, cpzn2 (zn.c:4543, 4563),
konamigv (konamigv.c:877), skns (suprnova.c:1686), alg_bios (alg.c:782),
maxaflex (maxaflex.c:541) and hng64 (hng64.c:2189) are GAME_IS_BIOS_ROOT
in mame2010-libretro at source_commit.
storage: large_file alone no longer counts as held (e65ece74). The fixture now holds jp.bin the way the large-files release does: indexed by the database, listed in .gitignore, absent from the checkout and the cache of this offline run.
The flycast standalone paths (eb04fb50) stay out until the packs read the
platforms' launcher links. Two rosalies-mupen-gui aliases that only
RetroBat's launcher writes leave the profile, now that its layer
records them.
The -listxml names, for every machine, its parent (romof), the devices of its default configuration (device_ref) and the cards its slots offer (slotoption). A machine takes the system of the first set on its romof chain a written entry lists, and passes it to each device it can instantiate. A device set reached from one system gets system:, from several the new per-entry systems:, from none neither, and keeps serving every system of the profile. The gap report, the core extras and slots read the entry's own systems, so generate_pack --system and the installer pick by them.
The builder keeps a held regional fallback when the requested file is
missing (since 2026-10-17), and the comment beside the manifest's
omissions still said the opposite. A file the builder holds but the
manifest cannot download sat in omitted_files counted unheld, so the
installer kept a fallback the pack drops. Such an omission now carries
held: true and narrow() counts it held, as the builder does.
After --all-variants, --verify-packs printed "hashes checked during the
build" for the platform-only, truth and required-only packs and compared
none of them, so one missing a file its narrowed list requires passed.
Each pack is now held to the platform list narrowed the way it was built:
source and required_only, read from its name, reach the baseline, the
region grouping and the replay of the core extras.
profile_sync --all reported 18 repositories the forge answers under another owner or name. Each pin resolves in the renamed repository, so the URLs change and the pins stay. flycast2021 builds from metallic77/flycast 603814c9 (ROCKNIX package.mk), whose upstream libretro/flycast now answers as libretro/parallel-dc with 4c293f30 still in its master history.
Abdessamad Derraz