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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
LRPS2 reads pcsx2/resources/GameIndex.yaml through its data directory
and declares no file entry for it, so the truth entry other cores build
named armsx2 and yaps2 alone and hash_conflict missed LRPS2's copy. A
core whose data directory holds a file at an entry's path now folds in
as a reader with the cached copy's hashes, unless the profile lists what
it reads under that tree (yaps2, pcee2).
generate_pack and verify read --system beside --platform through common.resolve_system_arg, built on platform_system_names, the mapping the manifest's system_names comes from. verify --platform --system now reports on the narrowed pack. Unknown names are refused with suggestions before the database is read.
verify resolved offline, so a release asset absent from bios/ and the
cache read as missing while an online build fetched and packed it. verify
now reads the database record of the registered path and counts such a
declaration present, listed as fetched at build time. --offline keeps the
old count, and the offline pipeline passes it to its verify step.
A core extra resolved by name shipped on existence platforms even when
the core's own size check turns the copy away. The RetroPie pack carried
the 128 KB Apple IIGS ROM as Basilisk II's ROM (min 512 KB). The builder,
the manifest and verify now read validation.core_size_refusal, which
accepts a copy any version of the same profile slot takes.
emulatorLauncher writes a BIOS path into an emulator's configuration
only when the file exists: string x = Path.Combine(bios, "name");
if (File.Exists(x)) ini.WriteValue(section, key, x). The extractor now
records each such write as a fixed_name launcher record, with the
enclosing if and early-return conditions, and a key that receives the
bios folder itself as passes_path. A path reassigned before the check,
or a write under a loop or an else, is not read.
Generators read at 48cdc616: KegaFusion (SCD and 32X keys, GenesisBIOS
given the folder), Jgenesis, MelonDS (DS), Mupen64, Project64, mGBA.
The RetroBat paragraph of the Kega Fusion profile now lives in the
launcher layer.
detect_pinned_tag matched core_version against every view, so an upstream_commit set to the release tag a port was cut from (triforce on Dolphin 2407, dosbox_pure on 1.0-preview7, GroovyMAME on mame0289) froze the whole profile: the port was no longer compared with its HEAD and bump_commit refused. Only the documented build's repository freezes the profile now. An upstream on its tag is self-checked at that tag, is not reported orphaned, and a bump leaves upstream_commit on it.
flycast now reads naomi2.zip, which the RetroArch list RetroPie inherits
already declares. The render added it to the flycast help sentences but
landed_changes counted additions only for entries the platform layer
lacks, so the report missed a name the diff carries. names_anew lets an
exporter whose unit is not the entry say so.
The download page had no Android line and no Windows form with
options, and platform and system pages offered only ZIP parts. One
generator now writes the Linux, Windows and Android commands for the
download page and the platform, emulator and system pages. A system
section lists each platform's command under the system id its install
manifest records, the only names --system accepts.
The which-pack page called RetroPie the largest community with the most
guides, Batocera an easy setup and Recalbox good for a first build,
claims nothing in the repository measures. Each row now says what the
setup is, with board names taken from the platform target lists.
The page opened on a slogan and four tiles that read Verified (100%)
for 5,437 of 5,438 files and Missing 0, above a table of red cells. It
now opens on what it covers and one sentence that says every count of
the platforms' own lists and points to the emulator files below.
An emulator page linked its YAML and api/v1 JSON, platform and system
pages nothing. Each platform page now links its YAML, its own
api/v1/platforms/<id>.json and its install manifest, and each system
page its api/v1/systems/<slug>.json, both validated by the envelope
schema.
NanoBoyAdvance opens general.bios_path, default bios.bin (src/platform/core/src/config.cpp:36 at 3bb6f478). gba_bios.bin is the path ROCKNIX's config.toml sets, recorded under launchers: in rocknix.yml.
Without the alias the entry met only PCem's and QEMU's bios.bin, 64 and 128 KB, which BIOSLoader refuses (bios.cpp:17-48). verify counted it held by name, so the launcher layer left it alone and the ROCKNIX pack gained PCem's image. A hashless entry whose every same-named copy fails its size is now not held, and the gba_bios.bin ROCKNIX declares settles it.
_holding_members kept every same-named copy when the best held nothing,
so galgames.zip, a lone assembler listing, resolved by name for mame,
groovymame and mame4droid-2024, and awbios.zip for mame4droid. Such a
copy now resolves as hash_mismatch.
mame2003_plus declared its contents by name only, while fileio.c:1031-1040
loads a member by CRC when the name is absent. The 61 members now carry
the CRC their driver declares, so stvbios, megatech and the six ZN sets
keep matching the archives the collection holds.
validate_pr.py built its folder advice from platform lists alone, so a
file only an emulator profile declares got the generic
bios/Manufacturer/Console/ advice. Profiles now feed the same table
through each entry's system, and the contributing guide says the
command answers where a file goes.
An emulator card's anchor changed when a second entry with the same
path was added, so cited links landed at the page top. A card whose
entry declares a hash is now addressed by it, and the first card of a
path keeps the plain file-<path> id as an alias.
jp, us, kr and gb were aliases but au was unknown, and the first
spelling offered for it was auto, which means world. Every territory
of the region tree now answers to its ISO 3166-1 code, in the build
scripts and in the installer, whose SHA-256 is pinned again.
verify, generate_pack and cross_reference took -p and -t, slots, generate_truth, diff_truth, export_native and refresh_data_dirs refused them. A test reads every add_argument call.
A fork's clone has origin alone. Pushed to the fork's main, the commit
left origin/main...HEAD empty and --changed reported nothing with rc 0.
When no remote names the project, its main is fetched and compared, and
a fetch that fails is an error.
The pack README's one-line install was written per platform: ROCKNIX and MiSTer had none, EmuDeck's Windows edition was told to open Konsole, and RomM users were sent to library/bios/ whatever their firmware template. The automatic section now follows each platform's install.detect systems, the EmuDeck and RomM manual steps name every layout, and the download page lists EmuDeck under Windows and macOS.
_foreign_tree compared owner tokens by equality, so cxbx-reloaded-2023
read bios/Other/cxbx-reloaded/ as another emulator's tree and the
case-folded fallback served xemu's encrypted EEPROM. The leading whole
words of a profile key now name its own tree too. Across every profile
entry this moves cxbx-reloaded-2023's EEPROM.bin to the decrypted dump,
turns eight name matches on the same files into path matches, and gives
solarus-2.0.0 the Solarus tree's gamecontrollerdb.txt.
Without jsonschema the step printed only the missing module, and the run then read COMPLETE while PR validation runs the same check. The skip now names the install command and the PR check.
Abdessamad Derraz