A personal experimental tool to synchronize files between my retro-handhelds using rclone.

It is potentially extensible to other systems as long as they are based on GNU Linux and have at least bash 4 available. I will not extend this more without considering re-writing it: better cross-platform GUI, less bashing and better packaging.

Use-cases:

• Backup save games.
• Cross-system save games (depends on how the saves are structured).

This is a experimental tool. For now, I will do minor adjustment so that I focus on playing the games :) If you want something more stable consider the alternatives:

• SteamDeck: https://github.com/DavidDeSimone/OpenCloudSaves
• ArkOS: https://github.com/ridgekuhn/arklone-arkos
• JELOS: https://github.com/JustEnoughLinuxOS/distribution/wiki/Using-Cloud-Drives

Tested systems:

• Anbernic RG353M(ArkOS)
• Steam Deck using EmudeckEmuDeck

Requirements:

• SSH connection to the device.
• ATTENTION: A backup!
• Bash > 4.0

Information:

• rg353m and deck are my SSH aliases. Use your own SSH targets.
• The Steam Deck installation will disable read-only FS temporarily.

Install:

• ArkOS: $ ./bin/dev-install.sh rg353m arkos "/opt/system/Tools"

• Steam Deck:

  1. If-first-time: sudo steamos-readonly disable && sudo pacman-key --init && sudo pacman-key --populate archlinux && sudo pacman -S jq rclone dialog && sudo steamos-readonly enable
  2. Install: $ ./bin/dev-install.sh deck steamdeck "/home/deck/.bin"

Post Installation:

1. Go to Options > Tools and open RetroSync-GUI.sh and optionally go to Configure > Setup retroarch... to organize save-games.

2. Setup rclone (for dropbox I suggest this guide).

3. Add locations to sync under ${XDG_CONFIG_HOME:-$HOME/.config}/retrosync/locations:

   {
     "from": "/roms2/arcade",
     "to": "dropbox:roms/arcade",
     "filter": "retroarch-default.txt",
     "on_conflict": "manual"
   }

Notes: I do not recommend setting up cross-saving for systems where:

• All the saves are stored in a specific set of files (e.g., dreamcast).

ArkOS:

scp -r config-library/arkos-secondary-sd/locations rg353m:/home/ark/.config/retrosync/

SteamDeck:

scp -r config-library/emudeck-sdcard/locations deck:/home/deck/.config/retrosync/

• Automate file renaming between NDS emuladors (Drastic .dsv <-> melonDS .sav).
• GUI: Force-Sync.
• GUI: Have better logs in case something goes wrong.
• GUI: See configured locations and delete/disable them.