Retro Tools 2026 v0.1.0

Retro Tools 2026 v0.1.0

First release: DAT parsing (No-Intro/Redump/TOSEC/MAME), ROM scanning and
hashing (incl. ZIP/7Z/RAR/CHD), 1G1R selection with configurable
region/language rules, file-build operations with undo, a static plugin
system, a full CLI, an egui desktop UI, and Windows packaging
(installer + portable build).

Added

• Replaced the two literal "Placeholder preview" mockups in docs/screenshot1.png/screenshot2.png with real captures of the running app (Dashboard and 1G1R Builder, with an actual DAT imported); corrected a stale claim in docs/PLUGIN_DEV.md that CHD conversion was unimplemented (it was added in Phase 7, retrotools_core::convert)
• Real GitHub-Releases-backed auto-updater (retrotools_common::updater::GitHubReleaseSource): checks the public Releases API (no auth token needed) and compares versions; wired into the UI (startup check when check_updates_on_startup is on and a repository is configured in Settings, with a toast when an update is available) and the CLI (check-update [--repository owner/repo]); no repository is guessed by default (AppConfig::update_repository starts None)
• Windows installer (packaging/installer.iss, Inno Setup 7): per-user install (no admin rights), bundles resources/*.exe and docs, Start Menu/desktop shortcuts; unsigned (no code-signing certificate available)
• Portable build (packaging/make_portable.ps1 + retrotools_common::config::is_portable_mode()): dropping a portable.txt marker next to the exe switches every config/cache/log/DAT path to <exe_dir>/data/ instead of the per-user profile
• Multi-resolution app icon (crates/ui/assets/icon.ico, 16/32/48/256), procedurally generated (no source logo existed), embedded into the exe (crates/ui/build.rs via winresource) and set as the runtime window icon
• Full-pipeline integration test (crates/core/tests/integration_pipeline.rs): scan → match → 1G1R preview/selection → filter → plan → execute against real files on disk, plus post-transfer verification and undo, using only the public API — the previous test suite only ever covered one module at a time
• Large-scale synthetic-DAT non-regression test (crates/core/tests/synthetic_no_intro_regression.rs): a generated ~750-game, ~150-family DAT modeled on real No-Intro naming conventions (region/revision/beta tags), checked for zero lost or duplicated families after 1G1R selection, with a runtime ceiling to catch algorithmic regressions; real No-Intro/Redump sample DATs aren't bundled (third-party copyright, no network access here to fetch them)
• criterion benchmarks for hashing (crates/core/benches/hashing.rs, 1/8/32 MB buffers) and DAT parsing (crates/core/benches/dat_parsing.rs, 500/3000-game synthetic DATs), runnable via cargo bench -p retrotools-core
• Headless automated UI smoke tests (crates/ui/src/main.rs::ui_smoke_tests): drive every tab's show() against a real egui::Context with no window/event loop, across several frames, with and without an imported DAT, both in Expert and Wizard 1G1R modes; egui_kittest isn't published for the pinned egui/eframe 0.28, so this is a small hand-rolled harness instead
• Security review of archive extraction and file-build path construction: confirmed no zip-slip vector (entries are always streamed to a caller-supplied writer, never used to build a filesystem path) and added adversarial tests proving a malicious DAT-supplied game/rom name (../../../../etc/evil, backslash traversal) can never escape the configured destination root
• Test proving a build batch degrades gracefully when one transfer fails (destination blocked by a pre-existing file, the same failure class as a full disk or a permissions error): the failing item is reported per-item, the rest of the batch still completes
• ROM/ISO format converter (retrotools_core::convert): convert_to_chd/convert_from_chd, reusing the already-bundled chdman.exe (the same tool used for CHD extraction since Phase 2); new CLI convert to-chd <source> <dest.chd> and convert from-chd <source.chd> <dest_dir>; verified with a real round trip (raw image → CHD → extracted back → byte-for-byte identical). CSO (PSP) and RVZ (Dolphin) are still out of scope — each needs its own dedicated codec (maxcso, DolphinTool) that isn't bundled and isn't a byproduct of any other feature
• Missing-DAT detection and assisted download (retrotools_core::dat_library::platforms_missing_dat): flags ROM subfolders with no matching DAT imported yet; new CLI dat detect-missing <roms_root> <dat_dir> [--assist] and a new "Missing DATs" section in the UI's Platforms tab (Detect missing DATs... button, then a per-platform Download & import button when a same-named DAT source is already tracked) — reuses the existing tracked-source infrastructure rather than attempting real DAT discovery, since no unauthenticated No-Intro/Redump/TOSEC API exists for that; verified end-to-end (CLI and UI) against a real local HTTP server
• Games grid view (views/games.rs::show_grid), selectable alongside the existing list view via a List/Grid toggle; card-based layout with a status-colored placeholder tile (no real artwork yet — no scraper until Phase 7)
• Wizard mode for the 1G1R tab (views/onegameonerom.rs::wizard, driven by the new AppState::wizard_step/WizardStep): a step-by-step Platform → Scan → Rules → Preview → Build flow with a clickable breadcrumb and Back/Next navigation, reusing the same section-rendering functions as the existing single-page layout
• Expert mode toggle in the 1G1R tab (AppState::expert_mode, on by default): switches between the wizard and the original all-on-one-page layout
• Command palette (Ctrl+Shift+P or the new 🔍 button): fuzzy-filtered command list with arrow-key navigation and Enter/click execution — jump to any tab, import a DAT, toggle expert mode, toggle light/dark theme
• Additional keyboard shortcuts: Alt+1 through Alt+7 jump directly to each tab
• Minimal i18n layer (crates/ui/src/i18n.rs): Language/Key/t(), with a language selector in Settings that switches the UI immediately; covers tabs, the dashboard and a handful of key buttons/labels rather than every string, matching the roadmap's "structure ready" goal
• Adjustable UI scale for accessibility (AppConfig::ui_scale, a Settings slider applied via egui::Context::set_pixels_per_point and persisted across restarts)
• Light fade-in transition when switching tabs (egui::Context::animate_bool_with_time in app.rs::central_content), as lightweight visual feedback without pulling in a tweening library
• Duplicate ROM detection (retrotools-core::matcher::find_duplicate_matches): identifies extra copies of a ROM that already matched a DAT entry elsewhere (as opposed to unknown, which is content the DAT doesn't recognize at all) and picks a deterministic file to keep; the CLI clean command gained --duplicates (opt-in, off by default to stay backward-compatible) and --no-unknown, trashing both categories through the same undo-able safe-delete path with the reason labeled in its output
• PDF export for scan reports (ScanReport::to_pdf, via printpdf's HTML-to-PDF renderer, reusing the existing to_html layout instead of a separate PDF-specific one); new CLI scan --pdf <path> option
• RAR and CHD archive support (retrotools-core::external_tools, extending archive.rs): shells out to bundled third-party CLI tools under resources/ (UnRAR.exe for read-only RAR extraction, chdman.exe for CHD disk images — see docs/COMPILATION.md for licensing notes and packaging instructions) since neither format has a maintained pure-Rust decoder; tool resolution checks an env var override, a resources/ folder near the executable, then PATH; verified with a real create→scan→hash→extract→compare round trip against a CHD built by chdman itself
• Real-time scan throughput (files/s, MB/s) in the 1G1R tab's progress indicator (AppState::scan_speed)
• DAT auto-update from a tracked download URL (retrotools-core::dat_update): register a name + direct DAT/ZIP URL once, then re-fetch it on demand and compare its version against the local DatCache to report whether anything actually changed, without ever re-importing an unchanged DAT; new CLI commands dat source-add/dat source-list/dat source-remove/dat update/dat update-all, and a matching "DAT update sources" section in the Settings tab (background thread, doesn't block the UI)
• Internal plugin architecture (retrotools-plugin-api): a Plugin trait, PluginContext and PluginRegistry let optional modules extend the app without modifying retrotools-core or retrotools-ui; plugins are statically-linked crates registered at startup rather than dynamically loaded .dlls (see docs/PLUGIN_DEV.md for the rationale and a step-by-step guide)
• Playlist Generator plugin (retrotools-plugin-playlists): generates RetroArch .lpl, LaunchBox XML and ES-DE gamelist.xml playlists from the current 1G1R selection
• BIOS Manager plugin (retrotools-plugin-bios): verifies a folder of BIOS files against a BIOS DAT (the same Logiqx/XML format No-Intro publishes for BIOS packs) by reusing the core scan/match engine, so no BIOS checksum is ever hardcoded
• New CLI commands plugin list and plugin run <id> <dat> --output <dir> [--source <dir>] [--profile <name>]
• New Plugins tab in the UI, listing every registered plugin with a Run button; validated end-to-end (source/output folder pickers, real files written to disk, live "last run" status per plugin)
• "Fix report" (retrotools-core::fix): turns a scan/match result into a precise, actionable list of what's needed to complete a set — ROMs to obtain (missing) and files to replace (present but not matching the DAT) — exportable as text/CSV, shown in the 1G1R tab and via the new CLI fix command
• Set comparator (retrotools-core::compare): diffs two ROM scans by content hash (added/removed/changed, with rename detection via matching file names), exposed via the new CLI compare command
• Real-time folder watcher (retrotools-core::watcher, backed by notify) and periodic auto-rescan, both toggleable from the 1G1R tab — a folder change now triggers an automatic re-scan (3s debounce) without any user action
• Multi-platform library overview via the new CLI status command: scans every platform subfolder of a ROMs root against its matching DAT and prints a completion table for the whole collection
• Fixed a real contrast bug found during visual QA: theme.rs's selection stroke color was identical to the selection background, making selected tab/row text invisible; it's now computed for contrast against the accent color
• Full desktop UI wired to the core engine (crates/ui): a new AppState (crates/ui/src/state.rs) centralizes the imported DAT library, per-platform scan/match results, 1G1R rules and background scan/build jobs (dedicated threads + mpsc channels so the UI never blocks)
• Platforms tab: import DAT files (button or drag & drop), list imported platforms with type/version/game count, select/remove
• Games tab: searchable, filterable (region/language/status) and sortable (name/region/status/size) game list with a details panel (regions, languages, tags, ROM files, scan status, 1G1R kept/removed state)
• 1G1R tab: guided flow — scan a ROM folder with a live progress indicator, edit region/language priority and exclusion rules, preview the selection (kept/removed diff with per-choice explanations), load/save rule profiles, and build the set (copy/move/hardlink/symlink, dry-run, rename-to-DAT-name, folder organization)
• Settings tab now edits and persists the real AppConfig (theme, accent color, ROM/DAT directories, log level, update check)
• Dashboard shows real statistics (platforms, DAT files, games tracked, completion, per-platform breakdown) instead of placeholders
• Toast notifications wired to real actions (DAT import, scan, build, errors) instead of being unused
• Ctrl+O keyboard shortcut to import a DAT; drag & drop of .dat/.xml/.zip files anywhere in the window
• File-operation engine for materializing a 1G1R set (retrotools-core::fileops): copy, move, hardlink or symlink the selected ROMs, with automatic fallback to copy when the source lives inside an archive; destination filenames can follow the DAT's canonical ROM name and be organized into platform/region subfolders
• Dry-run mode and post-transfer verification (re-hashes the destination and compares it to the source) for every build operation
• Operation history with undo (retrotools-core::undo::UndoLog, SQLite-backed): every build/clean batch can be listed and reversed via undo list/undo apply
• Safe delete: the clean command moves files unrecognized by the DAT into a local trash folder instead of deleting them outright, reversible through the same undo log
• Archive rebuild (retrotools-core::rebuild): writes one ZIP per game from the matched ROMs, streaming directly from the original file or archive entry (no full extraction to disk)
• CLI commands build1g1r, rebuild1g1r, clean, and undo list/undo apply
• 1G1R selection engine (retrotools-core::rules): configurable region/language priority, per-category exclusion filters (Beta/Proto/Demo/Kiosk/Promo/Unlicensed/Pirate/Bad Dump), "prefer parent over clone" tie-breaking, and revision-tag scoring (Rev/v1.1/lettered revisions)
• Multi-disc/multi-file aware grouping: releases are grouped by canonical title (parentheses stripped) rather than by cloneof, since many real-world DATs leave clone metadata unset or inconsistent for discs beyond the first — every disc of the winning release is kept together
• Selection preview with before/after diff and a human-readable explanation per choice (rules::preview_selection, SelectionResult, SelectionExplanation)
• Reusable 1G1R rule profiles saved as JSON on disk, plus built-in presets "Standard Europe", "Standard USA" and "Complete - No Filter" (retrotools-core::profiles)
• New Game tag fields (is_sample, is_kiosk, is_promo, is_pirate, is_alt) parsed from DAT ROM names, extending the existing Beta/Proto/Demo/Unlicensed/Bad Dump detection
• CLI commands select1g1r and profile list/profile show
• Recursive, multi-root ROM directory scanner (retrotools-core::scan), parallelized with rayon
• Streaming CRC32/MD5/SHA1/SHA256 hashing in a single pass (retrotools-core::hash), including a second "headerless" hash when a known ROM container header is detected
• ROM header detection for iNES, Lynx and Atari 7800 (retrotools-core::header)
• Archive scanning without full extraction (retrotools-core::archive): ZIP, 7Z and TAR entries are streamed directly into the hasher; RAR and CHD are detected but not yet extractable
• ROM ↔ DAT matching (retrotools-core::matcher): exact hash matching with a filename-based fallback that flags corrupted/renamed dumps, plus "unknown" (unneeded) and "missing" reporting and a completion percentage
• Scan reports exportable as CSV and HTML (retrotools-core::report::ScanReport)
• Incremental scan cache (retrotools-core::cache::ScanCache, SQLite): skips re-hashing files unchanged since the last scan
• CLI command scan to scan a directory, optionally match against a DAT, and write CSV/HTML reports
• Logiqx/XML DAT parser (retrotools-core::dat) supporting No-Intro, Redump, TOSEC and MAME datfiles (<datafile>/<game> and <mame>/<machine> layouts), with automatic DAT type detection and region/language/tag extraction from ROM names
• Support for DAT files delivered inside ZIP archives
• Parent/clone relationship handling (cloneof, romof) with GameSet::find_clones_of
• DAT integrity validation (required fields, CRC32 format, dangling clone references)
• Multi-DAT library management (retrotools-core::dat_library::DatLibrary) for importing and tracking several DAT files at once
• Local SQLite cache of parsed DAT files (retrotools-core::cache::DatCache, via rusqlite)
• CLI commands dat import, dat import-dir and dat validate for parsing and validating DAT files from the command line
• Cargo workspace scaffold with four crates: retrotools-common, retrotools-core, retrotools-ui, retrotools-cli
• Centralized SemVer versioning via the workspace Cargo.toml, with git commit hash and build date injected at compile time
• Unified application error type (AppError) with severity levels and user-facing messages
• User configuration system persisted as TOML under the platform config directory
• Structured logging via tracing, writing daily rotating log files
• Native desktop application shell built with egui/eframe: top navigation, light/dark/system theme with accent color, toast notification system
• "About" tab displaying copyright, license, contact email, website and repository links
• Placeholder data model (Game, RomFile, Region, Language, GameSet) and stub modules for DAT parsing, ROM scanning and 1G1R rule selection, scheduled for upcoming phases
• Minimal command-line interface (retrotools-cli) exposing version and configuration path commands
• Continuous integration workflow: format check, Clippy lint, Windows build and test
• Professional repository scaffolding: LICENSE (MIT), CONTRIBUTING.md, CODE_OF_CONDUCT.md, issue and pull request templates, .gitignore, .gitattributes