Repository navigation
Releases: ericreinsmidt/TortOS
Release list
TortOS v1.6.0
Mono audio, for anyone who hears with one ear. A new row in the TortOS menu, Audio Channels, right under Audio Output, on the Brick and the Pixel 2. mono plays the two channels as one in both ears, so nothing a game or a song puts on one side alone is lost. mono left and mono right play that same sound in one ear only, on headphones, a Bluetooth headset or the Pixel 2's USB-C adapter. On the speaker they play as mono, since a speaker isn't on one ear. stereo is how it's always been, and where it starts. It works in games and in Muse, changes without a click, even mid-song, and is kept through a restart.
Updating from an earlier version
With the TortOS Installer, choose Update. By hand on the Brick, copy the zip's TortOS/, .tmp_update/ and trimui/ over the card's, replacing what is there. Copying the zip's Roms/, Saves/ or Bios/ over the card's replaces them, games and saves included. On the Pixel 2 the installer is the only way that keeps the games: writing the image by hand erases the card.
New install
With the TortOS Installer, choose the device and Fresh install. By hand, as in the README: the Brick uses TortOS-v1.6.0.zip, the Pixel 2 TortOS-v1.6.0-pixel2.img.xz. TortOS-v1.6.0-pixel2-sources.tar holds the source of the open-source software in the Pixel 2 image, and SHA256SUMS the checksums of all three files.
If I had a nickel for every time I said, "what?" to my wife, I'd have well over $100 and a strange way of making money. It's funny how things right in front of us are so easily missed sometimes. This one is for you, u/Inner-Comfort-5225.
TortOS v1.5.0
The Pixel 2's side lights show the battery. The four lights on its side were lit the whole time it was on; now they mean something. While it charges, a bar fills up from the bottom, starting from a light for each full quarter it already has, and a full battery holds all four. Below 10% on the battery, the bottom light flashes red every five seconds. Press L2 and R2 together, outside a game, and the lights flash the level. The rest of the time they're dark.
Tidy names. Albums from some downloads come named like Artist.-.Album.2015.MP3 with tracks like 01..Song.Name.mp3. Open the album's folder on Over The Hare's page (Down To The Wire's on the Pixel 2) and press Tidy names: the page shows every rename first, the folder taking the album's name and each track keeping its number, and nothing changes until you press Rename all. A name that would land on one already there is skipped, never overwritten.
Muse shows those names as words anyway. On the shelf, names with dots or underscores for spaces read as words, and an album's leaves off the artist in front, the release year and words like MP3 and 320kbps, so an album looks right before it's tidied, or if it never is.
Muse plays MP4 files. An .mp4 is the same kind of file as an .m4a, often with nothing but sound in it, and now plays like one. A video in one plays its sound.
Renaming keeps what goes with a name. Rename on the page, on an album or a book, takes its cover, what Album Art remembers of it and the book's place along to the new name, and renaming a book's file keeps the place in it.
Also:
- Down To The Wire makes the cable connection fresh each time it opens, so a computer that had dropped the Pixel 2 finds it again without a restart.
- MENU > Controls on the Pixel 2 lists L2+R2 on the shelf's page.
- The text in the transfer page's buttons sits in the middle of them.
Updating from an earlier version
With the TortOS Installer, choose Update. On the Pixel 2 that's how the side lights arrive, with the new system. By hand on the Brick, copy the zip's TortOS/, .tmp_update/ and trimui/ over the card's, replacing what is there. Copying the zip's Roms/, Saves/ or Bios/ over the card's replaces them, games and saves included. On the Pixel 2 the installer is the only way that keeps the games: writing the image by hand erases the card.
New install
With the TortOS Installer, choose the device and Fresh install. By hand, as in the README: the Brick uses TortOS-v1.5.0.zip, the Pixel 2 TortOS-v1.5.0-pixel2.img.xz. TortOS-v1.5.0-pixel2-sources.tar holds the source of the open-source software in the Pixel 2 image, and SHA256SUMS the checksums of all three files.
If you haven't yet, you should check out K-Wall's most excellent CFW, slot., for the Anbernic RG SP at https://slot-cfw.fyi
TortOS v1.4.0
Down To The Wire. Over The Hare on the GKD Pixel 2, over its USB cable instead of Wi-Fi. Plug the Pixel 2 into a Mac, a Linux computer or a Windows 11 PC, open MENU > Down To The Wire, then http://10.42.0.1 in a browser, and type the PIN. Games, music, books and saves go on and off by dragging, and Download logs works over the cable too. Nothing to install on the computer.
Sound through a USB-C DAC on the Pixel 2. Plug in a USB-C headphone adapter and the sound goes there, ahead of the headphone jack, in Muse and in games. USB is a fourth choice in Audio Output, and the volume buttons set it like any other.
Box art and album covers on the Pixel 2. It has no network of its own, so Down To The Wire's page fetches them through your computer instead: Get Box Art and Album Covers finds games' box art in libretro's collection and albums' covers in MusicBrainz's Cover Art Archive, and puts them on the card.
Muse keeps the Music folder tidy. On both devices, songs left loose at the top of Music/ move into Music/Singles/, an album of their own with its own cover, and an album folder put straight into Music/ is filed under its artist when its tags say clearly who that is.
Updating keeps your games. The new TortOS Installer, for macOS, Windows and Linux, updates a card in place on either device: put the card in the computer and choose Update. On the Pixel 2 that used to mean writing a new image and losing everything on the card; now the new TortOS and plastron go on, and the games, music, saves and settings stay.
Truer colors in the Pixel 2's games. Its panel shows greens yellow beside the Brick's; games are now drawn through a color correction that takes most of the yellow out.
Also:
- A game resumed at power on always comes back with its in-game menu. It could start without one when the emulator was slow to answer.
- Album Art asks again about an album whose cover was taken off the card, where it used to remember it as done.
Updating from an earlier version
With the TortOS Installer, choose Update. By hand on the Brick, copy the zip's TortOS/, .tmp_update/ and trimui/ over the card's, replacing what is there. Copying the zip's Roms/, Saves/ or Bios/ over the card's replaces them, games and saves included. On the Pixel 2 the installer is the only way that keeps the games: writing the image by hand erases the card.
New install
With the TortOS Installer, choose the device and Fresh install. By hand, as in the README: the Brick uses TortOS-v1.4.0.zip, the Pixel 2 TortOS-v1.4.0-pixel2.img.xz. TortOS-v1.4.0-pixel2-sources.tar holds the source of the open-source software in the Pixel 2 image, and SHA256SUMS the checksums of all three files.
If you made it this far, I hope you have a fantastic day.
TortOS v1.3.0
TortOS on the GKD Pixel 2. The Pixel 2 has no system of its own to run on, so this release brings one: a card image with TortOS on plastron, a small Linux built to boot fast. The shelf is up about 3.6 s after the power button. Write TortOS-v1.3.0-pixel2.img.xz to a card with the TortOS Installer or any image writer; it erases the card. The first boot turns the rest of the card into space for games, music and saves. FUNCTION is MENU, and FUNCTION with volume is brightness. The Pixel 2 has no Wi-Fi or Bluetooth, so it has no Over The Hare, no box art fetched on the device and no RetroAchievements.
Date & Time, in the TortOS menu on both devices. Set the clock and choose your time zone, each part with left and right. On the Pixel 2 this is how the clock gets set at all, and it keeps the time once it is. On the Brick, Wi-Fi still sets the clock, but until now there was no way to choose a zone other than New York.
The Brick starts sooner. The emulator and the launcher start about 1.4 s sooner, and the consoles row is complete on its first frame instead of cards filling in after.
Also:
- Holding volume or brightness in a game repeats, at the same pace as on the shelf.
- Volume and brightness pressed in the in-game menu step from where the game left them, and are no longer pressed again when the game resumes.
- Muse no longer clips very loud recordings, which could crackle.
- The screen goes dark as soon as the power-off animation ends.
Updating from an earlier version
On the Brick, replace the TortOS/ folder on the card with the one in the zip, and nothing else. Copying Roms/, Saves/ or Bios/ over the card's own replaces them, games and saves included.
New install
As in the README. The Brick uses TortOS-v1.3.0.zip, the Pixel 2 TortOS-v1.3.0-pixel2.img.xz. TortOS-v1.3.0-pixel2-sources.tar holds the source of the open-source software in the Pixel 2 image, and SHA256SUMS the checksums of all three files.
Huge thanks to SundownerSport for his excellent installer!
TortOS v1.2.0
Fast forward. In a game, hold MENU and press R1 to speed up to 2x, then 3x, then 4x, and once more to go back to normal. A note at the bottom of the screen says which, the game is silent while it's fast, and the speed stays where you left it through the in-game menu. NES and Genesis games reach the full speed; a heavy SNES or Game Boy Advance game tops out at about 2.5x. Because MENU now does two jobs, the in-game menu opens when you let go of it rather than when you press it.
Achievement notices no longer slow the game. Drawing one could take longer than drawing the game itself, and in a game like Sonic that made it stutter for as long as the notice was up. It now costs a fraction of that. A notice also no longer leaves pieces of itself on the black bars around a smaller picture.
Also:
- Holding SELECT in a game no longer steals L1, R1 and A. Leftover test controls had used SELECT with them to change the display, and could switch a game to a slower drawing mode without saying so.
- On Game Boy Advance, L2 and R2 are turbo L and R. They always were; the Controls page and the docs now say so.
Updating from an earlier version
Replace the TortOS/ folder on the card with the one in the zip, and nothing else. Copying Roms/, Saves/ or Bios/ over the card's own replaces them, games and saves included.
New install
As in the README.
Bloom is going to be great, and tenlevels is one helluva great guy!
TortOS v1.1.0
Lock Muse for your pocket. Hold F1+F2 (the front function keys) for a second in Muse while music plays, or pick Lock Screen in Muse's menu. The screen goes off and every button is ignored except volume, power and a Bluetooth headset's play, pause and skip. Hold F1+F2 again to unlock. With the screen off, a book playing lasts about 10 hours instead of 6.
Chapters and speed for audiobooks. In a book with chapters, L1 and R1 move by chapter. On Now Playing, Y sets the speed, from 0.75x up to 2x, kept for each book.
Over The Hare takes whole folders. Drag a folder onto the page, or use Upload folder, and it arrives with everything inside, minus the macOS clutter. A folder that isn't empty can now be deleted after a warning, except the base folders and a console's folder that still has games in it.
Also:
- The mute switch now brings the sound back every time. It also mutes headphones, and headphones no longer come back too loud after muting.
- Volume 0 is silent on headphones too.
- Each boot clears .DS_Store, Thumbs.db, desktop.ini, .Trashes and the other folders macOS and Windows leave on a card.
- Over The Hare's transfer row reads "In / out", so it fits without scrolling.
Updating from an earlier version
Replace the TortOS/ folder on the card with the one in the zip, and nothing else. Copying Roms/, Saves/ or Bios/ over the card's own replaces them, games and saves included.
New install
As in the README.
Big thanks to Ryan Retro for his review of TortOS and the kind words. If you are interested you can check out his review here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ojOEDTD7BEQ
TortOS v1.0.4
Download logs, for when something goes wrong. Open Over The Hare, and at the bottom of its first page, Download logs gives you one .tar.gz file: the last ten boots' logs and a short summary of the Brick, ready to send to whoever is helping you. Wi-Fi network, headset and account names, and Bluetooth addresses, are masked in it. The logs on the card are left as they are.
Better logs. The Brick now keeps ten boots of logs instead of two, so a problem is still there to find a few restarts later. When a game you copied doesn't show up, the log says why: each console lists the files it left out and the file types it takes.
Updating from an earlier version
Replace the TortOS/ folder on the card with the one in the zip, and nothing else. Copying Roms/, Saves/ or Bios/ over the card's own replaces them, games and saves included.
New install
As in the README.
I'd like to send a heartfelt thank you to dash for the excellent prose (as always), for really getting the feel of what TortOS is, and for being a great friend and Muse 🙂
TortOS v1.0.3
Audiobooks in Muse. Put books in Audiobooks/, one folder per book, with or without an author folder above it. A book picks up where you left it, through power-offs and games, and one played to the end is marked Finished. MENU > Show on Muse's shelf switches between music and books. Books always play in order, and a book's cover comes from its files or a picture in its folder.
Faster seeking. Left and right still move ten seconds a tap. Held, they move a minute a step after a second and five minutes after three, so a long book is quick to get around.
Also:
- Now Playing's times keep their width as they tick, and seeking no longer jumps back and forth.
- Album Art finds covers it missed before, by trying again without an edition in the album name, with only the first of several artists, or by title alone for a folder with no artist.
Updating from an earlier version
Replace the TortOS/ folder on the card with the one in the zip, and nothing else. Copying Roms/, Saves/ or Bios/ over the card's own replaces them, games and saves included. Audiobooks/ appears the first time you open Over The Hare, or you can make it yourself.
New install
As in the README.
We all have a finite amount of time in our lives. Reddit users who want to use a comments section to pick fights, or as a soapbox about AI assistance being the devil, can find another person to try it with. My time is too precious to waste on them. Yours should be too.
TortOS v1.0.2
Fixed: the Brick could turn off right after starting a game. With Auto Off on and on battery, starting a game after more than the Auto Off time on the shelf switched the Brick off a moment into the game. The game was saved and came back on the next boot, but it never got to play. Games now wait for their own Auto Off setting.
Updating from v1.0 or v1.0.1
Replace the TortOS/ folder on the card with the one in the zip, and nothing else. Copying Roms/, Saves/ or Bios/ over the card's own replaces them, games and saves included.
New install
As in the README.
TortOS v1.0.1
Music over Wi-Fi. Over The Hare now reaches Music/, so albums can go onto the Brick from any browser, and they're in Muse when you leave its screen. New cards get an empty Music/, and on a v1.0 card Over The Hare makes one the first time it opens.
Updating from v1.0
Replace the TortOS/ folder on the card with the one in the zip, and nothing else. Copying Roms/, Saves/ or Bios/ over the card's own replaces them, games and saves included.
New install
As in the README.