Help tab

The Help tab (?)

In one line: the manual that ships inside the app — no internet needed.

The last tab, labelled simply ?, is a scrolling text page covering the same ground as this wiki in condensed form. It is worth knowing about because it works offline and is always in sync with the version you are actually running.

What's in it

• Introduction — where the project came from: em00k's HDFM-GOOEY, Jari Komppa's NextSync, and how the two became one Python app with the Sync4 extension on top.
• Keyboard shortcuts — the explorer and gallery-viewer keys, the same list as in the User Manual.
• Third-party licences — PySide6/Qt, pygame-ce, itch-dl, Flask, Send2Trash, PyInstaller and UPX, with what each one is used for and whether it needs installing separately.
• Setup & how-to — links to the video walkthroughs.
• hdfmonkey — what it is, why it's required, and how to install it on each platform.
• NextSync — the protocol, the dot command, the IP/port setup, and syncignore.txt / syncpoint.dat.
• OpenAL (Windows sound for CSpect) and Mono (needed on Linux/macOS).
• Third-party content sources — the legal position on GetIt, ZXDB and zxArt.

The 🎮 Retro button

The one control on the page turns the help text into an 8-bit console: an animated starfield with green Consolas text, scrollable so you can still read the whole thing. It needs the optional pygame-ce package, and the button is greyed out with an install hint without it. Click 🖼 Switch to 'Classic' view mode to go back.

Where else to look

Question	Best source
How do I install this?	Installation
What does this tab do?	User Manual
Something broke	zx-next-unite.log, next to the app
Something crashed hard	Turn on crash logging in Settings, reproduce, then attach zx-next-unite-crash.log
Report a bug	GitHub issues

Videos

• Setup & how-to: https://youtu.be/-gUxV4fM1yo
• NextSync v4 — the new .sync4 command explained: https://youtu.be/pKchUZhNHKE
• Demo / show time: https://youtu.be/0qsIU01zsoM
• Emulator integration: https://youtube.com/shorts/hPmV5shvBfo

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See also: User Manual · Home for licensing and the full legal disclaimer.