[Android/F-Droid] F-Droid version online updating issue

[guoyunhe]

Description

Official website 1.19.1 APK is perfect on Android: it auto-download assets and you can download cores.

But F-Droid's 1.19.1 APK cannot auto-download assets and the core list is empty.

I guess F-Droid team mis-configured the build...

Expected behavior

F-Droid APK should auto download assets and core list should not be empty. Just like the official APK:

Actual behavior

F-Droid's 1.19.1 APK cannot auto-download assets and the core list is empty.

Steps to reproduce the bug

1. Install APK from F-Droid
2. Launch the app
3. Go to Online Update

Bisect Results

[Try to bisect and tell us when this started happening]

Version/Commit

• RetroArch: 1.19.1

Environment information

• OS: Android 14 (Xiaomi HyperOS 1.0)
• Compiler: [In case you are running local builds]

[hizzlekizzle]

did you try updating the info files first?

[guoyunhe]

did you try updating the info files first?

Yes, I did. Actually, it forces you to update core info first before downloading cores...

[gouchi]

Even if you grant access to write external storage, it seems that default directory for cores and cores info is

/data/user/0/com.retroarch/cores

If you switch to

/storage/emulated/0/RetroArch/cores

It will work.

[guoyunhe]

Even if you grant access to write external storage, it seems that default directory for cores and cores info is

/data/user/0/com.retroarch/cores

If you switch to

/storage/emulated/0/RetroArch/cores

It will work.

Is it a misconfigured build from F-Droid? Official APK works out-of-box, without any manual configuration.

[gouchi]

Is it a misconfigured build from F-Droid? Official APK works out-of-box, without any manual configuration.

I don't know well Android but it does not seem they have changed something to the build recipe.

[licaon-kter]

I don't know well Android but it does not seem they have changed something to the build recipe.

true, and as the recipe is pretty short one can see we don't touch anything, afaik, so not sure that's what breaks it

HOME - Load Core - Download a Core - Fetch list... pops up... but stays empty, right @guoyunhe ?

All F-Droid versions do this, mmmkay

But...

HOME - Online Updater - touch Update CoreInfoFiles, then Assets, then touch the rest... Fetch list appears, files get downloaded, and put in place...

now, if you go to Download a Core... what do you see? 😉

anyway, #16126 should be fixed I guess

/PS: It does not help that there's no actual logcat error for us to grasp and find out why, even if the server is contacted, no content is pulled

[hizzlekizzle]

If this is an info/assets issue, would you want to switch to this alternate asset bundle, @licaon-kter ?

glui_minimal_assets.zip

I know we talked about this and other strategies in another issue but we never went any further with the other options, and this seems like a simple fix in the meantime.

[guoyunhe]

@licaon-kter exactly, F-Droid version seems missing some automatic download logic. You have to manually click everything in order by yourself. Official APK, on the other hand, is smarter and does all the essential downloading for you.

[licaon-kter]

@hizzlekizzle

would you want to switch to this alternate asset bundle,

switch to another one, yes

but I want it from http://buildbot.libretro.com/assets/frontend/ ... not a random Github link

[hizzlekizzle]

Sure. If you're prepared for that change, I'll get it up there. I just didn't want things to break by it suddenly having a different checksum.

[licaon-kter]

I can build a test one first, to see if it fixes stuff, brb

[licaon-kter]

https://github.com/user-attachments/files/17996557/glui_minimal_assets.zip

using this one and the list is fetched right away 🎉

when is the next version gonna be released?

[hizzlekizzle]

That's a good question. I don't have an ETA (I don't think anyone does, actually), but I can start talking to the other folks on the team about it. It's been a long time, so probably a good idea to get something going soon.

[guoyunhe]

@hizzlekizzle

would you want to switch to this alternate asset bundle,

switch to another one, yes

but I want it from http://buildbot.libretro.com/assets/frontend/ ... not a random Github link

+1, GitHub is blocked in China and some other countries. Using libretro domain & server is much safer.