Amiberry insits or creating default directories and theme file even when user-defined paths have been defined

[mrandreastoth]

Describe the bug
Amiberry automatically creates the default directories and Default.theme in their default locations completly ignoring the configuration settings in amiberry.conf.

To Reproduce
Steps to reproduce the behavior:

1. Stop Amiberry

2. Move ~/.config/amiberry/themes to your Amiberry home directory

3. Move/rename directories under the Amiberry home directory

4. Reflect your path changes in the amiberry.conf

5. Start Amiberry

6. Observe the ~/.config/amiberry and Amiberry directories as well as the configured paths under the Amiberry GUI

7. Close Amiberry

8. Confirm paths in amiberry.conf

Expected behaviour
Amiberry starts up and uses the new directory layout as-is. The GUI reflect the configured paths to be as defined in amiberry.conf. Closing Amiberry keeps the path configurations intact in amiberry.conf.

Actual behaviour
Amiberry starts up and recreates ~/.config/amiberry/themes/Default.theme and all the default Amiberry directories under the Amiberry home directory. The GUI correctly reflect the configured paths and the paths correctly remain intact after closing Amiberry.

Screenshots
User-defined paths...

User-interface using the paths...

Desktop (please complete the following information):

• OS: EndeavourOS

• Version: 2024.09.22

Additional context
Amiberry is built from source.

[midwan]

This should be fixed with the commit above. Please confirm when you get a chance

[mrandreastoth]

My workaround is to rename amiberry to amiberry.bin and, in place of the original amiberry, I wrote this executable script called amiberry...

#!/bin/bash

# Use AMIBERRY_HOME_DIR if set, otherwise default to $HOME/Amiberry
AMIBERRY_HOME="${AMIBERRY_HOME_DIR:-$HOME/Amiberry}"

# Remove any trailing slash (if any) for consistency
AMIBERRY_HOME="${AMIBERRY_HOME%/}"

await_and_delete_defaults() {
    while true; do
        # Await until all default directories have been created, including the themes directory
        if [ -d "$AMIBERRY_HOME/cdroms" ] && \
           #[ -d "$AMIBERRY_HOME/conf" ] && \
           #[ -d "$AMIBERRY_HOME/controllers" ] && \
           [ -d "$AMIBERRY_HOME/floppies" ] && \
           [ -d "$AMIBERRY_HOME/harddrives" ] && \
           [ -d "$AMIBERRY_HOME/lha" ] && \
           [ -d "$AMIBERRY_HOME/roms" ] && \
           [ -d "$AMIBERRY_HOME/rp9" ] && \
           [ -d "$AMIBERRY_HOME/savestates" ] && \
           [ -d "$AMIBERRY_HOME/screenshots" ] && \
           [ -d "$XDG_CONFIG_HOME/amiberry/themes" ]; then
            break
        fi

        # Sleep for a short interval before checking again
        sleep 1
    done

    while true; do
        # Await until the Default.theme file appears and is complete
        if [ -f "$XDG_CONFIG_HOME/amiberry/themes/Default.theme" ] && \
           [ $(stat -c %s "$XDG_CONFIG_HOME/amiberry/themes/Default.theme") -eq 216 ]; then
            break
        fi

        # Sleep for a short interval before checking again
        sleep 1
    done

    # Sleep to give any handles time to close
    sleep 1

    # Delete all the default directories, including the themes directory
    rm -rf "$AMIBERRY_HOME/cdroms"
    #rm -rf "$AMIBERRY_HOME/conf"
    #rm -rf "$AMIBERRY_HOME/controllers"
    rm -rf "$AMIBERRY_HOME/floppies"
    rm -rf "$AMIBERRY_HOME/harddrives"
    rm -rf "$AMIBERRY_HOME/lha"
    rm -rf "$AMIBERRY_HOME/roms"
    rm -rf "$AMIBERRY_HOME/rp9"
    rm -rf "$AMIBERRY_HOME/savestates"
    rm -rf "$AMIBERRY_HOME/screenshots"
    rm -rf "$XDG_CONFIG_HOME/amiberry/themes"
}

# Run the cleanup function in the background
await_and_delete_defaults &

# Run the original amiberry binary
/usr/local/bin/amiberry/amiberry.bin "$@"

[mrandreastoth]

@midwan, please see #1612 (comment).

[giantclambake]

@midwan

Would it be more correct to place the themes directory under XDG_DATA_HOME? ...ie; ~/.local/share/amiberry/themes

[midwan]

New commit, changes behavior on startup to avoid creating amiberry/conf always. I didn't really test this change much, but hopefully it doesn't break anything :)

@giantclambake I see themes files as global settings (related to the GUI), so I placed them in the XDG_CONFIG_HOME (unless you're using portable mode, in which case they default under the config_path you have). XDG_DATA_HOME is meant for "data" files, which to me at least means things like icons, fonts, etc. https://specifications.freedesktop.org/basedir-spec/latest/

[mrandreastoth]

@midwan I'll test this change next.

[mrandreastoth]

@midwan, I have both good and bad news, but no ugly ones 😝. The good news is that conf is no longer created. The bad news, and this is a new one that I haven't reported before as I wasn't aware of the directory due to some dyslexia on my part, is that the ~/.local/share/amiberry directory is still created although, in my case, it is not used by any of the configured paths.

config_path=/home/andreas/Amiberry/configurations/
controllers_path=/home/andreas/Amiberry/controllers/
retroarch_config=/home/andreas/.config/amiberry/retroarch.cfg
whdboot_path=/home/andreas/Amiberry/whdboot/
whdload_arch_path=/home/andreas/Amiberry/media/floppy_disks/whdload/
floppy_path=/home/andreas/Amiberry/media/floppy_disks/adf/
harddrive_path=/home/andreas/Amiberry/media/hard_disks/
cdrom_path=/home/andreas/Amiberry/media/optical_discs/
logfile_path=/home/andreas/Amiberry/save/amiberry.log
rom_path=/home/andreas/Amiberry/amiga/roms/
rp9_path=/home/andreas/Amiberry/media/floppy_disks/rp9/
floppy_sounds_dir=/home/andreas/Amiberry/amiga/floppy_sounds/
saveimage_dir=/home/andreas/Amiberry/save/disk_images/
savestate_dir=/home/andreas/Amiberry/save/states/
screenshot_dir=/home/andreas/Amiberry/save/screenshots/
ripper_path=/home/andreas/Amiberry/save/disk_rips/
inputrecordings_dir=/home/andreas/Amiberry/save/input_logs/
nvram_dir=/home/andreas/Amiberry/save/nvram/
plugins_dir=/home/andreas/Amiberry/plugins/
video_dir=/home/andreas/Amiberry/save/videos/
themes_path=/home/andreas/Amiberry/themes/

[midwan]

@mrandreastoth
That directory should contain the necessary data files, doesn't it?

[mrandreastoth]

@midwan, yes, if using the defaults, then that would be the case, but I'm using the paths shown above, i.e., these are defined in amiiberry.conf, and, as you can tell, all the data is now self-contained within the Amiberry home directory. As such the ~/.local/share/amiberry directory is never referenced and should hence never be created.

[midwan]

The data files is not configurable, and contains the GUI elements required, such as icons, font, etc. Don't you have those in there?