romlm (ROMs Library Manager)

A Python-based command line tool that helps you organize and manage your ROM collections effortlessly. Whether you want to pack, unpack, sort, or remove duplicates, romlm has got you covered.

All features are tested on the no-intro ROM sets (which I personally recommend), but it should work with any ROM collection that follows a similar naming convention. If you have some issues with other ROM sets, that can't be worked-around with the current implementation, feel free to open an issue on the GitHub issues page.

Features

• Extract (-x, --extract)
  Automatically unpacks all .7z or .zip files in the current directory (or a specified folder) into subfolders. Supports nested subfolders, keeping all the structure.

  

• Pack (-p, --pack)
  Compresses all uncompressed files in the current directory (or a specified folder) into .7z or .zip archives. Supports nested subfolders, keeping all the structure.

  

• Sort (-s, --sort)
  Moves files into alphabetically organized subfolders (A–Z). Optionally handles special folders for Homebrew (!Homebrew), Pirates (!Pirates), or user-defined subfolders (-f).

  • h will also sort files into homebrew subfolder.
  • p will also sort files into pirates subfolder.
  • f will also sort files into user-defined subfolders (-f).
  • a will also sort files into homebrew, pirates and all user-defined subfolders (-f). Equal to hpf.
  • You can also use any combination of h, p and f options, for example hp or fh.
  • -s reverse will reverse-sort files, i.e., move them all back into the root folder.

  

• Separate Homebrew and Pirate ROMs (-u, --unlicensed)
  By default, romlm detects and separates Homebrew or Pirate files into dedicated folders. Can be customized with options:

  • none disables separation completely,
  • h separates Homebrew files only,
  • p separates Pirate files only.

  

• Remove Duplicates (-r, --remove-duplicates)
  Automatically detects duplicate files, preserving the best candidate according to region, beta status, revision, version, release date and other data that can be received from the filename. Behavior for the situations when script can't decide the best file itself, can be specified:

  • ask prompts you which file to keep, default with -l,
  • all keeps all equally good files, default without -l,
  • one keeps exactly one of the best ROMs, taken randomly.

  I highly recommend to use this feature with -l option to see the results, and make a backup of your ROMs before!

  In the current scenario it removes all the beta and prototype files if there is a final version of the game exists. If not, it tries to keep only one the latest version. USA retro ROMs (not Virtual Console versions) counts as the best version of the game. Also, Europe and EN releases have a higher priority over JP and Asia versions, as well as NTSC counts better, than PAL. romlm will never remove all copies of one game!

  If you want to keep a Japanese collection intact, I recommend to separate it first. See Usage Examples below.

  

• User-defined Folders (-f, --folders)
  Easily map certain tags to user-defined folders. For example, specifying -f Japan will move ROMs tagged as (Japan) into dedicated subfolder. Works only with --sort process as a part of it. Search only within tags, to not be confused with a game name, so if you just want all your Mario games in one place, just search it manually, romlm not for that.

• Exclude Tags (-e, --exclude)
  Combine with -f to skip specified tags from the subfolders sorting process. For example, -f Japan -e USA will move all (Japan) tagged ROMs into a dedicated subfolder, excluding any (USA) tagged ROMs if (Japan, USA) combination is met.

  

• Logging (-l, --log)
  Enables verbose output to see exactly what the script is doing. Extremely useful when --remove-duplicates is enabled.

  

• Other Utilities

  • Cleans out unwanted system meta-files (e.g., desktop.ini, .DS_Store).
  • Removes empty subdirectories after sorting.
  • Provides an in-script help guide (-h, --help).

Installation

romlm is available from a variety of sources.
pip or brew is recommended, because they have a convenient way to manage updates automatically.

romlm shells out to a 7-Zip CLI binary (7zz, 7z, or 7za, whichever is found on your PATH) for .7z archive handling, so make sure one is installed if you plan to use -x/--extract or -p/--pack with .7z files. brew install sevenzip on macOS/Linux, or the official installer on Windows.

1. pip (Recommended for everyone with Python environment)
   • You can check if you have Python installed by running python --version in the Terminal or cmd.
   • For Mac and Linux users, there is a high chance that you already have Python installed on your system.
   • For Windows users, you can download Python from the official website.
   • After confirmation, install romlm through the PyPI package manager, typing pip install romlm in the Terminal. For Mac users, you may need to use pip3 instead of pip.
   • Verify the installation with romlm -h command.
   • You are perfect, you can use the app with romlm [parameters] command from any folder in your system.
2. brew (Recommended for Mac and Linux users)
   • You can install romlm through the Homebrew formula for macOS users, if you have brew installed.
   • Type brew tap manefunction/tap in your Terminal to add my custom tap (app source) to your brew sources.
   • Type brew install romlm to install application itself.
   • Verify the installation with romlm -h command.
   • You are perfect, you can use the app with romlm [parameters] command from any folder in your system.
3. Ready to use binaries (Recommended for Windows users)
   • Download ready-to-use binaries from the GitHub Releases.
   • Unpack the downloaded archive.
   • On Windows (cmd):
     • Open Command Prompt (cmd) with Win+R and typing cmd, or just searching cmd in a Start menu.
     • Run cd path\to\folder to go to the folder with romlm.exe. Don't forget to use cd with /d option to change the drive, if needed (cd /d path\to\folder).
     • Run romlm -h to verify the script is working.
     • You are perfect, you can use the app now with romlm [parameters] command.
   • On Windows (PowerShell):
     • Open PowerShell searching it in a Start menu.
     • Run cd path\to\folder to go to the folder with romlm.exe.
     • Run ./romlm -h to verify the script is working.
     • You are perfect, you can use the app now with ./romlm [parameters] command.
   • On Mac:
     • Open Terminal or any other CL app you prefer to use.
     • Run cd path/to/unpacked/folder to go to the folder (you can just drag'n'drop a folder to the Terminal to copy-paste its path).
     • Run xattr -r -d com.apple.quarantine ./ to remove the quarantine attribute from binaries
       (I do not have an Apple Developer status at the moment and cannot sign binaries properly, this, hopefully, will be fixed in the future).
     • Run ./romlm -h to verify the script is working
       (be aware, that macOS still running security checks, so the first start of the app will be longer for about 10-15 sec.).
     • You are perfect, you can use the app now with ./romlm [parameters] command.
4. Python package (manual installation, for advanced users)
   • Clone the repository or download the source code from the GitHub.
   • Go to the folder with the script in your Terminal.
   • Run pip install . to install romlm to your system.
   • Run romlm -h to verify the script is working.
   • You are perfect, you can use romlm [parameters] command from anywhere in your system.
5. Python script (manual usage, for advanced users)
   • if you are familiar with Python scripts, venv, and dependencies, you can simply clone the repository and run romlm.py. In that way, feel free to modify the script for yourself as you want.

Backstory

As a user of Analogue Pocket and an Emulation Station based handheld system, there are some nuances from both worlds that I'm trying to cover with romlm. Analogue Poket is a highly precise FPGA-based console, but it covers only earlier generations and a scoop of Arcade games. Though, those platforms, like NES, SNES and Genesis have a huge library of games, that should be sorted to have an easy access. Also, Pocket do not support archives, so all the ROMs should be unpacked. Standard software emulators, on the other hand, can play archived ROMs, and with the support of more later platforms, where games became bigger, it's great to have them packed, but also, it's good to have old systems packed as well, to save some Gigs for a few more CD games. So, I've need a tool to prepare my ROMs for both systems in a few clicks. That's how romlm was born.

Personally, I keep all my ROMs on Analogue Pocket, to be able to quickly launch any version of any game it supports. But I do not need all of those for a device that made for casual play. To be honest, I have Powkidy RGB30 with a rectangular screen, specifically for the Pico-8. Emulation capabilities of this device is just a neat bonus for me :) So, to prepare ROMs for Emulation Station devices, like Powkiddy, Anbernic, Miyoo, etc. we can clean our library from all the stuff we never play anyway.

Usage Examples

There is an example how to separate and work with your Japanese library, if you need it. But it also can be a great example of romlm capabilities for you to learn. Emulation Station have a separate folders for Japanese libraries (at least for the 3 whales of retro gaming: NES, SNES and Genesis) as well as for homebrew, so it's good to separate them first, if you are interested in them. Here is the way:

1. -i ./your-roms -s a -f Japan -e USA,EN command first to separate non-en Japanese releases (they ends up in !Japan folder). Alternatively, you can use -s f if your collection do not have a lot of homebrew and pirates, and you do not need to sort them in (A-Z) folders.
2. Put all sorted folders (A-Z) from your-roms folder to your-roms/sorted for example, to be able to treat them separately later.
3. Now you should have sorted, !Japan, !Homebrew (if there was any) and !Pirates (if there was any) folders in your your-roms folder. ! is used here to keep them on top of the list, as Emulation Station sorts folders alphabetically, but remember, that you should escape it with \! in the command line, so path for the next commands should look like -i ./your-roms/\!Japan for example.
4. Do -i ./your-roms/sorted -r -l for all the subfolders separately to remove duplicates, but keep them in sorted (mostly USA for now) and Japanese folders.
5. After that you can pack all the ROMs in one command -i ./your-roms -p. This command keeps our new folders structure.

This way you will keep all the Japanese versions of the games, separated into a dedicated folder, and anyways all other duplicates will be removed, easing the access to the games you want to play in the future and saving the space on your device for more great games.

Credits

Created and maintained by ManeFunction (ilia@inkedkettle.games).

Huge thanks to the no-intro team for their amazing work on the ROM sets and retro games preservation.

Also, big shoutout to the Nuitka project for the great Python compiler.

And of course, thanks for your contributions and feedback! If you have any questions, suggestions, or issues, feel free to open an issue on the GitHub issues page or create a or pull request.