Bit of an idea

[PokeParadox]

I was just taking a nice relaxing bath (You got a good mental image yet?), when just like Archimedes I had a bit of an Eureka moment.


I've often mentioned how it would be nice if there was a way to sync emulator save games and such, etc, etc. Well I've finally had a reasonable idea of how it could be done, and best of all, we ALREADY have the infrastructure in place!


So the answer is in fact, the repo. Yes the repo! We already have accounts for purposes of downloading commercial software and ratings, so all that would be needed (and yes I say that lightly) would be a "save locker" and an API that all applications could hook into.


Maybe another little extension of the PXML spec where an app can "export" its save and config dirs and a PNDManager-esque headless application does the save checking automagically?


Basically what I'm saying is I still don't really know how to code it, but I get the feeling it would be very similar to what it takes for making a PND updating application?


Now discuss!

 

[_wb_]

I've often mentioned how it would be nice if there was a way to sync emulator save games and such, etc, etc.

Could you please elaborate what exactly you mean by this? Or point to the relevant thread...

 

[PokeParadox]

I can't remember specific threads - But I have brought it up a few times. But basically I feel the Pandora could benefit to something like "Steam Cloud" where saves are synchronised on an account basis. The ideal would also to have a Desktop client that you could login and pull your saves and play the same snes games that you were playing on Pandora on ZSNES on your PC once you are in the house. Or something to that effect.

 

[PokeParadox]

Well the discussion is happening in here... this is why we can't have nice things!

 

[milkshake]

Could we some existing service like dropbox or google drive working o. Pandora for this?

 

[pmprog]

I'm sure ED wouldn't want to start hosting everybody's data too, that'll add to server bandwidth charges etc.


I would still like to make a server/client solution that supports multiple platforms (server: win/linux, client: win/linux/android), but expand it to support much more than just save states. It's in my list

 

[thatgui]

The idea has already been discussed .. somewhere, and ED also stated that he would be interested in somewhat like this. I like this idea too, but I would not combine it directly with the repo.


Oh, and I see a connection there

 

[bzar]

Maybe not connected directly to the repo, but the same credential system could be used. It could be as simple as a storage for application id to base64-encoded data map per user. Connect to something like https://appdata.openpandora.org/<user>/<appid>/,'>https://appdata.openpandora.org/<user>/<appid>/, provide api key in headers or something and use get/post to read/write the data. if the max size per app and user is limited to some sensible quota, there should be no big problems. Maybe even have https://appdata.openpandora.org/<user>/ for user data.

 

[sswam]

I sync saved games in git.

 

[ekianjo]

Could we some existing service like dropbox or google drive working o. Pandora for this?

We dont have clients for this as far as I know. BUt a python script could do for dropbox.

 

[PokeParadox]

Maybe not connected directly to the repo, but the same credential system could be used. It could be as simple as a storage for application id to base64-encoded data map per user. Connect to something like https://appdata.open...<user>/<appid>/, provide api key in headers or something and use get/post to read/write the data. if the max size per app and user is limited to some sensible quota, there should be no big problems. Maybe even have https://appdata.open...ora.org/<user>/ for user data.

Exactly what I was getting at!

 

[milkshake]

Isn't there an API available though for things like dropbox or google drive which could be leveraged for such a task? There must be since unofficial apps apear in those phone app stores all the time.

 

[TrashyMG]

Isn't there an API available though for things like dropbox or google drive which could be leveraged for such a task? There must be since unofficial apps apear in those phone app stores all the time.

I remember someone here saying they got the dropbox CLI working fine on the Pandora.


Edit: searching found it.. who would of thought..


http://boards.openpa...ra/#entry149149

 

[thatgui]

i would rather put my data on my own nas than on dropbox, googledrive, etc

 

[milkshake]

its only save game data, what would google want to do with that?

 

[thatgui]

its only save game data, what would google want to do with that?

I just don't want to use their service (google, dropbox and alike) (and no, and don't think that google is evil or that they are eager to get my savegames to analyse what I like to play)

 

[fahrstuhl]

Duplicity supports encrypted backups. Also:

In theory many protocols for connecting to a file server could be supported; so far ssh/scp, local file access, rsync, ftp, HSI, WebDAV, Tahoe-LAFS, and Amazon S3 have been written.

Maybe it could be wrapped up into something more user friendly and maybe come preconfigured. On the other hand it uses GPG for encryption which I haven't found to be overly user friendly...

 

[PowerGod]

Can anyone explain what can be the purpose of this ?


How many megabytes of data can take a collection of savegames ?


And what is the advantage of the need to be connected to play local games ?


Or I'm loosing the point ?

 

[DaMummy]

if you happen to lose your save files, or your memcard crashes, a "cloud" sync backup would be a great thing to have. id be happy if something like pndmanager had a button that simply syncs your saves in appdata with your account on repo

 

[notaz]

Not sure it's good for saves, my PCSX save directory takes over 400MB as you need 1-2MB per savestate (even compressed) for something like PSX, I can guess N64 would be similar. Depending on emulator, the savestates are often incompatible with anything on PC, so there is not much point to sync with it in those cases.