Building from Source

Instructions for building and running Retro Multi Tools from source code.

Requirements

Clone and Build 

git clone https://github.com/SvenGDK/RetroMultiTools.git
cd RetroMultiTools
dotnet build

The solution contains two projects:

Project Type Description
RetroMultiTools Avalonia Desktop (WinExe) Main application
RetroMultiTools.Updater Console (Exe) External updater that applies downloaded updates

dotnet build builds both projects.

Run 

dotnet run --project RetroMultiTools

Platform-Specific Notes

Linux

Avalonia UI requires several system libraries for rendering. Install them before building:

# Ubuntu / Debian / Linux Mint
sudo apt install libicu-dev libfontconfig1 libx11-6 libice6 libsm6

# Fedora / CentOS Stream / RHEL / Rocky Linux / AlmaLinux / Oracle Linux
sudo dnf install libicu fontconfig libX11 libICE libSM

# Arch Linux
sudo pacman -S icu fontconfig libx11 libice libsm

# Alpine Linux
sudo apk add icu-libs fontconfig libx11 libice libsm

# openSUSE / SLES
sudo zypper install libicu-devel fontconfig libX11-6 libICE6 libSM6

If you encounter a libSkiaSharp error at runtime, install the OpenGL library:

# Ubuntu / Debian / Linux Mint
sudo apt install libgl1-mesa-glx

# Fedora / CentOS Stream / RHEL / Rocky Linux / AlmaLinux / Oracle Linux
sudo dnf install mesa-libGL

# Arch Linux
sudo pacman -S mesa

# Alpine Linux
sudo apk add mesa-gl

# openSUSE / SLES
sudo zypper install Mesa-libGL1

See LINUX.md for full Linux installation details.

macOS

  • Requires macOS 10.15 (Catalina) or later.
  • On Apple Silicon Macs, ensure you install the ARM64 version of the .NET SDK.
  • macOS Gatekeeper may block unsigned builds. Use xattr -rd com.apple.quarantine RetroMultiTools to remove the quarantine flag.

See macOS.md for full macOS installation details.

Publish

All release builds are self-contained (include the .NET runtime).

dotnet publish RetroMultiTools -c Release -r win-x64 --self-contained
dotnet publish RetroMultiTools.Updater -c Release -r win-x64 --self-contained

After publishing, copy the updater executable into the main application’s output directory so it is bundled with the release.

Bundling External Files

Release builds also require two external files to be placed in the publish output directory:

File Source Purpose
SDL2 library libsdl-org/SDL Required for gamepad support in Big Picture Mode
gamecontrollerdb.txt SDL_GameControllerDB SDL2 game controller mappings for automatic controller recognition

The SDL2 library file name varies by platform:

Platform File
Windows SDL2.dll
Linux libSDL2-2.0.so.0
macOS libSDL2.dylib

Download the latest gamecontrollerdb.txt:

curl -fsSL -o gamecontrollerdb.txt https://raw.githubusercontent.com/gabomdq/SDL_GameControllerDB/master/gamecontrollerdb.txt

Copy both files into the publish output directory alongside the application executable. The CI workflows handle this automatically for all platforms.

Supported Runtime Identifiers

RID Platform
win-x64 Windows 64-bit (Intel/AMD)
win-arm64 Windows ARM64
linux-x64 Linux 64-bit (Intel/AMD)
linux-arm64 Linux ARM64
osx-x64 macOS Intel
osx-arm64 macOS Apple Silicon

Dependencies

Package Version Purpose
Avalonia 11.3.12 Cross-platform UI framework
Avalonia.Controls.DataGrid 11.3.12 DataGrid control
Avalonia.Desktop 11.3.12 Desktop platform support
Avalonia.Themes.Fluent 11.3.12 Fluent design theme
Avalonia.Fonts.Inter 11.3.12 Inter font family
Avalonia.Diagnostics 11.3.12 Debug diagnostics (Debug builds only)
AWSSDK.S3 4.0.19 Amazon S3 file transfers
FluentFTP 53.0.2 FTP / FTPS file transfers
Markdown.Avalonia 11.0.2 Markdown rendering
SharpCompress 0.38.0 Archive extraction (ZIP, RAR, 7z, GZip)
SSH.NET 2025.1.0 SFTP file transfers