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Getting Started

What is Tender?

Tender is a Decky Loader plugin that connects your self-hosted RomM ROM library to Steam. Every game in your RomM library appears as a Non-Steam shortcut in the Steam Library, complete with cover art, metadata, and collections. Games launch through RetroDECK.

Prerequisites

Before installing the plugin, you need:

  1. A RomM server — a running RomM instance with your ROM library. You'll need the server URL plus a username and password to connect the first time. The plugin exchanges those credentials for a RomM Client API Token and stores only the token — your password is never saved. Each user should have their own RomM account (see Save Sync for why this matters).

  2. RetroDECK — installed on your Steam Deck or Linux PC. RetroDECK handles the actual emulation. The plugin creates shortcuts that launch games through RetroDECK.

  3. Decky Loader — the plugin framework. Install it from decky.xyz if you haven't already. Decky renders inside Steam's gamepad UI, and the plugin works wherever that UI runs: Gaming Mode on the Steam Deck, or Big Picture Mode on a Linux PC/HTPC — a dedicated Game Mode session is not required.

  4. A personal RomM account — save sync ties saves to the authenticated user. Use your own account, not a shared one.

Installation

Not on the Decky store. The store doesn't accept plugins whose code is written with AI assistance, and Tender's is — see How this is built. Install it from the URL below.

From Decky's "Install Plugin from URL"

  1. Open the Quick Access Menu (QAM) in Gaming Mode by pressing the ... button
  2. Go to the Decky Loader tab (the plug icon) and open settings (gear icon)
  3. Under General → Other, enable Developer mode — a new Developer tab appears in the sidebar
  4. Open the Developer tab and select Install Plugin from URL

  5. Enter the direct URL to the release zip

    This names one fixed release, tender-v0.33.0:

    https://github.com/danielcopper/romm-tender/releases/download/tender-v0.33.0/Tender.zip

    Any other version is named the same way, by its tag:

    https://github.com/danielcopper/romm-tender/releases/download/tender-v{VERSION}/Tender.zip

    tender-v0.33.0 is the newest release carrying this asset, and releases from tender-v0.31.0 up to it all carry it — tender-v0.31.0 itself published it as tender.zip, and GitHub matches release-asset names case-insensitively, so the URL still finds it. Most of the decky-romm-sync-v{VERSION} releases before it published decky-romm-sync.zip; name that tag and that file for those. Four have no asset at all: the three earliest and v0.2.0.

  6. Decky downloads and installs the plugin automatically — no restart needed

Tip: You can also open the releases page in Steam's built-in browser (Gaming Mode → long-press the Steam button → Web Browser), long-press the zip download link, and copy the URL from there.

Any direct URL to the zip file works (GitHub releases, a self-hosted mirror, etc.) as long as it points to a valid .zip containing the plugin.

Updating from a release before 0.31.0

Releases up to 0.30.1 install into a folder named decky-romm-sync; from 0.31.0 on the folder is named romm-tender. Decky treats a differently-named folder as a different plugin, so updating across that boundary leaves you with two entries: the older one still shown as RomM Sync, and the new one as Tender.

Check one of your games before you remove the older plugin. Every Steam shortcut the older plugin created starts through a small file inside that plugin's own folder. Tender keeps its copy of that file under your home directory instead — ~/.local/share/romm-tender/bin/rom-launcher — and repoints your existing shortcuts at it the next time Tender loads. Until that has happened, removing "RomM Sync" stops all of your games from starting, and nothing can put the file back.

The shortcut itself tells you which state you are in, and looking costs nothing:

  1. Open any game Tender created in your Steam library and show its Properties — the gear icon on the game's page in Gaming Mode.
  2. Read the Target path under Shortcut.
  • The path is inside ~/.local/share/romm-tender/bin/ — your shortcuts no longer depend on the older plugin. Remove it wherever Decky lists your installed plugins, or keep it: it costs disk space and nothing else.
  • The path is still inside homebrew/plugins/ — leave the older plugin where it is. Tender repoints shortcuts when it loads, not when you open its panel, so reload Tender or restart Steam, then look again before you delete anything.

The new install also starts with its own settings and library: each install keeps its data in its own place, and nothing copies the older one's settings or synced library across. Set Tender up as if it were new, and remove the older plugin only once the check above passes.

Manual installation (alternative)

  1. Download the plugin's .zip asset from the releases page
  2. Extract the zip to ~/homebrew/plugins/ on your device (via SSH, file manager, or USB)
  3. Restart Decky Loader — either reboot, or run sudo systemctl restart plugin_loader via SSH
  4. The plugin appears in your QAM under the Decky tab

First-Time Setup

After installation, you need to connect the plugin to your RomM server:

  1. Open the QAM and find Tender
  2. Tap Settings in the menu, then Connections in the section list on the left
  3. Enter your RomM server URL (e.g. http://192.168.1.100:8080) — this saves automatically
  4. Tap Sign in, enter your RomM username and password once, and confirm
  5. The RomM Account row shows Signed in on success. The plugin's main QAM panel has a Connection row that shows the live connection status whenever you open it — there is no separate test button

On a controller you can confirm a text field with the on-screen keyboard's Enter key (or the R2 shortcut) instead of navigating to the button — for example save-slot names and the artwork search. In the sign-in dialog, Enter moves from the username to the password field and confirms only once every required field is filled; an incomplete form can't be submitted, and Cancel leaves your existing sign-in untouched.

The plugin mints a RomM Client API Token from the credentials you enter and discards the password — it is never stored. The same applies if the plugin auto-migrates an older install that still had a saved password: the password is discarded as soon as a token is minted. If your RomM account is not allowed to create API tokens, the sign-in step reports that and you'll need an account with token permissions.

Once connected, you're ready to sync your library. See Configuration for additional settings, or jump straight to Syncing Your Library.

Next: Configuration