Where Your Data Lives

Tender keeps what it knows about your library in folders under your own home directory, each named after Tender itself:

Folder	What is in it
~/.config/romm-tender/	Your settings — server address, sign-in, which platforms and collections you sync
~/.local/share/romm-tender/	The library database, and playtime and save-sync state; the copy an update made of the database and your settings, in update-backup/, and the one going back by hand made, in rollback-backup/
~/.cache/romm-tender/	Cached cover art and artwork
~/.local/state/romm-tender/	Tender's log file, backend.log; update-failure.json after an update that was rolled back

Four more places sit outside those folders, because none of them holds anything of yours:

Where	What it is
~/.local/bin/tender-rom-launcher	The small program every one of your Steam shortcuts starts through. It sits in the folder your own programs go in, shared with anything else you installed for yourself, and uninstalling Tender leaves it there so your games keep launching
~/.local/lib/romm-tender/	Tender itself, with the installer that updates it and puts the previous version back (install.sh). Replaced whole when you update, removed when you uninstall
~/.local/lib/romm-tender.old/	The version your last update replaced, kept so that it can be put back. Each update replaces it; going back puts it in place of the current version, after which there is none. Uninstalling removes it
/run/user/<id>/romm-tender/	One note saying which port Tender is answering on while it runs. Your session clears it when you log out

Your games are not in any of them. Downloaded ROMs, BIOS files and save files live in RetroDECK's own folders, exactly as before, and nothing on this page moves them.

What an update keeps

Before an update replaces Tender, it stops it and copies your library database and your settings to ~/.local/share/romm-tender/update-backup/, replacing the copy the previous update made. Uninstalling leaves it there, with the rest of your data. A previous copy that cannot be removed is left beside the new one as update-backup.prev/; the next update removes it first, and does not go ahead until it can. An update interrupted while replacing the copy can leave it only as update-backup.prev/; the next update, and going back by hand, move it back first.

If the new version has not started within about a minute, the installer puts the previous version and that copy back and starts it again — so anything the new version recorded in that minute is gone, and nothing from before it is. It then leaves ~/.local/state/romm-tender/update-failure.json saying which version it tried, which one it went back to, and when; the next update whose new version answers removes it. Troubleshooting has what to do next.

Going back to the previous version by hand (install.sh --rollback) puts back that same copy, but first copies the database and settings it is about to replace to ~/.local/share/romm-tender/rollback-backup/, replacing the copy the previous time you went back made, with a previous copy that cannot be removed left as rollback-backup.prev/ the same way. Updates leave that folder alone, and so does uninstalling.

The split that matters

The database folder and the cache folder are separate on purpose. Everything in ~/.cache/romm-tender/ can be fetched again from your RomM server — delete it and Tender re-downloads the covers as it needs them. Nothing in ~/.local/share/romm-tender/ can: that folder holds the only record of what you have installed, synced and chosen.

So a cleanup tool that empties caches is safe to point at the first folder and never the second.

Why they are named after Tender

Earlier versions kept this data inside Decky's plugin folders. Decky names those after the plugin's own folder, and that name is not something Tender chooses — so when the project was renamed at version 0.31.0, every user's data moved with it, and a freshly updated Tender opened on an empty library while everything was still sitting in the old folder.

Naming the folders after Tender ends that. They no longer depend on how the plugin happens to be packaged, so a rename cannot move them again.

If your folders are somewhere else

The folders above are the defaults. Tender asks its environment first, so an installer that sets TENDER_CONFIG_DIR, TENDER_DATA_DIR, TENDER_CACHE_DIR, TENDER_STATE_DIR, TENDER_CODE_DIR or TENDER_BIN_DIR decides where they go; failing that it follows the standard XDG_* variables — there is none for the launcher's folder and none for Tender's own, so those two are either their TENDER_* variable or the default — and only then falls back to the paths in the tables above.

The installer settles all of them once and writes them into Tender's service file, so

systemctl --user cat romm-tender

prints the answers this install is running on, one Environment= line each. Tender also resolves them at every start and logs the program, database and cache folders, so the last host: code … line in backend.log says the same thing. Look for the last one rather than the first: the log is appended to across runs, so the top of the file belongs to an older start.

Coming from an older version

Nothing copies your data forward. If you used a version that stored its library inside Decky's plugin folders, that library stays there and Tender starts with an empty one — set it up as if it were new.

The old folders are yours to keep or delete:

• ~/homebrew/settings/<folder> — the settings that install used
• ~/homebrew/data/<folder> — its library, covers and artwork

<folder> is decky-romm-sync or romm-tender, depending on which version wrote them. Tender reads neither, so deleting them frees the space and changes nothing; leaving them alone is equally fine.

The older plugin itself is a separate question

If Decky still lists an older "RomM Sync" plugin, that is not the same thing as the folders above. Your Steam shortcuts may still start through a file inside it, and removing it before they have been repointed stops your games from launching. Check one of your games first — Updating from a release before 0.31.0 has the check.