ShadowMountPlus/docs/api.md

ShadowMount HTTP/JSON API v1

The machine-readable OpenAPI 3.1 description is available in openapi.yaml.

ShadowMount exposes its public API over HTTP/TCP. The default endpoint is 127.0.0.1:10101, so only software running on the PS5 can connect. Set api_bind_address=0.0.0.0 to allow clients on the network, or select a specific PS5 IPv4 address. api_port accepts values from 1 through 65535. These settings are applied on runtime config reload. api_enabled defaults to 1; setting it to 0 stops the listener and joins the libmicrohttpd service and worker threads. Re-enabling it restarts the HTTP service without restarting the payload. An already-running storage job is allowed to finish, but no new jobs can be submitted while the API is disabled.

/data/shadowmount/index.html overrides the web interface bundled into the payload. If the file is absent, the same web/index.html built into the ELF is served automatically, so enabling the API always provides a landing page.

The API has no authentication. Bind it to a network-facing address only on a trusted network.

The internal /system_tmp/shadowmount.sock Unix socket remains private to the SceShellCore bridge and must not be used by third-party applications.

The HTTP service uses libmicrohttpd with eight fixed polling workers. It accepts up to 32 concurrent connections, uses a listen backlog of 32 and closes idle connections after 15 seconds. Slow clients therefore do not serialize unrelated requests or create an unbounded number of threads. If daemon startup fails, the service retries with an interruptible 250 ms to 5 s backoff. Suspend, shutdown and config reload stop the daemon cleanly; resume recreates it.

Every JSON API operation uses POST, includes Content-Type: application/json and contains one JSON object. GET / returns the optional web interface and the icon endpoint returns PNG bytes. Connections are closed after one response; chunked request bodies are not supported. The maximum request body is 4096 bytes. The parsed request-header limit remains 8192 bytes.

All responses include Access-Control-Allow-Origin: *. Browser preflight requests using OPTIONS are supported and allow GET, POST, the Content-Type header and Private Network Access. This permits calls from any browser origin; the listener still needs api_bind_address=0.0.0.0 for access from another device.

Routes

Route	Request	Purpose
/	GET	Serve /data/shadowmount/index.html, or the embedded page when it is absent
/api/v1/version	{}	API and ShadowMount versions plus capabilities
/api/v1/storage	{}	Mounted storage filesystems with total, free and available space
/api/v1/images	{}	Complete image snapshot
/api/v1/scan	{"reset_attempts":false}	Queue an immediate full rescan; optionally reset title and image retry counters
/api/v1/manual/list	{}	List direct paths to individual game folders or images from manual.lst
/api/v1/manual/add	{"path":"/mnt/usb0/games/PPSA12345"}	Idempotently add one game source to manual.lst
/api/v1/manual/remove	{"path":"/mnt/usb0/games/PPSA12345"}	Remove matching source lines from manual.lst
/api/v1/settings	{}	Read web-managed runtime settings and scan paths
/api/v1/settings/update	{"debug":true,"quiet_mode":false,"update_emulators":true,"fakelib_default_mode":"full","auto_update_ampr":false,"auto_remove_missing_games":false,"auto_remove_missing_delay_seconds":300,"allow_lan_access":true,"fan_target_temperature":0,"scan_paths":["/mnt/usb0/games"]}	Atomically update the web-managed part of config.ini
/api/v1/debug-log	{"max_bytes":131072}	Read a bounded tail of debug.log for the web log dialog
/api/v1/kernel-log	{"max_bytes":131072}	Read a bounded tail of the SDK kernel-log stream used by crash detection
/api/v1/games	{"include_size":false}	Detailed game snapshot; optional physical source-size calculation
/api/v1/games/info	{"title_id":"PPSA12345"}	Detailed app.db and source information for one game; size is always calculated
/api/v1/games/fakelib	{"title_id":"PPSA12345","mode":"emulators"}	Persist the PS5 game's fakelib policy for its next launch
/api/v1/games/fakelib	{"title_id":"PPSA12345","ignore_global_fakelib":true}	Ignore the global fakelib overlay for this PS5 game on its next launch
/api/v1/games/icon?title_id=PPSA12345[&size=thumb]	GET	Stream the full PNG or a cached 128x128 thumbnail
/api/v1/games/mount	{"title_id":"PPSA12345","mode":"ro"}	Mount a managed game, optionally overriding its image mode with ro/rw
/api/v1/games/unmount	{"title_id":"PPSA12345"}	Unmount a managed game
/api/v1/games/uninstall	{"title_id":"PPSA12345"}	Request uninstallation through AppInstUtil
/api/v1/games/move	{"title_id":"PPSA12345","destination_dir":"/mnt/usb1/games"}	Start an asynchronous move job
/api/v1/games/copy	{"title_id":"PPSA12345","destination_dir":"/mnt/usb1/games"}	Start an asynchronous copy job
/api/v1/games/unpack	{"title_id":"PPSA12345","destination_dir":"/mnt/usb1/games","delete_source":false}	Mount an image read-only and asynchronously copy the game into a folder
/api/v1/games/storage/status	{"job_id":1}	Get current or last storage job status; job_id is optional
/api/v1/games/storage/cancel	{"job_id":1}	Request cancellation while the active job is still cancellable
/api/v1/games/delete	{"title_id":"PPSA12345","confirm":true}	Start asynchronous permanent deletion of the physical source

Example:

curl -sS http://127.0.0.1:10101/api/v1/version \
  -H 'Content-Type: application/json' \
  -d '{}'

curl -sS http://127.0.0.1:10101/api/v1/games \
  -H 'Content-Type: application/json' \
  -d '{}'

curl -sS http://127.0.0.1:10101/api/v1/scan \
  -H 'Content-Type: application/json' \
  -d '{}'

curl -sS http://127.0.0.1:10101/api/v1/games/mount \
  -H 'Content-Type: application/json' \
  -d '{"title_id":"PPSA12345","mode":"rw"}'

An autonomous example library UI is provided as web/index.html. Copy it to /data/shadowmount/index.html on the PS5 and open the configured API listener in a browser, for example http://192.168.1.50:10101/. The file is read for each request, so it can be replaced without restarting ShadowMount. If it is missing, GET / returns HTTP 404 with the normal JSON error response. The bundled interface covers all 31 console locales, selects the closest match from the browser locale, and keeps a manually selected locale in local storage.

Responses

Every response contains numeric status. It is zero on success, or a positive errno value on failure. Error responses also contain error and use an appropriate HTTP status such as 400, 404, 409, 413 or 415.

A successful version response has this shape:

{
  "status": 0,
  "api_version": 1,
  "shadowmount_version": "1.7",
  "capabilities": ["web_ui", "storage_space", "list_images", "list_games", "game_info", "game_icon", "mount_game", "unmount_game", "uninstall_game", "move_game_source", "copy_game_source", "delete_game_source", "unpack_game_image", "storage_job_status", "storage_job_cancel", "list_manual_sources", "add_manual_source", "remove_manual_source", "manage_settings", "read_debug_log", "read_kernel_log", "rescan"]
}

List responses contain count and the complete images or games array. Confirmed running FAKE* and LAPY* applications do not defer scans or block source copy/move/delete operations and uninstalls for unrelated titles. This applies to folder, image and installed-PKG applications. Ordinary PS4/PS5 games allow the same work while AppFocus confirms they are in the background. The live application's own title, source, and backing image chain remain protected; operations affecting them return game_active. Returning to an ordinary game, unknown focus, and pending launches/exits defer new background work. Focus changes wake the scanner; unblocking makes the next full resync due immediately.

Image items expose path, mount_point, size, modification time, unit_id, backend, complete, source_available, mapped and mounted. Game items combine ShadowMount's game cache with tbl_contentinfo from app.db. They expose the physical path, runtime_path, source_type (folder or image), image filesystem type, PS4/PS5 platform, title/content IDs, name, last-launch and install timestamps, game version, relative icon_url, app.db size, and runtime state. version comes from AppInfoJson (CONTENT_VERSION, falling back to APP_VER) and is an empty string when unavailable. The timestamp values from AppInfoJson (#_last_access_time and #_install_time) take precedence over the stale top-level columns when they are present.

POST /api/v1/games does not walk game directories by default. Set include_size=true to add size_status and, on success, size_bytes to every item. POST /api/v1/games/info always performs this calculation. An image uses its file size; a folder uses the sum of its regular-file sizes.

POST /api/v1/storage returns capacity-bearing mounted filesystems and omits virtual mounts such as devfs, nullfs and tmpfs. Each item contains the device source, mount_point, filesystem, total_bytes, free_bytes, available_bytes, used_bytes and read_only. available_bytes is the space available for new files; used_bytes is calculated against that value. The destinations array contains only writable, currently available managed /data/homebrew, /mnt/ext*/homebrew and /mnt/usb*/homebrew paths. Scanned /mnt/ext* and /mnt/usb* roots are included as additional destinations. Each item adds the selectable path to the same filesystem metadata.

The web storage overview uses mounts to show the internal /user filesystem and mounted /mnt/ext0..1 and /mnt/usb0..7 disks once per filesystem/source. System partitions and game mounts are omitted from that overview. The separate destinations list supplies folder choices for copying, moving and unpacking.

copy and move preserve the source basename and require an existing destination under a configured non-runtime scan root. They and delete return HTTP 202 with a job_id and continue in one background worker; only one of these jobs can be active. A second start returns HTTP 409/EBUSY. delete still requires confirm=true. If a cached source is already absent (ENOENT or ENOTDIR), it instead returns HTTP 200 with source_missing=true and scan_queued=true, without creating a job or directly uninstalling the title. The scanner reconciles stale cache and links when runtime is safe. An absent source can also mean disconnected storage; permission and I/O errors remain failures. Unknown titles still return HTTP 404. The status response contains the phase, byte-based percentage, processed/total bytes, processed/total files, average processed-byte rate, elapsed time and final errno-style result. The initial measuring phase discovers the totals and has zero percent until they are known. Only the active or most recently finished job is retained; an older explicit job_id returns HTTP 404.

scan, successful uninstall, and missing-source delete responses include scan_queued, scan_deferred, and scan_deferred_reason. The reason is game_active, runtime_prepared, rest_mode, or an empty string. These fields describe the runtime at response time; queue acceptance is not scan completion. A successful uninstall request queues a full synchronization only when its known source was already absent before uninstall. Retained sources do not trigger immediate rediscovery; scan_queued=false reports this case. Uninstall does not exclude or delete the source, so a later scan can still discover it. Busy uninstall/storage responses add a stable error_reason code; storage jobs expose the corresponding result_error_reason. The English error and result_error remain available for clients without localized catalogs. Reasons distinguish game activity, pending installation, mutation-gate contention, prepared runtime, and busy mount release. Close a game fully before retrying; returning to the home screen alone does not terminate it. If the source root disappears after a delete job is accepted, an absent root is treated as already deleted. A missing child in an existing tree, I/O errors, permission errors, and cancellation remain failures.

Cancellation is cooperative during preparing, measuring and transferring. A partial copy destination is removed. A delete job becomes non-cancellable when it enters deleting, before its first physical removal. Likewise, once a cross-filesystem move enters finalizing and starts deleting the complete source, cancellation is rejected to avoid leaving the only source tree partially removed. The scanner and ShellCore mutation gates remain held for the whole job and a rescan is queued after success, cancellation or failure. move uses rename() on one filesystem and exact copy-plus-delete across filesystems. A backing image shared by several titles is handled as one physical source. unpack uses the same worker and progress endpoint. It mounts the requested image read-only, copies the mounted game tree to <destination_dir>/<TITLE_ID>, and always releases the runtime mount afterward. delete_source=true removes the image only after a complete copy and successful unmount; this irreversible final phase is non-cancellable. Source deletion is rejected when one image is shared by several titles. Changing the API bind address or port restarts only the HTTP listener; an active storage job continues and remains available through the new listener.

The game list combines discovered folder/image sources with installed PS4 and PS5 PKGs from app.db, identified by an existing app.pkg. Title IDs appear once; managed folder/image sources retain their normal actions. Installed PKGs have source_type: "pkg", installed_pkg: true, managed: false and mounted: false. Their path points to app.pkg; runtime_path is empty. They support information, icons and uninstall, plus fakelib configuration for PS5. Mount/unmount and source copy/move/delete/unpack reject PKGs with HTTP 403 and EPERM. PKG size uses the installed size in app.db, falling back to the package file size; folder/image measurement remains unchanged.

Game responses also provide can_uninstall, can_manage_source, can_toggle_fakelib, fakelib_enabled and fakelib_effective_enabled. fakelib_mode is the resolved mode (full, emulators, disabled), fakelib_mode_override is the title's explicit mode or default, and fakelib_default_mode is the current global default. ignore_global_fakelib reports the title's global_fakelib_exclude setting. Post title_id and a boolean ignore_global_fakelib to update only that setting; do not combine it with mode or enabled. False removes the exclusion, including legacy global_fakelib_exclude_title entries. The game's own fakelib mode stays unchanged. Changes apply on the next launch and preserve active mounts. The fakelib route accepts only known PS5 games, including PKGs, images and folders. PPSA identifies PS5; LAPY/FAKE homebrew uses its app.db platform. Send mode: "full", "emulators" or "disabled" to persist an explicit override, or mode: "default" to remove it and inherit fakelib_default_mode. Legacy enabled: true|false requests remain supported and select explicit full or disabled; mode takes precedence when both fields are present. Unrelated config lines, other title overrides and global settings are preserved. The response includes the three mode fields, saved: true and applies_on_next_launch: true. Existing mounts stay until game exit. fakelib_enabled is false when the resolved mode is disabled; fakelib_effective_enabled also respects the global backport_fakelib switch. Reaching the 128-title override limit fails without modifying the file; removing an override remains possible at the limit.

Mount mutations remain conservative. They return HTTP 409 with status set to EBUSY while a game is active, while ShellCore owns another prepared title, during suspend, or while a conflicting mount/release is in progress. Clients must not retry this response in a tight loop. HTTP 404 with ENOENT means the title has no ShadowMount mount.lnk tracker. The optional mount mode is request-scoped and does not change config.ini. Accepted values are ro, rw, r/o and r/w; responses normalize them to ro or rw. It applies to every image layer needed for that title. A direct directory source or an image profile that is inherently read-only rejects an explicit mode it cannot support with HTTP 501 and ENOTSUP. An already mounted image in the other mode returns HTTP 409 and EBUSY. With persistent_image_mounts=1, unmounting a game releases its per-title runtime layers but keeps the backing image mounted.

The scan command queues the existing full-scan path and wakes the scanner. If a game runtime mount is active, the request remains pending until the lifecycle watcher reports that scanning is safe; it does not create a parallel scan. By default retry counters are preserved. With reset_attempts=true, immediately before the requested full scan starts it clears all title registration and install/remount counters plus all path-owned image-mount counters. If several scan requests merge while one is pending, one true request keeps the reset enabled for that scan.

Manual entries are direct paths to individual game directories or image files; they are not recursive scan roots. Updates atomically replace manual.lst and preserve comments and unrelated lines. Adding an existing normalized path and removing a missing path both succeed with changed: false. A real change queues a scan. Removing a manual source does not uninstall its game; use the uninstall route separately when both operations are desired. The list route returns {status, count, paths}. Paths use the same trimming and trailing-slash normalization as the scanner; comments and empty lines are not included. A missing manual.lst is reported as an empty list.

The settings update owns only debug, quiet_mode, update_emulators, fakelib_default_mode, auto_update_ampr, auto_remove_missing_games, auto_remove_missing_delay_seconds, api_bind_address, fan_target_temperature, and repeated scanpath keys. The allow_lan_access field maps to 0.0.0.0 when enabled and 127.0.0.1 when disabled. It atomically rewrites those keys while preserving every unrelated config.ini line and comment, then wakes the scanner so its existing runtime-reload path applies the values and rebuilds scan watches. api_enabled is deliberately config-only, so the web interface cannot disable the service it needs to restore access. A fan target of 0 means system control; explicit values must be 50 through 91 degrees Celsius. Unlike manual.lst, scan_paths are recursive library roots. The settings response contains only explicit custom roots, never compile-time defaults or internal image-mount roots. Saving an empty array removes the custom override and restores compile-time defaults.

GET /api/v1/settings returns fakelib_default_mode (full, emulators, or disabled; initial default full). The settings update accepts the same optional field; omission preserves its current value for older clients. Per-title overrides take priority, and mode changes apply on the next launch.

The debug-log route returns at most 256 KiB and never modifies or rotates the log. The kernel-log route reads a sceKernelDebugGetSdkLogText snapshot.

Uninstall returns success after sceAppInstUtilAppUnInstall accepts the request; the on-disk removal itself is asynchronous. It returns EBUSY while a game is active, another title owns a prepared runtime mount, or batch install work is pending. An unchanged discoverable source may be installed again by a later scan, so remove its manual entry or source first when that is not wanted.

Test client

Run the host-side Python client while ShadowMount is active:

python3 tools/api_test.py 192.168.1.50 10101

It validates CORS preflight, the version response and complete image/game snapshots. It also runs 16 parallel version requests while one client holds an incomplete request open, then selects the first safe managed game for a mount/unmount cycle. The mutation test is skipped if there is no candidate or the runtime is busy.