Homebrew Channel Wii

Homebrew Channel
General
Author	fail0verflow, FIX94
Type	Loader
Version	1.1.4-1
License	GPL-2.0
Last Updated	2017/10/15
Links
Download
Website
Source

The Homebrew Channel is a platform for running homebrew applications on the Wii gaming console. It allows users to launch and manage their homebrew applications from a custom graphical user interface (GUI). The interface can be customized by adding descriptions and icons for each application, making it easy to use and visually appealing. The applications are stored and organized on an SD card or USB mass storage device, and can be launched directly from the Homebrew Channel interface.

The Homebrew Channel also provides the option to launch applications via TCP, making it possible to test new code from a PC, or via a USBGecko. This versatility makes it an ideal tool for both developers and casual users who want to explore the world of homebrew applications on their Wii console. Overall, the Homebrew Channel is an essential component of the Wii homebrew community, providing a user-friendly and convenient way to launch and manage homebrew applications.

Installation

You can install the Homebrew Channel with:

• HackMii Installer (the most commonly used method to install HBC).
• CompatInstaller (can be run in Wii U mode in vWii).
• Updating from a previous version with the auto update function.

Read the latest status and disclaimer.

Complete setup format

You should have a compatible SD or SDHC card (formatted to FAT16 or FAT32).

After you have installed the apps on your SD card, its folder structure should look something like this:

Removable Disk/ (eg: (E:) on Windows and where it is mounted
 |              to on Linux or Mac OS X eg: /media/disk/)
 |-apps/
 |  |-ScummVM/
 |  |  |-boot.dol
 |  |  |-meta.xml(Optional)
 |  |  |-icon.png(Optional)
 |  |
 |  |-WiiShopInstaller/
 |  |  |-boot.dol
 |  |  |-meta.xml(Optional)
 |  |  |-icon.png(Optional)

If you have any problems having your Applications showing up on the HBC, make sure you are following the correct format.

(Apps on your USB storage device are stored like on a SD card.)

User guide

In order to make an application appear in the Homebrew Channel, the following steps must be taken:

• Create a folder on the root of your SD card named "apps".
• In the folder "apps," create a folder for the application (for this example, ScummVM will be used).
• Copy the files for the application into its folder (e.g. apps/scummvm/).
• Find the executable file (either .elf or .dol) and rename it to boot.elf (or boot.dol if it was a .dol file) if it is not already named that (e.g. apps/scummvm/boot.dol). If the app comes with these files, copy the icon.png and meta.xml files into this folder.

Now the application will appear in the Homebrew Channel. If the icon.png or meta.xml are not present, the menu will .

meta.xml

Here is an example of a completed meta.xml for ScummVM:

 <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" standalone="yes"?>
 <app version="1">
   <name>ScummVM</name>
   <coder>dhewg</coder>
   <version>rev32231</version>
   <release_date>20080523000000</release_date>
   <short_description>Point & Click Adventures</short_description>
   <long_description>ScummVM is a program which allows you to run certain classic 
   graphical point-and-click adventure games,provided you already have their 
   data files. The clever part about this: ScummVM just replaces the executables 
   shipped with the games, allowing you to play them on systems for which they 
   were never designed! Some of the adventures ScummVM supports include Adventure 
   Soft's Simon the Sorcerer 1 and 2; Revolution's Beneath A Steel Sky, 
   Broken Sword 1 and Broken Sword 2; Flight of the Amazon Queen; Wyrmkeep's Inherit 
   the Earth; Coktel Vision's Gobliiins; Westwood Studios' The Legend of Kyrandia 
   and games based on LucasArts' SCUMM (Script Creation Utility for Maniac Mansion) 
   system such as Monkey Island, Day of the Tentacle, Sam and Max and more.
   </long_description>
 </app>

(Optional) The following notes are supported since v1.0.7. They must be children of the <app> node.

Arguments example (arguments passed to the loaded application as argc and argv):

<arguments>
  <arg>--loaded-by-hbc</arg>
  <arg>insane argument with spaces</arg>
</arguments>

ahb_access example (requests full hardware access (AHBPROT)):

<ahb_access/>

icon.png

The icon must be in .png format with dimensions of 128x48 pixels. The full alpha channel can be used.

Copy it into the folder of the application under the name "icon.png" (e.g. apps/scummvm/icon.png).

See also Homebrew Channel icons.

FAQ

The official FAQ from the developers of the Homebrew Channel can be found here.

Controls

Wiimote & Nunchuck:

D-Pad Up/Down - Up/Down

Minus/Plus - Page left/right

A - Select

Home - Menu

Pointer+B or Nunchuck Analog - Scroll text

B - Back

1 - Settings

2 - Swap view

Power - Shutdown

Nunchuck Z+C - Screenshots

Classic Controller:

D-Pad Up/Down - Up/Down

Minus/L - Page left

Plus/R - Page right

A - Select

Home - Menu

Left Analog - Scroll text

B - Back

X - Settings

Y - Swap view

Media

How to Homebrew a Nintendo Wii (The Homebrew Channel) (SF Productions)

Who made the Homebrew Channel music? (f4mi)

Changelog

1.1.4-1 - FIX94

• Equal to previous file, just corrected a wii vc mistake when selecting "no" if you want to use the gamepad it did not correctly set up the stub.

1.1.4 - FIX94

• Added code based on TinyLoad to stub that allows wii vc to return to HBC when wii vc channel booter was used to initially get into HBC.
• Pushed OHBC version to 1.1.4.

1.1.3

• The channel is now open source with the source code hosted on github.
  • Not released in binary form, although Homebrew Channel 1.1.4 was released in binary form and is based on this version.
• Fixes issue with aspect ratio on vWii.
• Title ID changed (OHBC).
• Removed scam warning screen.

1.1.2

• PAL 50Hz (576i) video mode now works properly.
• Icons load again in The Homebrew Channel.

1.1.1

• WiiU (WiiMode) compatibility.
  • New title ID (LULZ).
  • Now has a proper entrypoint in the main DOL; previously, entrypoint was unset, since the Broadway always boots to 80003400, but because BC-NAND reads the entrypoint, it is now necessary to set it.

1.1.0

• Added support for RVL-CNT-01-TR Wii Remotes.
• New TrueType font renderer (FreeType) with antialiasing and theming.
• The new default font is Droid Sans.
• Added full UTF-8/Unicode support (font dependent).
• Added Japanese translation.
• IOS is always reloaded, use ahb_access to keep AHB access enabled.
• Fixed HBC framebuffer tearing/lag/sync/corruption issues.
• Aligned HBC graphics to the pixel grid (sharper graphics).
• Aligned font rendering to the pixel grid in both 4:3 and 16:9 mode.
• Fixed/improved text layout.
• Fixed support for huge meta.xml files (e.g. very long descriptions).
• Renamed "Coder" to "Author" in app descriptions (<coder> is now an alias for <author>).
• Fixed missing theme app entries (sometimes).
• Changed many crashes into explicit errors / a panic screen.
• Speed and stability improvements when launching apps (cleanup after IOS).
• Reload stub: support any BAT setup (or even real mode).
• Reload stub: do not depend on existing exception vectors.
• Reload stub: do not touch HID4.
• Reload stub: disable IRQs ASAP.
• Fixed bugs in device hotplugging support.
• Added nicer error message triggered when HBC runs out of memory while loading an app.
• Removed the <unknown> coder/version labels.
• Fixed memory leaks while loading themes and in app entries.
• Reduced the minimum theme size (for xml-only themes).
• Increased the maximum theme size up to 20MB (for huge fonts).
• Reduced memory fragmentation when loading apps/themes (less OOM errors).
• Fixed sorting by release date.
• Fixed crashes with incomplete meta files.
• Themes now affect language choice (due to font differences).
• HBC now allows apps to load code at 0x3400.
• Fixed various buffer overflow / error conditions.
• Fixed/improved thread synchronization and race conditions.
• Theme ZIP files can now contain .txt files, which are ignored (README.txt, etc.).
• HBC can now take screenshots (Nunchuk Z+C, in that order).
• Updated to devkitPro r24 and latest libogc/libfat git.

1.0.8

• General USB improvements for all IOS versions, this fixes the regression introduced in version 1.0.7.
• USB2 support through IOS58.

1.0.7

• New title id (00010001-af1bf516) to circumvent its deletion by System Menu 4.3.
  • The low 4 bytes are actually the first 4 bytes of the DSi common key.
• New look from our favorite pixel artist drmr.
• Both views now show five rows of application entries.
• On-NAND settings.
• HBC now has the HW_AHBPROT flags set for direct hardware access, thus replacing DVDX.
• Ability to not reload IOS when launching an application.
• USB access is more stable, thanks to tueidj.
• Fixed the retry mechanism for the network initialization.
• Fixed some rare hangs upon launch and exit (Hopefully all of them).
• Notable speed improvement.
• Now capable of custom themes granted all files are of the same dimensions.

1.0.6

• Freeze fix.
• Some other minor hiccups.

1.0.5

• System Menu 4.2 support.
• New title ID to circumvent deletion (JODI).
• Improved startup.
• HBC prefers boot.elf over boot.dol when launching apps.
• Improved fonts.
• Widescreen support:.
  • If your Wii is set to 16:9 in the system menu options, HBC won’t stretch the picture like it did in older versions.
• Grid view:.
  • 4 columns on 16:9 TVs.
  • 3 columns on 4:3 TVs.
• Device hot-swapping:.
• Added a menu for device options.
• App sorting.
  • Name.
  • Release date.
    • For release date sorting to work a valid release_date tag must be present in the apps meta.xml file.
• Wiiload overhaul.
  • On-the-fly compression.
  • Improved USBGecko support.
  • libftdi support.
    • Because of these improvements, older wiiload versions and 3rd party upload clients are incompatible. Use the bundled v0.5, binaries and source code are included.
• Basic app management :.
  • To add apps: Just wiiload a ZIP archive, it will then get extracted to the active device. The ZIP file must be structured in a certain way, check this description for the details.
  • Added option to delete apps.

1.0.4

• Fixed POWER button bug (BootMii IOS).
• Turned HBC upside down for those who modified the contents of the HBC or installed it using a "wad manager".

1.0.3

• SDHC support.. again.
• Improved SD Card support (regression was introduced in v1.0.2).
• HBC is compatable with all pre-4.2 system menu versions (stock 3.3 post Oct 23 has issues.
• Fixed rare hangs when exiting HBC.
• Added translation for "Launch BootMii" button.

1.0.2

• Added "Launch BootMii" button (BootMii IOS) to home menu.
• System Menu 4.0 support.
• USB support.
• Manual shutdown support.
• Installer has been removed in favor of the HackMii Installer.

1.0.1

• Fixed B button issues.
• Wii Remotes are in-sync with System Menu.
• Possibly fixed the USB Ethernet Issues.
• Fixed wiimote auto-shutdown.
• Possibly fixed "video after shutdown" Issues.
• Changes to () -> *.

1.0 (Beta 10)

• Meta.xml supports all ISO-8859-1 characters.
• Wii Remote shutdown support.
• Rumble support (system menu settings).
• Fixed some crash bugs.
• Fixed meta.xml UNIX style newline regression.
• Support for Non-Nintendo Wii Remotes.
• Classic Controller support.
• Nunchuk support (scroll only).
• Guitar Hero 3 guitar support.
• Left/Right button page scrolling.
• Hit 1 on Wii Remote for net reload (like net icon click or GC Z).
• Add information to installer.
• Fixed network issues.
• Pushed in some text to avoid overscan crop.
• Widened video width to match System Menu ("black bars" fix).
• B returns from app screen (unless scrolling).
• Auto-connect support.
• Retry network init.
• Reload stub now identifies itself (magic number).
• Support for broken HTTP proxies in update check.
• Added IOS revision in main menu.

Beta 9

• Installer / updater now works with the October 23 update (now uses STM Release Exploit).
• SDHC support.
• Fixed memory card bug.
• Installer now picks newest sane IOS.
  • This removes the WiFi router issues caused by switching to IOS21.
• Added reload button (SD card).
• Removed return to system menu warning.
• Fixed some graphical glitches.
• Compliant ELF loading code (iff you get errors use ELF to DOL Converter).
• Improved XML load code.
• Many fixes to underlying stuff in the newer libogc.

Beta 8

• Removed the need to eject your memcards.
• Converted from IOS35 to IOS21 (HBC is usable on older system updates now).
  • WiFi now performs worse as a result.
• Improved SD card support.
  • Thanks, svpe.
• Improved translations.
• Fixed IP label.
• Improved argv support.
• Fixed wiiload issue.
• Apps are now sorted alphabetically.
• Rumble support.
• Installer overhaul.
  • Added warning if your system menu is too new (future updates).
• Updated libogc; Wii-specific code (e.g. Wiimotes) is now part of libogc.

Beta 7 (Initial Public Release besides chainloader).

• Minor bugfixes.
• GUI updates.
• Added translations.
• ISO distribution.
• First public beta.

April Fools

• 10 minute ticket time limit.

Beta 6

• GUI overhaul chapter 2.
• Added translations.
• Wii Remote dragging on memo widget.
• Auto-disconnect Wii Remote after idle time.
• Other fixes I can't remember.

Beta 5

• GUI overhaul chapter 1.
• Improved IR pointer.
• Improved argv support.
• Fixed Wii Remote code bugs.
• Fixed update bugs.
• SD card is scanned for boot.dol then boot.elf.

Beta 4

• Added Wii Remote IR cursor.

Beta 3

• Fixed flicker glitch.
• Stable Wii Remote libs.
• Support for argv.

External links

• Official Website - https://hbc.hackmii.com/
• WiiBrew - https://wiibrew.org/wiki/Homebrew_Channel
• GitHub (fail0verflow) - http://github.com/fail0verflow/hbc
• GitHub (FIX94) - https://github.com/FIX94/hbc/