The tier mis-compiled and has been hard-gated off since 2026-06-25; overlay
gaps fall to gcc/tcc shards and the dirty-RAM interpreter, unchanged.
Re-do on master of the removal validated on the stale branch (6da8c02),
reconciled with everything master grew since the fork:
- Delete overlay_sljit.{c,h}, overlay_compile_worker.{c,h}, lib/sljit,
runtime/tests/sljit_*.c, and the runtime.cmake sources/include-dirs.
- Strip the sljit provider/backend from code_provider.{c,h},
overlay_backend.{c,h} ("sljit" in overlay_backend/PSX_OVERLAY_BACKEND now
degrades to auto so stale configs still boot), main.cpp, debug_server.c
(sljit_status/sljit_async/sljit_try TCP commands), overlay_loader.{c,h}
(live policy, JIT-on-miss, persisted-shard cache, async worker glue,
psx_sljit_call/cop2/memx host helpers — reachable only via the removed
cpu->sljit_helpers table), and cpu_state.h (SLJIT_HLP_* enum + the
sljit_helpers[] member; CPUState layout change reshards via the cg tag).
- Master-only entanglement resolved before deletion: 28165d6's Einhander WS
player-X bound emit existed in three paths (gcc code_generator, sljit,
dirty_ram_interp). The gcc shard link contract now forwards
psx_ws_player_x_bound (ABI v13, previous commit), so deleting the sljit
emit path loses no widescreen behavior; ffc6688's game-dispatch block
inside the dead psx_sljit_call helper goes with it.
- Reword comments that described sljit as a live backend (gpu.{c,h},
ws_*_detect.h, cosim_state.c, dirty_ram_interp.c, autocompile.h,
boot_state.h, config_loader.h, compile_overlays.py, and the CPS marker
comments the recompiler emits).
recompiler psxrecomp-game builds clean; game runtimes rebuilt + boot-verified
separately.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Two framework bugs that made overlay variants run interpreted forever (the
"agonizing lag" in overlay-heavy areas like Tomba's dwarf village):
1. Cache read/write divergence. The loader reads <exe>/cache and the runtime
writes captures to <exe>/overlay_captures.json, but the gcc autocompile path
used the game.toml command verbatim, whose hard-coded --out-dir/--captures
pointed elsewhere (build-stable/build-modern). So compiled shards landed where
the loader never looked and captures were read stale -> the variant never went
native. Fix: the runtime now injects PSX_OVERLAY_CACHE_DIR / PSX_OVERLAY_CAPTURES
(the canonical loader paths) into every autocompile spawn; compile_overlays.py
honors them over any CLI flag (--captures now optional). One source of truth for
the cache location, uniform across all games, dev or prod. gcc/tcc stay separated
by the existing <compiler> namespace.
2. Overlay DLL preamble missing psx_ws_cull_sltiu. auto_screen_x emits this helper
at every width-cull site into EVERY build's C (identity at 4:3), and the main EXE
links it from gpu.c, but the overlay DLL preamble never defined it -> any overlay
variant with cull sites failed to link -> no shard -> interpreter. Fix: provide
the self-contained helper (depends only on the already-forwarded psx_ws_x_margin)
in the DLL preamble.
Proven on Tomba dwarf village: dispatch_native 29/s -> 11454/s (was ~97% interp,
now ~97% native).
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.8 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Root-cause class: a toolchain-less machine never self-improved via sljit on the
normal play path. Two blocks: (1) `auto` resolved to gcc on EVERY machine because
the discriminator was autocompile_configured() — "is a command STRING set" — and
the shipped game.toml always carries overlay_autocompile_cmd; (2) live sljit mode
was reachable only via a hand-set env var (dead public setter, no policy).
Fix:
- autocompile.c: autocompile_toolchain_available() probes PATH for a real C
compiler (gcc/cc/clang). main.cpp passes
`autocompile_configured() && autocompile_toolchain_available()` to
code_provider_init, so `auto` picks gcc only when one is actually reachable,
else sljit.
- overlay_loader.c: overlay_loader_apply_live_policy() (called from main.cpp
AFTER backend resolution) defaults live ON when the resolved backend is sljit
— so a toolchain-less box runs VALIDATED shards live (self-improves on the
normal path); PSX_OVERLAY_SLJIT_LIVE still overrides. The env-only block in
overlay_loader_init is removed (the policy fn subsumes it).
Runtime-only (no regen). Refs SLJIT.md §11 Phase C.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.8 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>
Runtime detects an uncovered overlay/kernel variant by sustained dirty-RAM
interp pressure inside the capture windows (g_dirty_window_dispatches,
sampled every 600 vblanks; fires only at a coherent non-loading moment via
cdrom_load_in_progress, 60s cooldown, 16/session cap), writes the capture
JSON, and spawns the game.toml-configured compile command
([runtime] overlay_autocompile_cmd, cmd.exe /C, cwd=project root, child
output kept in an in-memory ring — no log files). On child exit 0 the emu
thread rescans the cache (overlay_loader_rescan: idempotent dir re-scan +
checked-regions reset) so the new DLL loads on the next dispatch and the
variant goes native in-session. Dedup is tool-side (existing-CRC skip);
pressure drops to zero once code is native, so the loop self-limits.
New TCP: autocompile_status / autocompile_run / overlay_rescan.
compile_dll now uses absolute native paths and reports exit codes.
VERIFIED live (user-played route): 2 auto-triggers fired, captures written,
child ran recompiler+audit (new variants 1E7DDE2C, A62D0A7C discovered and
audit-clean), rescan picked the compiled DLL up in-session. OPEN ISSUE: gcc
exits 1 with no output inside the spawned cmd.exe child (same absolute-path
command succeeds from an interactive shell) — compile step currently
completed manually; suspect child-env difference, to be isolated next
session.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Matthew Stanley