orbisRPC — Discord Rich Presence for the PS4

A background daemon that runs entirely on your jailbroken PS4 and posts what you're playing to your Discord profile as Rich Presence — "Playing Call of Duty: Black Ops III — 1h 23m". No laptop, no phone bridge, no secondary device at runtime. Just the console.

It's Discord's "now-playing" integration, the way the PS5 does it — but for a 9.00 / GoldHEN PS4.

---

How it works

The PS4 only runs one foreground app at a time, so a normal homebrew app gets suspended the moment you launch a game and can't report your activity while you play. orbisRPC avoids that by running as a GoldHEN payload daemon: it loads at boot (from GoldHEN/payloads/) and keeps running in the background while games launch in the foreground.

            +--------------------------+      HTTPS/WebSocket        +-------------------+
            |   orbisRPC (payload daemon) |  wss://gateway.discord.gg  |   Discord         |
            |  on your PS4 @ 192.168.1.136  |  <-- presence -->      |   (your profile)  |
            +-------------+--------------+                              +-----------------+
                          |
       detects running game (process list + app.db) | config + token (/data/orbisRPC)
                          v
            +--------------------------+
            |  /user/app/CUSAxxxx      |
            |  /system_data/priv/mms   |
            +--------------------------+

1. The daemon notices which game is running.
2. Looks up its title + cover.
3. Connects to the Discord gateway over TLS.
4. Sets your activity: Playing <Game> with an elapsed timer.
5. Clears it when the game exits.

Everything stays on the PS4. Your Mac only touches this repo to build it.

---

Status

Milestone	Progress
Toolchain / build (OpenOrbis, macOS native, LLVM 21 + lld)	done
M1 — network + TLS (SceNet + LibreSSL/OpenSSL-ABI)	done (compiles + links)
M2 — Discord OAuth2 token flow + refresh	done (compiles + links)
M3 — gateway: connect / heartbeat / presence	done (compiles + links)
M4 — game detection (foreground user → CUSA → title)	done (compiles + links)
M5 — GoldHEN autoload + package + install	pending (needs on-console test)
On-console validation (M1's TLS + detection against live FW)	pending

build/orbisrpc.elf (182 KiB) and build/orbisrpc.fself (188 KiB) link successfully against OpenOrbis v0.5.4; the TLS layer uses libSceLibreSSL's OpenSSL-ABI exports (SSL_CTX_new / SSL_connect / SSL_write / SSL_read).

---

Building (macOS, native — no Docker needed)

Verified path on this Mac (LLVM 21 via brew + OpenOrbis toolchain v0.5.4):

# 1. one-time toolchain (OpenOrbis v0.5.4, ~160 MB)
mkdir -p ~/PS4Toolchain && cd ~/PS4Toolchain
curl -L -o toolchain-llvm-18.tar.gz \
  https://github.com/OpenOrbis/OpenOrbis-PS4-Toolchain/releases/download/v0.5.4/toolchain-llvm-18.tar.gz
tar -xzf toolchain-llvm-18.tar.gz     # -> ~/PS4Toolchain/OpenOrbis/PS4Toolchain

# 2. one-time toolchain deps
brew install llvm          # clang 21
# lld 21 (linker) — built from source or brew lld@21, see scripts/build.sh

# 3. build
OO_PS4_TOOLCHAIN=~/PS4Toolchain/OpenOrbis/PS4Toolchain \
  LLD=/Users/mac/lldbuild/build/bin/ld.lld \
  ./scripts/build.sh
# -> build/orbisrpc.elf (raw payload), build/orbisrpc.fself, build/orbisrpc-eboot.bin

The GoldHEN payload to deploy is the raw ELF, build/orbisrpc.elf, uploaded as orbisrpc.bin (the orbisrpc.fself/orbisrpc-eboot.bin outputs are for the PKG/fself route, not GoldHEN's auto-payload loader). No toolchain = no build.

---

Installing on the PS4 (no PC after first build)

1. Build orbisrpc.pkg (or grab the .elf payload) on any Mac/computer.
2. Transfer to the PS4 over FTP, or on a USB stick.
3. Daemon route (recommended): put orbisrpc.elf in /data/GoldHEN/payloads/ (named orbisrpc.bin) — it auto-loads on every boot and runs in the background while you game. (GoldHEN 2.2.)
4. Or install orbisrpc.pkg like any homebrew app if you prefer a foreground launcher (note: it suspends once a game opens, so the daemon route is what powers presence-during-play).

Config lives at /data/orbisRPC/config.json — edit it over FTP or on a USB stick. Logs go to /data/orbisRPC/log.txt.

---

One-time setup: your Discord app

The safe route (recommended; ToS-friendly) needs a Discord Developer Application: it's what makes Discord show "Playing …" as an integration rather than as your own account automating itself (which Discord bans on the user account — see notes in the repo). Steps:

1. Open https://discord.com/developers/applications → New Application → name it orbisRPC (or whatever) → Create.
2. Copy the Application ID (Client ID) and Client Secret into /data/orbisRPC/config.json (client_id, client_secret).
3. In the app → OAuth2 → Redirects, add: https://example.com/callback
4. In the app → OAuth2 → Scopes, add rpc.activities.write (and identify).
5. Reboot the daemon: it will print an authorize URL into log.txt. Open that URL on your phone/computer, approve, then paste the code= back into the config (or let the daemon watch the config file). It exchanges the code once and then refreshes automatically.

After that it just runs. No PC needed at runtime.

---

Safety / ToS notes

• We use the OAuth2 application flow, not your personal account token. Automating your user account is what Discord flags as a "selfbot" and bans for. A registered application acting on your permission is the supported integration path.
• Discord may require your application to be verified to use rpc.activities.write. For a personal, low-traffic app it usually works unverified; worst case it labels the activity "via orbisRPC".

---

License

MIT — see LICENSE. Headers + minimal JSON parser (jsonlite) are self-contained (no third-party runtime deps beyond the Orbis toolchain).