DarKE/README.md

Ender-3 V3 KE firmware workspace

This repo contains a stock KE firmware image, a small overlay tree of our changes, and a helper script for rebuilding an .img package.

Files

• FIRMWARE_NOTES.md: archive password and firmware layout notes
• tools/ke_firmware.py: extract/rebuild helper
• requirements.txt: Python dependency list for the helper script

Python setup

Install the helper dependency with:

pip install -r requirements.txt

On Linux, install squashfs-tools-ng so gensquashfs and rdsquashfs are available on PATH. On Windows, the helper uses the bundled .exe tools.

Rebuild flow

python .\tools\ke_firmware.py build --stock-archive .\Ender-3_V3_KE_F005_ota_img_V1.1.0.17.img --overlay-dir .\overlay_rootfs --output .\build\DarKE_KE_F005_ota_img_V11034.img

If the stock archive is missing, pass --stock-url and the helper will download it before extracting. If your C: drive is tight, point --build-dir at a larger drive so the stock rootfs can be unpacked there.

The build step downloads or reuses the stock archive, extracts it, overlays overlay_rootfs/, rebuilds the root filesystem with the Windows squashfs-tools-ng binaries, and repacks the Creality image envelope with py7zr. The rebuild is metadata-preserving, so stock symlinks and executable bits survive the round trip.

Compare flow

python .\tools\ke_firmware.py compare --stock-archive .\Ender-3_V3_KE_F005_ota_img_V1.1.0.17.img --rebuilt-archive .\build\DarKE_KE_F005_ota_img_V11034.img --overlay-dir .\overlay_rootfs

Use this after a build to confirm the rebuilt rootfs still matches stock everywhere except the overlayed files.

Stock flash flow

1. Copy the generated .img to a USB drive.
2. Insert the USB drive into the Ender-3 V3 KE.
3. Use the built-in updater to flash the image.
4. After reboot, the firmware reports the UI/display version from the package metadata.

This flow does not require manual edits on the printer itself.