First Statistics On Steam Linux Usage

[efikkan]

Actually DistroWatch doesn't even count the OS that you are using, only what OS you check out on their site ...

I know, it only tracks what their visitors are checking out, and only unique visits. Which is generally useless information.

[StephanG]

Well, almost all other Linux steam users will first have set up a Steam account on Windows some time in the past. Hell, that survey done by Canonical a while back showed that 75% of their userbase still used windows.

What I'm trying to say, if they take every Linux Steam user and subtract that user from the Windows statistics, the percentages might look a little better. Not much, but it might approach 2%.

[madinside]

I am pretty sure wine users are listed as wine users.

From Steam's systeminformation (German):

Windows XP (32 Bit)
Wine-Version: wine-1.5.10

I didn't expect, but Steam detects wine. It's okay with me as long as they don't block its usage.

On another note: I made some math and tried to analyze other values and changes on Valve's statistics page. Most notably, the number of systems running NTFS has decreased by 1.40 % to 94.54 %. The number of OS X systems has increased by 0.5 % to 3.72 %. As OS X uses HFS+, there are still changes of 0.9 % of all systems using something else than NTFS or HFS+. One candidate might be FAT, but I don't think there are any new systems using FAT. 'Other' has changed by 0.14 %. With the 0.8 % of Ubuntu systems added, this makes a reasonable guess of 0.94 % for Linux systems. Also, it matches quite well the change in NTFS systems percentage. With 3.72 % + 0.94 % = 4.66 %, there seem to be around 0.8 % of all systems running on FAT filesystems.

Sincerely,
madinside

[efikkan]

Well, almost all other Linux steam users will first have set up a Steam account on Windows some time in the past. Hell, that survey done by Canonical a while back showed that 75% of their userbase still used windows.

What I'm trying to say, if they take every Linux Steam user and subtract that user from the Windows statistics, the percentages might look a little better. Not much, but it might approach 2%.

The statistics count active installs, if most of the Linux users also have Steam active on Windows, these would be counted as well. If a single user has multiple computers with different OSs used during a month, each will be counted in it's respective category.

[elanthis]

If they counted every linux user using wine to play steam games, it would have been like 5% or more.

Right. Because 1 out of every 20 gamers is a Linux user. Never mind that even on many developer and nerd oriented websites (sites that target the same kinds of users who generally find Linux attractive), Linux usage stats only show ~5% on most of them, compared to 1-2% tops on most "mainstream user" sites.

[curaga]

Another problem linux has as compared to windows is driver/userland software availability for expensive gaming controllers - mice, keyboards and others for all available brands (no I will not buy roccat just because they support linux, I like my current gear better).

That's kinda funny, you bought expensive kit with a sticker on the box saying "Windows only", and somehow it's linux's fault the manufacturer only supports windows?

[deanjo]

but at least the 64-bit Ubuntu Linux builds have much greater popularity than their 32-bit counterparts.

Sadly, the Steam client however still relies on 32-bit libraries (which means having to pull flash plugin shenanigans just to see the videos in the steam client on a 64-bit system that utilizes 64-browsers and plugins by default).

[uid313]

So most Steam users on Linux use 64-bit.
I hope Valve makes a 64-bit Steam client.

[Krysto]

Isn't the client still in beta?

[deanjo]

So most Steam users on Linux use 64-bit.
I hope Valve makes a 64-bit Steam client.

Ya I hope so. There is little reason for them not to have a native 64-bit client. Sure a lot of games would still have 32-bit dependencies but not having a native 64-bit client that utilizes native 64-bit browser plugins is really inexcusable other then pure laziness. The client is after all based on Webkit which has easily compiled native 64-bit systems for quite some time now.