Valve Reaffirms Commitment To Linux While Also Releasing Updated Proton

[phoronix]

Phoronix: Valve Reaffirms Commitment To Linux While Also Releasing Updated Proton

Following all the drama caused by Canonical announcing last week they'd stop their 32-bit archive with Ubuntu 19.10 and that leading to a mess of concerns including Valve saying they would not be officially supporting Ubuntu 19.10 and later, today they issued a statement reaffirming their commitment to Linux...

http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=Steam-Linux-Client-32-Bit-Post

[TheOne]

ArchLinux surely has great support for gamers with latest video drivers, 32 bit libraries, etc..., it is also one of the most used platforms to report issues on ProtonDB, I tend to always see archlinux users also more involved in the community, maybe Valve knows this because of their stats.

[stiiixy]

Paraphrasing: 'We don't care what distro you use; talk to us, and we'll help'.

That's the kind of attitude I like to hear. Only EVERYONE will benefit from such a massive team pushing in from the top end of the Linux eco-system.

Poor old openSuSe doesn't get a mention again.

[oiaohm]

ArchLinux surely has great support for gamers with latest video drivers, 32 bit libraries, etc..., it is also one of the most used platforms to report issues on ProtonDB, I tend to always see archlinux users also more involved in the community, maybe Valve knows this because of their stats.

There is a problem here.

https://store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey/

Click on the OS versions and notice how little 32 bit there is. All of OS X and Linux users are 64 bit installs. There is only about 2 percent 32 bit in use by OS people is using and that is all windows. Most of that is Windows 7 that goes end of life in 2020.

Remember https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?pa...10-x8664&num=1 we stopped running these benchmarks because i686 was never winning against x86_64.

Steam Client really should be 64 bit. We should be able to run some games from steam without needing 32 bit libraries. Its been years since the steam hwsurvey has shown a 32 bit Linux user. Anyone after performance with a Linux system will not be using i686 binaries they will be using x86_64.

[tildearrow]

Typo:

updating to Wine-Mono49.,

[ElectricPrism]

Stats may be 2% 32 bit but what % of 96 bit has 32 bit multilib installed? I am willing to guess 90%+

Next question, what % of those require multilib? I am willing to guesd 60-70%

Idealism is nice when you dont have the price of practicality.

Many games on steam include lost source code or no financial incentive and will remain 32 bit.

Breaking compatability on peoples purchases for no good reason is not reasonable and foolish.

[tildearrow]

As predicted. Valve need Ubuntu. Ubuntu need Valve.

Why all the drama?

Canonical started the drama.

[pracedru]

This is so nice to hear from valve. Acknowledging other distros and confirming their belief in the platform. Thanks valve. And also thanks canonical for not making a dumb mistake.

[dungeon]

Why all the drama?

Because no one knows when 32bit will be dead, while software for 8bit Commodore 64 is still released

Maybe it is Game Over today, maybe it isn't

https://edition.cnn.com/2019/06/26/tech/commodore-64-retro-console-trnd/index.html

[stormcrow]

There is a problem here.

https://store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey/

Click on the OS versions and notice how little 32 bit there is. All of OS X and Linux users are 64 bit installs. There is only about 2 percent 32 bit in use by OS people is using and that is all windows. Most of that is Windows 7 that goes end of life in 2020.

Remember https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?pa...10-x8664&num=1 we stopped running these benchmarks because i686 was never winning against x86_64.

Steam Client really should be 64 bit. We should be able to run some games from steam without needing 32 bit libraries. Its been years since the steam hwsurvey has shown a 32 bit Linux user. Anyone after performance with a Linux system will not be using i686 binaries they will be using x86_64.

The "problem" has nothing to do with how many people are using 64 bit on Linux (or Mac). That's literally irrelevant to most game developers. What's going on is that Microsoft has made running 32 bit programs on 64 bit Windows so seamless that it only been the past few years that 64 bit native games have started appearing on the platform. Since it's pretty much irrelevant on *Windows* what kind of installer you use (32 or 64 bit), nearly all installer executables are 32 bit regardless because there's no reason to reinvent and update to 64 bit native installers. There's quite literally no perceived benefit to do it. Installers are I/O bound and there's no storage medium that can keep up with the CPU even in 32 bit mode. This is why Wine-32 can't be done away with even if the game executables are 64 bit clean and would otherwise run with Wine-64. Linux is still an afterthought for game development houses. Like John Carmack once said about the original Doom, Linux gave him a woody. That's why Doom got ported, not because there was any financial benefit in it (or the SGI IRIX port for that matter). We're damned lucky the development houses are even bothering to release games running on top of a packaged version of Wine for Linux when the market share is close to a statistical blip (around 1% on Steam).

As for the Steam client being 32 bit? Who cares if i686 benchmarks are slower. This is a network client that's basically just a pared down web browser with installation capability. A 64bit native client might install a game from backup 30 seconds faster. Who cares? Installing from download certainly won't be any faster (which is why 32bit v. 64bit client is irrelevant on Windows).

My guess is the Steam Windows client is probably 32 bit too. Shared source tree. Like I said earlier, on Windows that doesn't matter. The experience for the Windows end user is the same either way (roughly 96% of their clients). And before you say "Just recompile!", it's no where near that simple. When Valve is ready to move to a 64 bit client they'll probably release all supported clients as such. Till then take your 32 bit client and be grateful you even have that. There's no financial reason for Valve to support Linux. They could (very) easily get along without Linux user revenue.