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Steam survey shows Linux marketshare hitting 1.0%

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Re: Steam survey shows Linux marketshare hitting 1.0%

#51
post #4

Nowadays OS matters pretty little. Personally, on some level, I don't even notice difference working macOS, Linux and Windows. Other than platform specific development work, it doesn't really matter in the big picture. Other than that, only Linux allows me true visibility to its innards. Fast to fix almost any issues, should they happen. And I say this as someone who has for example no problem debugging Windows kerne…

I would rephrase this: The share of users who could work well with any of the operating systems is increasing. The fundamental differences between the operating systems that impact user experience are decreasing.

I think 90-99% of users only use Browser+Office+Games which could work well in any of the big operating systems. Some software preferences are superficial and appropriate replacements exist on the other platforms.

As someone working with macOS, Linux and Windows I focus my workflow on the things that work under all of these operating systems so the impact they have on me is very little. People who are deeper into the UX of a single operation system may disagree completely.

Re: Steam survey shows Linux marketshare hitting 1.0%

#52
post #11
post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Windows has no epoll(), but of course that doesn't matter for games.

Windows does have I/O completion ports, which is, frankly, superior. Then again, Linux has io_uring. Again, pointless in the big picture. Most of the time these details are hidden by libraries.

Btw Windows built an api based on io_uring https://windows-internals.com/i-o-rings-when-one-i-o-operati...

Re: Steam survey shows Linux marketshare hitting 1.0%

#53
post #4

Nowadays OS matters pretty little. Personally, on some level, I don't even notice difference working macOS, Linux and Windows. Other than platform specific development work, it doesn't really matter in the big picture. Other than that, only Linux allows me true visibility to its innards. Fast to fix almost any issues, should they happen. And I say this as someone who has for example no problem debugging Windows kerne…

I would rephrase this: The share of users who could work well with any of the operating systems is increasing. The fundamental differences between the operating systems that impact user experience are decreasing. I think 90-99% of users only use Browser+Office+Games which could work well in any of the big operating systems. Some software preferences are superficial and appropriate replacements exist on the other plat…

> I would rephrase this: The share of users who could work well with any of the operating systems is increasing. The fundamental differences between the operating systems that impact user experience are decreasing.

Thanks. This was indeed my main point.

Of course this doesn't mean there aren't a lot of niches that require a particular OS.

Re: Steam survey shows Linux marketshare hitting 1.0%

#55
post #21

Just to be fair and balanced I'm a hardcore linux user and gamer and I've tried gaming on linux and I've hit many issues. 365 games on steam and while some windows games work I've hit probably just about every possible issue you can hit with other games. Graphical artifacts, freezing, stuttering, and even full OS reboots. Sometimes I read this thread and scratch my head. I get enthusiasm for FOSS, but enthusiasm to t…

I've had a similar experience. I would love to stop using Windows but I have found that ProtonDB wildly exagerrates the compatibility of games. I had game breaking issues with 50% or more of "gold" rated titles and even some with a "platinum" rating.

ProtonDB is driven by reports/feedback from individual users, right? Did you submit your experience so that the ratings are more accurate?

Re: Steam survey shows Linux marketshare hitting 1.0%

#56
post #14

i’ve been using linux as my daily driver for just over a year. steam on linux has been great, and proton (wine) has been indispensable. big title games i’ve played with _no_ issues at all: * Cyberpunk 2077 (ok that has issues, but it has the same issues for windows users..) * Dying Light * Titanfall * The Division along with _many_ other indie/small games. honestly the only thing left is titles that include invasive…

99% of games I play work with Proton, or Lutris, which is great most of the time. However, it's the small amount of time when something stops working or needs small config tweaks that really annoy me, as they cut into my gaming time.

Also, setting up games can be a little bit of a faff. For example, wanting to play FFXIV, well, nothing worked at all. I had to go into the config file and skip the cutscene, and also change the launcher to the old launcher. Now, that doesn't seem like much, and it isn't, but the first time I had to do that took me hours to figure out.

Re: Steam survey shows Linux marketshare hitting 1.0%

#57
post #52
post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Windows does have I/O completion ports, which is, frankly, superior. Then again, Linux has io_uring. Again, pointless in the big picture. Most of the time these details are hidden by libraries.

Btw Windows built an api based on io_uring https://windows-internals.com/i-o-rings-when-one-i-o-operati...

Nice! Haven't heard about this before, must be something really new?

Anyways given extremely high syscall cost due to Meltdown workarounds, batching multiple operations makes more and more sense.

Re: Steam survey shows Linux marketshare hitting 1.0%

#59
post #35

Just to be fair and balanced I'm a hardcore linux user and gamer and I've tried gaming on linux and I've hit many issues. 365 games on steam and while some windows games work I've hit probably just about every possible issue you can hit with other games. Graphical artifacts, freezing, stuttering, and even full OS reboots. Sometimes I read this thread and scratch my head. I get enthusiasm for FOSS, but enthusiasm to t…

> Graphical artifacts, freezing, stuttering, and even full OS reboots. I have seen similar on Windows. For example when Bioshock Remastered Freezes there is no way to exit it, windows still responds, but there is no way to close the game because everything you open is hidden by it. Also the amount of Graphical glitches I encountered in Skyrim is just hilarious. DotA 2 seems to sometimes glitch out when you hit alt ta…

For this kind of situations xkill is marvelous.

I've used Windows xKill [1] for years, but I can't find a download link for which you don't have to sign in...

Alternatively, SuperF4 [2] looks decent, also with a separate CLI only xkill found in the github issues [3].

[1] https://www.deviantart.com/suprvillain/art/Windows-xKill-100...

[2] https://stefansundin.github.io/superf4/

[3] https://github.com/stefansundin/superf4/issues/39#issuecomme...

Re: Steam survey shows Linux marketshare hitting 1.0%

#60

Just to be fair and balanced I'm a hardcore linux user and gamer and I've tried gaming on linux and I've hit many issues. 365 games on steam and while some windows games work I've hit probably just about every possible issue you can hit with other games. Graphical artifacts, freezing, stuttering, and even full OS reboots. Sometimes I read this thread and scratch my head. I get enthusiasm for FOSS, but enthusiasm to t…

> I get enthusiasm for FOSS, but enthusiasm to the point of delusion?

Nothing wrong with being honest. We sometimes have to keep hiding the fact that when we use something on a system that is not officially supported and comes with tons of issues or bugs, we quietly fix it ourselves with hacks and workarounds and try to move on if possible.

Unfortunately with most users, they cannot tolerate 'Graphical artifacts, freezing, stuttering, and even full OS reboots' and would simply give up and use something fully supported like Windows.

> Honestly, Linux is not up to par with windows in terms of running games that are basically designed for windows. Thus the experience compared to windows for these things is definitively inferior.

If it says it is designed and optimised to run on Windows, then that's a hint that it will perform badly on other systems. You can 'try again' on other systems but obviously the help-desk guys will say: 'Sorry, that's unsupported.'

Better to go for something that has official support and move on, not half way there. Or wait until the other system has official support.

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