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5 years ago Valve released Proton

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Re: 5 years ago Valve released Proton

#71
post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is only because of the nature of dynamic linking. Have a statically linked executable and you should be fine. Not that it should be an issue to get old software to run you simply need to download the dependent lib versions. Anyone who sais this i feel hasnt worked very much with software, not that you should need to thats up to the one distributing the executable

Unless you statically linked GTK, possibly Xorg, and more into a ludicrous bundle size, you’d still be screwed. As for “just get the libs,” that’s hilariously easier said than done. Try my example - it’s enough to make an engineer cry.

Your example doesn't make sense. Linux distributions have always had this trade off: Binaries provided through the package manager work with the libraries that are provided by the same package manager. I have a bunch of older gog or Humble Bundle Linux releases of games that still work fine on my system because (Windows style) they carry around all of their libraries with them. Linking Xorg doesn't make sense and applications linked statically against libX11 will work perfectly fine even with Xwayland.

Re: 5 years ago Valve released Proton

#72
post #57

Proton has earned steam my business forever. I haven't booted into Windows in over a year.

Valve have funded some good work on the underlying compatibility code, but their big contribution was really fixing a problem they themselves created. Lots of games expect to be able to call back to the Steam client for a license check, and this used to require running the Windows version of Steam which didn't work well (huge compatibility issues and it really didn't like being run at the same time as the Linux versi…

Valve may have contributed to the issue initially, but can you blame them? There wasn't exactly an abundance of Linux Support before Valve came along either. Why would they support a Linux Steam client and the whole compatibility layer when the demand just didn't exist.

Valve becoming big enough to break into the hardware market (first Steam Machines and then the Steam Deck) was the first time they had any incentive to care about the OS layer. They could've made some deal w/ Microsoft but instead went the open-source route to the benefit of everyone. Kudos to Valve.

Re: 5 years ago Valve released Proton

#73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've only heard good things about it, but i see no reason to use it. making fedora do what it does is easy enough.

"Easy enough" sure, you keep up with all those patches, manually, on your own system, then say it. This site literally can't not be pretentious

>This site literally can't not be pretentious

Infamous Dropbox comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9224

Re: 5 years ago Valve released Proton

#74
post #57

Proton has earned steam my business forever. I haven't booted into Windows in over a year.

Valve have funded some good work on the underlying compatibility code, but their big contribution was really fixing a problem they themselves created. Lots of games expect to be able to call back to the Steam client for a license check, and this used to require running the Windows version of Steam which didn't work well (huge compatibility issues and it really didn't like being run at the same time as the Linux versi…

> but their big contribution was really fixing a problem they themselves created.

I think it’s a little bit of a stretch to say it’s a problem they created - they were just a victim of their own success. They can’t force developers to write games in a particular platform, and making games work under Linux is no small task.

It was probably easier to stream games from a Windows machine, which was their first approach with Steam Link and Steam Machines. It kinda sorta worked, and what they saw was enough encouragement to go and build the Steam Deck. On top of that, CPUs/GPUs just weren’t good enough 10 years ago to do what Valve wanted to do.

So I think it’s a little unfair to say they “created” this problem.

Re: 5 years ago Valve released Proton

#75
post #22

11 years ago today (2012, Aug 21) Valve released CSGO forever changing gaming сука блять

Don't look at a calendar, it will be a depressing experience.

to be fair, CSGO was a failure for the first few years of its existence. so it's likely you're remembering it best from around 2016.

all I know is that I have the operation payback challenge coin, but no real memory of those maps. i do wish they'd bring back some of the operation maps... (santorini anyone?)

Re: 5 years ago Valve released Proton

#76

Proton has earned steam my business forever. I haven't booted into Windows in over a year.

Are you saying, that it is actually a good experience to run Linux on the gaming laptop instead of Windows with Proton? I already have Steam Deck, and love it. But if I want to play games in better resolution, I might boot my Windows Laptop. Have not tried Linux with Proton. On Linux laptop I have a NVIDIA some kind of 3xxx series card.

What do you mean by "better resolution"? In my experience the resolution is the same on both OSs

Re: 5 years ago Valve released Proton

#77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you want more games to be played on Linux or not? Because we've been trying the whole "please target native Linux" thing for awhile now and it simply isn't appealing enough to ever work. Evangelism is useless in the face of results.

>Do you want more games to be played on Linux or not? This is meaningless if you change the definition of "on Linux" to mean "on Windows".

“on Windows” is no longer a worthwhile phrase when it simply means “targeting a Linux/Windows shared compatibility ABI”.

There are more functioning games on Linux than I ever would have thought possible because of this (very difficult and certainly open source) work that’s been done by Wine, Proton, Valve and many many more. But of course, someone has to find a way to discourage all of that because it isn’t pure enough or whatever.

Re: 5 years ago Valve released Proton

#78
post #63

When Proton came out I had multiple people on HN going on quite long rants about how Linux would never be viable for gaming. One multi-million-unit-selling handheld gaming system later and I don't see those arguments much anymore.

It makes for a very boring discussion (and makes this a boring comment) to recall some random person who ranted in a way that didn't age well. If you're going to make that point, at least link to the thread to allow reading some interesting comments there instead.

If your memory is about [1], which is the first main topic on Proton, the criticism seems quite muted (and otherwise downvoted).

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17815892

Re: 5 years ago Valve released Proton

#80

Proton has earned steam my business forever. I haven't booted into Windows in over a year.

Are you saying, that it is actually a good experience to run Linux on the gaming laptop instead of Windows with Proton? I already have Steam Deck, and love it. But if I want to play games in better resolution, I might boot my Windows Laptop. Have not tried Linux with Proton. On Linux laptop I have a NVIDIA some kind of 3xxx series card.

My steam deck has been basically flawless with its software with the exception of assetto corsa, because it needs a million .net installs.
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