Don't want to see articles from a certain category? When logged in, go to your User Settings and adjust your feed in the Content Preferences section where you can block tags!
We do often include affiliate links to earn us some pennies. See more here.

Valve updates Steam with more Linux improvements, new game properties UI

By - | Views: 36,185

A fresh Beta update for the Steam Client has rolled out and it seems Valve have begun modernising more parts of the UI, along with Linux fixes.

For the Steam Library, they've now ripped out the old Properties dialog with one that more closely matches their newer design style found elsewhere like with chat settings and they also fixed displaying the coming soon date for a pre-loaded game.

Here's a quick look at what it looks like (click to enlarge) in the new Beta:

There's a whole new design with a sidebar instead of tabs along the top, with a box for launch arguments now just always visible and a whole page just for Compatibility which is where you will find the Steam Play settings now. Overall, it looks nice and sleek and seems to do the job just fine as before. I'm sure it will annoy someone though, change always does.

Just for Linux - Valve also improved the performance of processing incremental Vulkan shader database updates, they fixed several issues around skipped Vulkan shader processing continuing in the background after a game has started and for NVIDIA GPU users they've currently disabled shader processing due to driver issues that are "being looked into". Hopefully NVIDIA will be able to sort that soon to give us all a better experience.

A new networking option was also added:

P2P connections now may attempt to negotiate a direct connection (punch NAT), if needed, to prevent connections from having very high latency. Added an option in the In-Game settings panel to control when your IP address is shared.

Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
Tags: Apps, Beta, Steam, Valve
41 Likes
About the author -
author picture
I am the owner of GamingOnLinux. After discovering Linux back in the days of Mandrake in 2003, I constantly came back to check on the progress of Linux until Ubuntu appeared on the scene and it helped me to really love it. You can reach me easily by emailing GamingOnLinux directly. Find me on Mastodon.
See more from me
The comments on this article are closed.
23 comments
Page: «2/3»
  Go to:

kuhpunkt Dec 11, 2020
Quoting: mylkadid they make the launch options more user friendly?
like right click -> launch options instead of right click -> properties -> launch options
also it would be great if we could save some launch options and we just have checkboxes for each command, instead of writing them down

Yes, just right click and click on properties and the "launch options" line is directly there.
BielFPs Dec 11, 2020
Remember some people complaining about the new steam ui? Now I think most of then won't even remember how it was without look in google. It's a cycle that happens every new version.

I personally like how they're improving this new layout without need to wait for another major release, the only thing I don't like is the chromium-based browser.
sjr Dec 11, 2020
Quoting: Liam DaweI actually had to turn it off, it made my PC freeze up hard with my NVIDIA GPU.

I recently helped my sister (technophobe) set up her first Linux machine. She has an AMD graphics card and... everything just worked. No PPAs, no DKMS, no installing drivers. Wonderful experience with the open source drivers.

I think my next video card will be from AMD.
Eike Dec 11, 2020
View PC info
  • Supporter Plus
Quoting: sjr... no DKMS ...

Sounds negative in my ears. :D

I know what you mean, but DKMS made my Nvidia life so easy that I even keep forgetting about it.
Comandante Ñoñardo Dec 11, 2020
Is that from Big Picture mode?
sjr Dec 11, 2020
Quoting: Eike
Quoting: sjr... no DKMS ...

Sounds negative in my ears. :D

I know what you mean, but DKMS made my Nvidia life so easy that I even keep forgetting about it.

Well, DKMS was a big improvement over having to build the drivers yourself. But even better is having them available in-tree, "built in".
Beamboom Dec 11, 2020
It's more and more likely my next GPU will be an AMD one. I was hoping we'd get there, and now it seems we are.
Philadelphus Dec 11, 2020
Nice to see Valve updating various parts of the UI over time like this.
Dunc Dec 12, 2020
Quoting: setzer22Issues "being looked into" could have something to do with the fact that I have to quickly press "Skip" when steam starts processing Vulkan shaders or the system starts consuming more and more RAM until it hits 32GB and my whole system dies.
Yikes. I haven't seen that. I have noticed that it processes shaders before launching a game every time, even though I have caching and background processing on. (Or had, in the latter's case. I eventually figured there wasn't any point.)

Quoting: sjrWell, DKMS was a big improvement over having to build the drivers yourself. But even better is having them available in-tree, "built in".
I remember the first time I installed an AMD card (upgrading from onboard... SiS, as far as I recall) and it just worked. I knew it would be a less painful experience than on certain other OSes, but I wasn't expecting it to seamlessly boot as if nothing had changed. I think that was the moment I fell in love with Linux.

Mind you, that was back when the open-source AMD driver wasn't very good. But it was enough for what I was doing at the time.

(I've also just realised it was 15 years ago, almost to the day. )
TangoBaker Dec 12, 2020
I'd really like to see a second "browse" button under "local files" that would take you directly to the compadata folder.

I often find myself needing to see some configuration option file and then I have to look up the ID for the game before I can start. A brows compatibility folder just seems like a natural option.
While you're here, please consider supporting GamingOnLinux on:

Reward Tiers: Patreon. Plain Donations: PayPal.

This ensures all of our main content remains totally free for everyone! Patreon supporters can also remove all adverts and sponsors! Supporting us helps bring good, fresh content. Without your continued support, we simply could not continue!

You can find even more ways to support us on this dedicated page any time. If you already are, thank you!
The comments on this article are closed.