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Valve put out a brand new Steam Client Beta yesterday and it sounds like a pretty good one, with Linux issues getting some more attention.

Firstly though, they've re-named In-Home Streaming to Steam Remote Play, since the Steam client can now stream games to any other client both inside and outside your home. Additionally, your paired Steam Link devices will now show up in the Remote Play settings and you can remove all paired Steam Link devices.

The next interesting bit is for Vulkan, as Valve have re-worked their shader system so it's capable of downloading and pre-compiling the whole collection of Vulkan pipelines for games. So we will now see shader data downloads in Steam and pre-compiling will be enabled in a "future Beta build". This is exciting, hopefully when this is fully enabled, it will make Vulkan games super smooth for both native and Steam Play.

The Linux client also saw some nice attention, with a fix included for Steam randomly crashing when launching games, something I saw every week. They also fixed a bug that recently gained some renewed attention, where you couldn't copy/move files bigger than 2GB. They've improved the Steam Client's responsivness to networking changes, a fix is included for Risk of Rain and other GameMaker titles due to a libcurl issue. Valve also added the ability to remove old Proton versions by "aliasing them to more recent ones" and they added support for "developers and Valve testing specifying default Proton configuration options for games even if they're not yet white-listed".

For those who had trouble with games like Forager, Chronicon and The Swords of Ditto do give this new beta a try and see if they now run for you. They're all GameMaker titles that had the noted issue above, so hopefully the experience is now better.

Lastly, there's a few Steam Input changes and the Steam Overlay also had a few fixes.

Full changelog can be found here.

Ps. Valve also sent word early this morning that the Steam Link application is now available for iOS and Apple TV users.

Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
Tags: Beta, Steam, Valve
31 Likes
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buenaventura May 16, 2019
The libcurl issue has hit many DASH-players so I'm happy they fix that! :D
Philadelphus May 16, 2019
Oh wow, I restart Steam after getting the pop-up notifying me of the update, and suddenly I have 56 games queued up to download shaders. ^_^

Edit: Hmm, now Steam completely freezes every 2–4 shaders it downloads for some reason. :S: Oh well, guess I'll just have to keep killing and restarting it.


Last edited by Philadelphus on 16 May 2019 at 9:37 am UTC
legluondunet May 16, 2019
Quotethey added support for "developers and Valve testing specifying default Proton configuration options for games even if they're not yet white-listed".
They gave developers tools for their games have better Steamplay support, very nice, I hope this will sensitize developers who do not plan to develop their game for Linux to make it more Linux-friendly.


QuoteSteam In-Home Streaming is experimentally available outside the home, and is now known as Steam Remote Play.
So If I correctly understood, we don't need Steam Link for remote gaming?
Is this new feature a next step towards a full network gaming solution as Google Strada or Playstation now?

QuoteWe will now download official Steam Input configurations during game installation for Steam Input users. This should fix the issue where Steam Input games would need to be run once before controllers worked in offline mode
I'm using more and more my Steam Controller instead of my x360: more comfortable, more keys to program, config bank available online for games...I'm thinking to buy a second one when my friend play with me.


Last edited by legluondunet on 16 May 2019 at 9:32 am UTC
tuubi May 16, 2019
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Quoting: HoriI use monitor built-in-speakers so unless I destroy my finger pressing the volume down button 100 times to turn mute the audio, and then 100 times again to turn it back to max, which I never expected to have to do, I can't do anything about it.
Usually monitors with speakers have a headphone jack, which automatically mutes the speakers when in use. That might be an easier workaround until the bug gets fixed.
Eike May 16, 2019
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Quoting: HoriHopefully they will fix the audio bug when streaming. I can hear the audio on both the server and the client - which sucks. I have to close the door each time I want to use it, so I can't hear the sound from the PC. I use monitor built-in-speakers so unless I destroy my finger pressing the volume down button 100 times to turn mute the audio, and then 100 times again to turn it back to max, which I never expected to have to do, I can't do anything about it. Turning the volume down normally through GNOME will turn the volume on the receiver also.

No mute function at the monitor?
damarrin May 16, 2019
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I just turn the monitor off when streaming.
Arehandoro May 16, 2019
Great update. Interesting seeing yesterday lots of games that I did not know used Vulkan getting the shaders pre-downloaded (Vampyr, Shenmue I/II for example)
BielFPs May 16, 2019
Quote"developers and Valve testing specifying default Proton configuration options for games even if they're not yet white-listed"

It would be really nice if those Japanese companies starts to use this, so they could see the bad side of insist in using Microsoft proprietary codecs in their games.
Mohandevir May 16, 2019
Quoting: HoriHopefully they will fix the audio bug when streaming. I can hear the audio on both the server and the client - which sucks. I have to close the door each time I want to use it, so I can't hear the sound from the PC. I use monitor built-in-speakers so unless I destroy my finger pressing the volume down button 100 times to turn mute the audio, and then 100 times again to turn it back to max, which I never expected to have to do, I can't do anything about it. Turning the volume down normally through GNOME will turn the volume on the receiver also.

Can you turn off your monitor? My speakers are connected to mine and that's what I do. It works. The important thing is that something must be connected in one of your GPU's video output. After that, if it's on or off, doesn't matter. I even tested with an HDMI dummy plug (6$) and it works too.

For those that don't know what is an HDMI dummy plug:
https://www.amazon.com/Headless-Display-Emulator-Generation-Single/dp/B07FB8GJ1Z/ref=sr_1_1_sspa?keywords=dummy+hdmi&qid=1558011247&s=gateway&sr=8-1-spons&psc=1


Last edited by Mohandevir on 16 May 2019 at 7:25 pm UTC
Kimyrielle May 16, 2019
Nice update. Being able to remove old Proton versions is nice. I don't think there is a good reason to keep them around, so they are just cluttering our hard drives.
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