Update: Canonical are now saying 32bit libraries will be "frozen" and not entirely dropped.
Original article:
Things are starting to get messy, after Canonical announced the end of 32bit support from Ubuntu 19.10 onwards, Valve have now responded.
Speaking on Twitter, Valve dev Pierre-Loup Griffais said:
Ubuntu 19.10 and future releases will not be officially supported by Steam or recommended to our users. We will evaluate ways to minimize breakage for existing users, but will also switch our focus to a different distribution, currently TBD.
I'm starting to think we might see a sharp U-turn from Canonical, as this is something that would hit them quite hard. Either way, the damage has been done.
I can't say I am surprised by Valve's response here. Canonical pretty clearly didn't think it through enough on how it would affect the desktop. It certainly seems like Canonical also didn't speak to enough developers first.
Perhaps this will give Valve a renewed focus on SteamOS? Interestingly, Valve are now funding some work on KWin (part of KDE).
Looks like I shall be distro hopping very soon…
To journalists from other websites reading: This does not mean the end of Linux support, Ubuntu is just one distribution.
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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The comments on this article are closed.
Quoting: bird_or_cageI wouldn't. I would point him at Windows.Quoting: riddleyDebian isn't difficult to install.As a person, who uses Ubuntu, Debian, and Arch I agree.
But how do you explain ex. Windows user that to get fresh Nvidia driver and kernel to work with Ryzen he has to open a terminal and type:
sudo echo "deb http://httpredir.debian.org/debian stretch-backports main contrib non-free" >> /etc/apt/sources.list
sudo apt update
sudo apt install -t stretch-backports linux-image-4.19.0-0.bpo.5-amd64
#do you update it manually every time or is there a meta package?
sudo apt install -t stretch-backports linux-headers-4.19.0-0.bpo.5-amd64
sudo apt install -t stretch-backports nvidia-driver
Debian is not my main distro and I would be glad if you can correct me and there is GUI way to do this.
If he was so keen on going GNU/Linux then I would point him to something a bit more like Linux. And then point him at the gigantic amount of text that was written over the years.
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What a messy situation. Lets start that I get the sentiment for the decision, I tried to keep my system 64bit only before I recognized that gaming actually works on Linux. But now this will hurt, even if I'm not directly affected with running Fedora.
From what I read the decision to ditch all 32bit thingies was initiated more than a year ago. Unfortunately Valve and SteamPlay really took off in the last year and now that decision has much wider implications than a year ago. New users, developers and Valve plus GoG will (heavily) suffer with this new heavy fragmentation in the Linux Desktop market. The timing is really bad as stated earlier here. I guess especially for Valve this feels like a stab in the back. Even I feel like this.
I really hope that someone at Ubuntu will stand up and scream: "Boys and Girls, that decision seemed sensible a year ago but Linux on the Desktop has changed quite significantly since then. We really should reconsider...".
Last edited by jens on 22 June 2019 at 1:00 pm UTC
From what I read the decision to ditch all 32bit thingies was initiated more than a year ago. Unfortunately Valve and SteamPlay really took off in the last year and now that decision has much wider implications than a year ago. New users, developers and Valve plus GoG will (heavily) suffer with this new heavy fragmentation in the Linux Desktop market. The timing is really bad as stated earlier here. I guess especially for Valve this feels like a stab in the back. Even I feel like this.
I really hope that someone at Ubuntu will stand up and scream: "Boys and Girls, that decision seemed sensible a year ago but Linux on the Desktop has changed quite significantly since then. We really should reconsider...".
Last edited by jens on 22 June 2019 at 1:00 pm UTC
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First of all, wow to what's been happening.
My thoughts are now are that Canonical might be rethinking the support of 32-bit multilib. But it looks like Valve has made up their mind with the tweet that was sent out by Pierre-Loup Griffais.
I'm curious to see what happens to Ubuntu in distrowatch and how system76 supports Pop_OS! with 32-bit multilib or will they ditch Ubuntu for another distro later down the line?
Right now I'm using Pop_OS! 19.04 on my Dell Inspiron Gaming laptop and I'm really happy with it (finding it really stable). I've used Manjaro for almost two years before switching to Pop_OS!, and I really like using Manjaro as well. Most likely I'm going to switch back to Manjaro and use KDE since Valve also announced more funding on both KDE and Xorg.
Disto hopping......so much fun :D
My thoughts are now are that Canonical might be rethinking the support of 32-bit multilib. But it looks like Valve has made up their mind with the tweet that was sent out by Pierre-Loup Griffais.
I'm curious to see what happens to Ubuntu in distrowatch and how system76 supports Pop_OS! with 32-bit multilib or will they ditch Ubuntu for another distro later down the line?
Right now I'm using Pop_OS! 19.04 on my Dell Inspiron Gaming laptop and I'm really happy with it (finding it really stable). I've used Manjaro for almost two years before switching to Pop_OS!, and I really like using Manjaro as well. Most likely I'm going to switch back to Manjaro and use KDE since Valve also announced more funding on both KDE and Xorg.
Disto hopping......so much fun :D
1 Likes, Who?
gradyvuckovic Jun 22, 2019
Quoting: keanI would even pay for it if everything works well.
I'd happily sign up to that, $10/month for a Valve developed Linux OS which provides the best possible gaming experience for Linux? Hell yes, give me that.
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Eleven years of loving Ubuntu has also meant eleven years of growing exasperation with Canonical. This latest announcement feels like just another in a series of boldly taken stumbles made in the name of Canonical progress.
Unity desktop, Mir, that phone thing and its convergence, It feels like another case of Canonical imagining itself as a pack leader, shouting, "This way, Linux!" only to find out hardly anyone's following them. Mir, Mir, Mir, Mir, naaaah, Wayland. Unity eeeiiiiiiggghhhht---er, Gnome 3. They'll go off again, being all "64 bit is the way!!!" and everyone else will be like, "Mebs, but we'll hang onto 32 bit for now, yeah?"
Unless they drop Linux support entirely, I don't think Valve's next move will surprise me at all:
I'll be sad to leave Ubuntu for what will probably be the last time, but I'm excited to see where gaming on Linux goes next. Whereever it goes, I'm confident it's not going away.
Unity desktop, Mir, that phone thing and its convergence, It feels like another case of Canonical imagining itself as a pack leader, shouting, "This way, Linux!" only to find out hardly anyone's following them. Mir, Mir, Mir, Mir, naaaah, Wayland. Unity eeeiiiiiiggghhhht---er, Gnome 3. They'll go off again, being all "64 bit is the way!!!" and everyone else will be like, "Mebs, but we'll hang onto 32 bit for now, yeah?"
Unless they drop Linux support entirely, I don't think Valve's next move will surprise me at all:
- I can see them sidling up to one of the more "core" distros: Suse, Debian, or Redhat/Fedora;
- I can see them doubling down with SteamOS, expanding it with apps, adding more and more desktop functionality, integrating something like a flatpak software center.
- I can see them leaning over to the Solus crew and saying, "So, what is you're working on? You say you've built it all yourselves? Hmmm, would you like some help with that?"
I'll be sad to leave Ubuntu for what will probably be the last time, but I'm excited to see where gaming on Linux goes next. Whereever it goes, I'm confident it's not going away.
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Quoting: gradyvuckovicI'd happily sign up to that, $10/month for a Valve developed Linux OS which provides the best possiblegamingdesktop experience for Linux? Hell yes, give me that.
FTFY
I would pay for that.
Last edited by whatever on 22 June 2019 at 1:18 pm UTC
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GustyGhost Jun 22, 2019
The problem is not 100% Canonical's decision. Consider also Valve's failure to build Steam for amd64, and the games industry (in general).
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Quoting: GustyGhostThe problem is not 100% Canonical's decision. Consider also Valve's failure to build Steam for amd64, and the games industry (in general).
To be fair most new games (at least in the AAA category) have 64bit or are 64bit only, in some cases out of necessity.
Last edited by bolokanar on 22 June 2019 at 1:23 pm UTC
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Koopacabras Jun 22, 2019
QuoteInteresting twitter replies right now from OpenSUSE Chairman Richard Brown to Pierre-Loup Griffais from Valve, pitching a cooperation between Valve and OpenSUSE.
https://mobile.twitter.com/sysrich/status/1142363021605580801
OpenSuSe has the best QA and testing infrastructure, they are the backbone of kde and create daily builds of kde and make an iso, Krypton or something like that is named, everything is automatized and for the software to get release status is has to pass several compliances checks, they do this daily. I haven't seen any other distro doing this with the exception of fedora . If they could ease QA of the steam client to opensuse it would be a win-win situation.
OTH opensuse leap has the right balance of not being ancient like debian stable and not being a rolling release. For me Leap 15.1 really is Ubuntu 18 LTS, because of glibc, the kernel, mesa, etc. Game devs want to code onto a basis that's stable and well tested, rolling releases are discarded imho.
ps: besides, of course that rpm is superior, but I just leave that there, don't want to start a flame war.
Last edited by Koopacabras on 22 June 2019 at 1:50 pm UTC
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