⨯ Check out our Monthly Survey Page to see what our users are running.
Cleaning up after Proton
Eike Mar 12
Having had a look at my compatdata folders, I found the big ones mostly belong to Proton installations. Proton installations I uninstalled long ago and have got no wish to ever reinstall.

Like this, which, according to its id, should be Proton 4.11:
~/.steam/steam/steamapps/compatdata/1113280

I guess I can remove those? (I only got a single Proton version left.)
And it seems they're not deleted by Steam?

BTW, I found that I can set a compatibility layer to run Proton itself. Wonder what happens when I make Run Proton on Proton? ;)

Last edited by Eike on 12 March 2024 at 4:06 pm UTC
Ehvis Mar 12
Recently the steam client started to clean up proton prefixes when you uninstall a game. But everything before that just remained there until you did that manually.

I haven't yet figured out if it cares about any savegames that might be in those prefixes. Maybe it only deletes the ones with cloud saves enabled. Curious to hear if somebody knows.
Eike Mar 12
Quoting: EhvisRecently the steam client started to clean up proton prefixes when you uninstall a game. But everything before that just remained there until you did that manually.

Does this include what Proton has saved in its own folder, not the games' ones?
Ehvis Mar 12
Quoting: Eike
Quoting: EhvisRecently the steam client started to clean up proton prefixes when you uninstall a game. But everything before that just remained there until you did that manually.

Does this include what Proton has saved in its own folder, not the games' ones?

From what I tested during the last next fest, the entire number directory was deleted.
Eike Mar 13
Hm. I removed the compatdata folder and reinstalled Proton 4.11. The folder did not reappear. But I found the data, along with all those other versions, somewhere else:

976M    /home/eike/.steam/steam/steamapps/common/Proton 3.16
1,8G    /home/eike/.steam/steam/steamapps/common/Proton 4.11
1003M   /home/eike/.steam/steam/steamapps/common/Proton 5.0
878M    /home/eike/.steam/steam/steamapps/common/Proton 5.13
1,1G    /home/eike/.steam/steam/steamapps/common/Proton 6.3
2,1G    /home/eike/.steam/steam/steamapps/common/Proton 7.0
1,2G    /home/eike/.steam/steam/steamapps/common/Proton 8.0
48K     /home/eike/.steam/steam/steamapps/common/Proton - Experimental

When I removed Proton, the folder vanished again. Good. But when I reinstalled it, played a game with it and then removed the game and Proton, there's still 885 MB sitting there.

Last edited by Eike on 13 March 2024 at 10:24 am UTC
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!
Login / Register

Or login with...
Sign in with Steam Sign in with Google
Social logins require cookies to stay logged in.
Register Forgot Login?
★ Support Us
Popular this week
Search or view by category
Contact
Latest Comments
Latest Forum Posts
Misc