Quoting: pleasereadthemanualYou mention other "installer type things", but I'm assuming you're referring to .sh install scripts. These are not really the same thing as Windows or macOS. For one thing, depending on how they're implemented, they may not solve the dependency issue at all. They're also often difficult to uninstall and create havoc on the user's system. Flatpak and AppImage are not like this.

Just for the sake of historical accuracy: Besides shell scripts there were things like InstallShield (basically still a script) available as distribution agnostic installers. Also, both of these things were pretty much exactly the same thing as Windows used for everything at the time (before the Microsoft Installer package manager existed). It's still possible to find Windows programs that use a script instead of a proper .msi package. Of course the scripts were only as good as the person creating them took the time for. However, generally, these old install scripts installed programs in /usr/local or /opt and didn't leave a mess behind (the weaker ones usually just left you with dependency issues for the so-called "installed" software they were for). You were more likely to get a mess when compiling software and using the 'make install' target that the developer created for make (though there were ways to deal with that cleanly as well).

The universal installer idea for Linux isn't very new. There were things like Zero Install (still maintained last I knew) and Klik (which AppImage is based on) quite a while back.

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I saw this bundle and never realized it was limited quantity instead of limited time period and thought, 'I'll look at that tomorrow.' As it turns out, tomorrow was too late. I probably would have picked it up if it were still available just for The Falconeer and Among Us. Oh, well.

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"We’re particularly excited about this ourselves as we feel it can open new opportunities in the Linux gaming community." — Missy Quarry, Community Manage for Microsoft Edge

I'm just trying to picture the reaction of Linux users fifteen years ago if you told them this was a quote from fifteen years in the future. For that matter, you could probably make that five years ago / five years in the future.

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If my X370 chipset is going to be supporting Zen 3 processors, I may have to upgrade my processor one more time before I move on to a later generation. It's tempting because it's easy to tell that my system is currently CPU bound. If I upgrade to a 5000 series processor, I will probably end up skipping the 7000 series, and get a new motherboard and CPU after that generation. On the other hand, I may skip the 5000 series and get a new motherboard and CPU at the same time for the 7000 series.

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Quoting: soulsourceI played the Linux build on the desktop some years ago, back when it was in Humble Indie Bundle 5. At that point it still worked out of the box, but distributions also still supported SDL 1 back then.

Yes, I played it some back then as well, but ended up setting it aside without playing that far into it. I always intended to get back to it, but haven't so far. I was thinking of playing it on my AYA Neo, since I have no shot at a Steam deck before at least the fourth quarter (possibly next year). Even on a handheld, though, it is one among many games that I wanted to get to. It's unfortunate that it now requires tinkering, which seems to be a hazard of playing older Linux games. I remember the port was originally done by Ryan C. Gordon (a.k.a. Icculus), and worked pretty well as far as I played it.

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Quoting: pleasereadthemanualIt's not just distribution that is protected under copyright, though I'm unsure if you're making this distinction. Unauthorized transcription, translation, performance, and of course, making an unauthorized copy of copyrighted content is copyright infringement.

This is not accurate when it comes to US copyright law. Transcription, translation, and making a second copy of something you own a copy of are all technically legal, as long as the result is not distributed. However, intent to distribute is taken into consideration when looking at these actions from a legal standpoint.* Why translate something unless you intend to distribute the translation? Why make 300 copies of a DVD unless you are intending to distribute them? Copyright holders are usually only concerned about somewhat widespread distribution, though, not giving a translation to three or four people.

Public performance is illegal because it is considered a form of distribution, but private performance is not. Remember that playing a DVD, a Blu-ray, or an MP3 file is performance as well, with the same rules as live performance. So, for example, a group of friends getting together for a party and sitting around playing songs on a guitar and singing is not illegal. Technically, a band performing in a bar, someone singing karaoke at a bar, or someone busking on a street corner without express copyright permission for each song is illegal, but even the RIAA is not usually crazy enough to try to clamp down too much on these things, which actually help promote the material (and the RIAA can be pretty crazy). There are also arrangements that can be made to get permission for some of these things, usually with payment made, to whole catalogs of record labels or groups of copyright holders (like ASCAP).

Also, copyright notices at the beginning of books or especially movies often contain a lot of meaningless drivel that has no legal basis. You can't trust these for accurate information about copyright. Many claim that copyrighted material is 'licensed for private use,' but this language is nonsense. No 'license' is required to do normal things with copyrighted material. According to copyright law you own your legally obtained copy of copyrighted material; you haven't 'licensed' it. You only need a license to do things that copyright law would otherwise disallow, like using one copy of a software program for five different people on five different machines (that is a fairly common software license).

*(Technically, making a copy with intent to distribute is what is illegal, so you don't have to have actually distributed copies yet to be arrested or sued.)

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Quoting: pleasereadthemanualI'd guess that Windows 10 wasn't targeting older hardware and was instead making allowances for budget processors like Celeron. I don't think any modern laptops ship with less than 4GB of RAM. Of course, it could be that because Windows doesn't work well with less than 4GB, laptops don't ship with less than that.

I think you are correct. However, some OEMs did ship what were basically netbooks with Windows 10 and 2 GB of RAM (soldered), and these are not fun to use. They can be good candidates for a Linux install, since most Linux distributions handle 2 GB of RAM pretty well.

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Quoting: pleasereadthemanualI know Windows has a reputation for slowing down over time—primarily due to its dated filesystem—but I wonder if this is still true. Windows as of late seems to be more well-optimized for older hardware.

It's generally seemed to me that the primary reason for the slowdown of Windows over time is registry cruft (at least since Windows 2000 and its automatic defragmentation).

Be that as it may, Windows 10 deals with low powered CPUs significantly better than Windows 7 does. However, for some reason it deals with limited memory worse than 7 (for example, 7 works significantly better with 2 GB of RAM than Windows 10) and it requires more disk space than 7.

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After investigating the games in this bundle myself, I've come to the conclusion that this bundle is probably worth the price for Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night all by itself. Of course, I will end up with yet another Steam key for Celeste, but I can probably find someone to give that to.

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It's difficult to imagine any open source news that could have surprised me more. I think of all those Intel Atom chips with integrated PowerVR GPUs that couldn't be used with Linux because there was no GPU driver. It's a bit late for them now, but PowerVR open sourcing any of their drivers is basically flabbergasting. At least newer ARM SoCs can have open source drivers now.

I remember when PowerVR discrete video cards were worthy of consideration (1990s) before the market boiled down to NVIDIA and AMD.

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