Quoting: Purple Library Guy

Quoting: scaineOf course, such a ridiculous argument. But somehow Canonical aren't allowed to do it. Only everyone else.

Well, two things about that. First, I think it's the case that there are bits and bits, and some things it really is problematic if there's more than one of them, while others it really isn't. If half of Linux used Wayland and half used Mir, I think that would cause problems.
The other thing is that Canonical do have the tendency when they go with some alternate technology to be saying "This will now be the standard, replacing other existing things"--even when it comes to the stuff that everyone normally agrees it's OK if it comes in multiple flavours. The name "Unity" along with some of the rhetoric around it definitely gave people the impression that they wanted Unity to be the One Desktop To Rule Them All, that everyone should, well, Unite on. Cinnamon on the other hand was just "So, we don't like Gnome 3 much, we preferred for instance Gnome 2, we're gonna make a desktop that does things the way we like".

I think you're reading a little bit too much into a name, especially considering how abysmal Unity was when it launched. It took two years to "git gud" and by then, its reputation was in the gutter. As for messaging, Canonical have always been divisive, which is why I think they get the NIH slur so often. Not because NIH is bad, but because people fell out with "the benevolent dictator for life" and decided that Canonical devs were just the "new gnome devs" - arrogant and offensive. Not true in the slightest, to be honest. Mark Shuttleworth did come across that way quite a lot, but again - bad for him to do it, but good for, say, Steve Jobs to do it. It's annoying double standards. Love both, or hate both, but don't apply the same argument to both and come to different conclusions (I'm simplifying a bit here, but you get the idea).

Quoting: Purple Library Guy

Quoting: scaineCould Canonical have contributed to Wayland? Nope. They tried to, and their patches were rejected. What were they supposed to do?

I dunno, not contribute to Wayland? There's plenty of stuff Canonical don't contribute to, what makes it corporate suicide in this case?
Or perhaps contribute different patches.

They couldn't not contribute to Wayland, because they needed Mir to be a joint phone/desktop display server. For reasons they explained in detail, X wouldn't cut it, and Wayland were rejecting their patches. So again, what were they supposed to do?

"Not innovate" is the answer most people seem to be implying.

You know, I said I was "mildly riled", but obviously I care about this stuff, cos I keep responding. :grin:

I'm not even an Ubuntu fanboi particularly - sure, I contributed to Ubuntu HUGELY until about 2015, but I didn't necessarily agree with everything they did. Buttons on the left was particularly egregious, for example, such a pointless "change for change's sake". Snaps too - I'm not a fan, despite them being a better flatpak than flatpak. Or, well, flatpak+ if you prefer (flatpaks are awesome, but snaps can do way more).

But my point is, for some reason people constantly tear down Canonical and Ubuntu... but with arguments that often apply to everyone else... but aren't applied to everyone else.

It's irritating.

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Quoting: slaapliedje

Quoting: scaineEven slaapliedje's comment about Canonical having NIH syndrome mildly riles me. NIH is literally the basis for Linux. It's why we have 100+ media players, 20+ desktop environments, 10+ package mangers.... Frankly, it's why we have 2000+ distributions. But for some reason when Canonical do it, they're the bad guy? Why? In fact, make that a rhetorical question - I don't care why anyone thinks they're the bad guy, but please just don't spill your vitriol in this community. We're (hopefully) better than that.

The thing is, they try to do their own things that everyone else has established as the standard. One exception is they did have a new start up before systemd came along. Otherwise, Wayland.. Mir, Gnome... Unity.. Instead of helping out the projects and making them better, they decided they should do their own thing and waste resources and in the end give up and go with what everyone else is doing.

Hell, Microsoft contributes to the Linux kernel more than Canonical does. You know... maybe if people could work better together, we wouldn't have 100+ media players, we'd have one really kick ass one 'Killer App' that most operating systems have. Like Photoshop, etc. Anyhow, I was just giving my reasons for not using Ubuntu and preferring to use Debian. I was all for Ubuntu when their purpose was to just do a 6 month release of Debian with latest Gnome. They strayed far from that and now I'm just not interested in it.

Sorry for mildy riling you up.

Standard? What standard? Linux doesn't have a standard. It has choice.

This is such weird mixed messages. Mint seems to get a pass, which does its own desktop (Cinnamon), but you don't like Ubuntu, because it did its own desktop (Unity)?

You don't like Ubuntu because it did Mir, but back when it did Mir, Wayland wasn't even a thing, and everyone was using X. In fact, Mir was announced three YEARS before any distribution ever tried to use it. In fact, outside of Fedora, the only other distributions to go near didn't do so until 2019.

Could Canonical have contributed to Wayland? Nope. They tried to, and their patches were rejected. What were they supposed to do?

I mean, why does Debian get a pass for using apt, when RPM was available the year before? Sounds like NIH syndrome to me, right? Hell, they went with Gnome instead of XFCE, which had been around for three years by that time.

Of course, such a ridiculous argument. But somehow Canonical aren't allowed to do it. Only everyone else.

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Quoting: GuestI really wonder why Linux players keep buying nVIDIA GPUs despite these being the worst option we have on Linux for at least half a dozen years already…

Nah. Discrete graphics are crap on both Nvidia and AMD - that's just a Linux issue.

But proper GPUs? Doesn't really matter hugely which you go for now, tbh. They're both rock solid options. Sure, I prefer AMD because it's so integrated and there's nothing to really think about, but once you add the Nvidia driver and tick a box in nvidia-settings, it's pretty much the same story. Fire and forget.

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Quoting: ValsoYou would have saved the most of the troubles you had, if you had used Arch instead of Mint. Ubuntu, Mint and Debian need an enema in order to make them run any game, not just the VR. All of the missing libraries you show on the screenshot in the article are available and installed by default in Arch - I didn't even know I had them until I manually searched for them.

This comment is dripping with ignorance, sadly. Yes, some small portion of the problems I experienced were due to Mint 19 being based on the older 18.04 architecture, correct. That's on me. So yeah, I had to install a couple of dependencies to get it working.

But no problem on Pop_OS 21.04, which is what I'm running right now.

Well, no issues apart from the common issues that affect all Linux VR users. Come join the Discord and chat in the #VR-Gaming channel to get a glimpse into what they are. But they're not specific to a distro. Liam is running Endevour, based on Arch and went through pretty much an identical set of challenges.

So, please don't bash other distros. I could share my extremely negative experiences of Arch, Manajaro and Endeavour, but why would I? Use what you're comfortable with and sing its praises. But don't sing them by knocking others.

Even slaapliedje's comment about Canonical having NIH syndrome mildly riles me. NIH is literally the basis for Linux. It's why we have 100+ media players, 20+ desktop environments, 10+ package mangers.... Frankly, it's why we have 2000+ distributions. But for some reason when Canonical do it, they're the bad guy? Why? In fact, make that a rhetorical question - I don't care why anyone thinks they're the bad guy, but please just don't spill your vitriol in this community. We're (hopefully) better than that.

"Need an enema to play a game"?? Jesus. Really? smh

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Quoting: Philadelphus

Quoting: CatKiller

Quoting: subIf Valve is serious about Linux, I'd still propose charging like 5 % less Valve fee if the published game features a Linux build.

That wouldn't help.

Sure, it would encourage them to press the "build for Linux" button for some free money, which is more than many devs do, but it wouldn't encourage them to do any testing or provide any support. At all.

"But," you might say, "the discount should only apply to proper Linux versions, not those other ones," and suddenly Valve has to be a gatekeeper, creating lots of uncertainty for devs as to whether they'll have their funds withheld, and Valve are having to do (a lot) more work in exchange for less money.

Hmm, what about 5% less Valve fee on every Linux purchase only? Then developers have incentive to make a good Linux version and to get people to buy it on Linux, without Valve necessarily having to play gatekeeper. Players can vote with their wallets and refund if they don't like it. Hearing devs begging players to buy on Linux would be amazing. :whistle:

Of course, the time to have done something like that is a few years ago, since any purchases on an unmodified Steam Deck will be a Linux purchase anyway, which would skew the numbers somewhat once it comes out (I think that's how it works even if you play on Proton, right?). But maybe that'll make developers more interested in a Linux version if the fraction of Linux purchases goes up over time even without any direct monetary incentives on Valve's part…

I kind of like the sound of that, but I feel like it's somehow illegal? Like selling petrol cheaper if you drive a Ford? Some kind of favouritism that I suspect regulators would take a dim view of.

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Quoting: elmapulunpopular opinion...
they should make their next game... linux exclusive.
otherwise people will keep seeing windows as capable of doing everything linux does, while they dont see linux as capable of doing everything windows do.

it need to be at least temporary exclusive.

It is an unpopular opinion - exclusives are generally horrible, and pretty much anti-Linux - we're the crowd that loves choice and freedom after all. But. BUT. It's extremely frustrating to have Sony (playstation), Microsoft (on their store, and with xboxxonexone, or whatever they're on these days), Nintendo (switch) and Epic... ALL push exclusives, but apparently Valve is meant to be above it all? Really?

I mean, Valve are the good guys, right? So therefore they're "not allowed" to push exclusives? Ever? Even a timed-exclusive?

A part of me actually wants them to play dirty - level the field. But then another part of me remembers when they made a single hat accessory for Team Fortress a Linux exclusive (you had to play TF2 under Linux to unlock it) and... wow. The anger, the vitriol, the sheer hatred over that. An unlockable hat. Jesus. I suspect it actually helped turn diehards away from Linux, rather than towards it.

I'm still torn though. So frustrating to see every other player use every dirty, anti-consumer trick in the book, but Valve are held to a higher standard.

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These are all local vulnerabilities - can't be exploited remotely. I, uh, can't really get very excited by such things unless they're feasibly chained with a remote exploit.

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Loved this game when I played it... 1996? 1997? Somewhere around there, I think.

I replayed it via Dosbox in the late 2000's and boy it had definitely aged. The control scheme is what tripped me up the most. I'm having that same problem this week with System Shock Remastered. Controls in games back then were awful!

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Quoting: Shmerl

Quoting: damarrinTo rain a little on everyone's parade (mine included), people on another gaming website I go to have been saying en masse how it's an instant Windows install for it to be even remotely useful. That's what the "general public" thinks, unfortunately :-(

I think realistically only a very tiny percentage of people are interested in installing OSes at all. And many of those who do, would prefer Linux. Regular user simply isn't interested or not even sure how to install an OS, no matter Linux or Windows. So I wouldn't worry about the above at all.

So if you want to analyze the "general public" - it's a major plus that device is coming with Linux preinstalled, because that's what they'll be using.

Yep. You want figures on roughly how many people will install a new O/S? How does roughly 1% sound? :grin:

Looking forward to hearing stories of people bricking their £500 toy trying to install Windows on it. The Win10 kernel is a bit better with some stuff these days, but it still needs drivers for a pretty high number of components. Basically installing Windows is much, much harder than installing Linux, even putting aside the 100Gb+ you need for it to actually work.

No thanks.

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Quoting: Supay

Quoting: scaineGreat to see actual hardware, instead of a loose spec.

Great to see it running Linux on custom AMD hardware.

Great to see twin sticks and twin touchpads.

Great to see a pledge from Valve on the subject of anticheat. Very excited by this!

Maybe I missed it, but I'm surprised that third party app support like Netflix, Prime and Spotify hasn't been mentioned?

But overall, I'm super-excited. Reckon I'll stick myself in the pre-order queue. For £4, I can always change my mind when my delivery date comes through and they ask for payment. Although... I doubt I will change my mind. This whole thing just looks pretty damn epic.

I think the third party apps built in would really cement this device, for those who just want them there ready to use. You can obviously just load up a browser and login or install services manually yourself, but a slicker ready to go option would be best for most people.

For this to work, I'm definitely talking about native apps for the third party services. While many would love to, I'm definitely not hacking on this thing. It's a consumer handheld. I expect it to work natively with these apps, or I won't be using them, and that question will be a consideration for many when they think about how they'll use this device.

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