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Latest Comments by scaine
Minigalaxy, the FOSS Linux client for GOG adds support for Wine
22 Apr 2020 at 8:50 pm UTC

Well, an interesting read. I get your point about LTS now, that makes much more sense, ta. Although you claim moving between LTS releases is a big deal... I've never found that to be the case. Indeed, I jumped two releases back in 2012 when I didn't like the look of 14.04, and waited until 2016 to upgrade. My HWE Kernel and PPAs kept me up to date on everything I cared about - kernel, drivers, and primary software. And since it was LTS, I still another year of support to manage the transition to the more modern desktop.

Ultimately though, all your (excellent) arguments fail for me until GDM fixes its multi-monitor support. I like the look of Pop_OS but it's based on GDM and I don't feel like experimenting with LightDM and I'm not a fan of Gnome-Shell anyway, which I still find clunky, rigid and generally unpolished.

Pop_OS has a nice recovery tool, but it's quite low level. I actually prefer Mint's approach of using an integrated Timeshift. It's the only OS I know of that builds a Timeshift capability into the core OS, which is quite nifty. Never had to use it yet though, so it's unproven, I suppose (for me). I'm only 2 months into my Mint journey so far though.

I'm also surprised to hear you say that Cinnamon is buggy. Amazing that my experience can be so positive, while yours is negative (and vice versa for Gnome Shell).

It's both a strength and an infuriating weakness of the Linux ecosystem that there's just so much choice, so many ways to do things.

Minigalaxy, the FOSS Linux client for GOG adds support for Wine
22 Apr 2020 at 5:05 pm UTC

I won't quote your post EagleDelta, but I guess time will tell. But if Canonical announce that 20.04 is the last LTS, or even 22.04... I'll be gobsmacked. Similarly, if Steam announce that their new target for compatibility is a rolling release, I'll be gobsmacked all over again.

I suppose time will tell.

Very surprised to hear you say that the panel can be moved to a secondary monitor. I researched this problem for weeks, also raised it on our own Discord, but everyone confirmed - when you change your primary monitor, the panel instantly wants to live there. Some of the hacks allow you to manually move it over to the secondary monitor, but on restart, it rehomes itself again. Pretty frustrating.

As for my "favourite" distro - well sure, that's Ubuntu, obviously. I've been a massive part of that community since 2006. At least... it was until I tried Mint again recently for the first time in about five years. It's pretty incredible and I honestly wonder if I'll ever find myself going back to Ubuntu after trying it. I also really liked Solus/Budgie. I'm going to keep track of that one, such a beautiful desktop.

Help GamingOnLinux beat Coronavirus, join us on Folding@home
21 Apr 2020 at 10:18 pm UTC

Quoting: doctorxI have mine running... but on Manjaro, i cannot get idle detection working. I run xscreensaver btw. Anyone have luck getting idle detection working?
Nope, sorry. I manually turn it on last thing at night and kill it in the morning!

Minigalaxy, the FOSS Linux client for GOG adds support for Wine
21 Apr 2020 at 10:17 pm UTC

Quoting: EagleDeltaThis has been an issue with desktop for a while. To the point where Laptop/Desktop OEM System76 suggests you update every 6 months when they release their Ubuntu-based distro. To the point where they have a nice Rust-based updater that works quite well (I used it for Pop!_OS 19.04 -> 19.10 without issue). The idea here is that many desktop OSes are going to more of a rolling or semi-rolling release model. Partially due to security and partially due to the fast rate at which software moves these days. The days of the LTS on desktop are numbered, I think. At least for things like gaming.

I'd suggest trying the Pop!_OS 20.04 beta and see how that works for you.
Nah, Pop is based on Gnome Shell, and their multi-monitor support means that you can't have your panel on a non "primary" display. But I need the panel to appear on the secondary display. Actually, I think the problem is the underlying GDM, because LightDM-based Unity didn't do this, while GDM-based Gnome-shell, XFCE, Unity(!) and Budgie all exhibited the same behaviour. It was just too much effort to get going.

As for LTS dying a death? Nah. Maybe for consumer distros... maybe. But the Redhats and Canonicals of this world need to support the concept of LTS for enterprise support. You might love rolling distros, but in my experience, they break too often, while I typically game at the cutting edge while on an LTS for periods of up to 2.5 years - or in the case of 12.04 to 16.04, just over four. They're stable and, thanks to PPAs, still cutting edge. Also, I just can't be bothered upgrading the core O/S that often. It does nothing for me. My PPAs do all the heavy lifting.

There are edge cases though, like mininova's insistence on some brand new feature of pygobject. Fair enough. I'll take that hit for the stability/reliability and convenience. And ultimately, I could upgrade it... I just don't care enough about their project to be bothered.

Minigalaxy, the FOSS Linux client for GOG adds support for Wine
21 Apr 2020 at 2:21 pm UTC Likes: 3

Quoting: CimerydTranslated to Nynorsk? That's excellent news to... let's see, population 5.386 million divided by 12% preferring Nynorsk to Bokmål, divided by 1.85% using Linux on their desktops, we're at roughly 12,000 divided by however many play GOG games...

That's great for that one guy who translated it!

I kid, of course, good to have it in there.
A niche of a niche of a niche! That's pretty... niche.

Minigalaxy, the FOSS Linux client for GOG adds support for Wine
21 Apr 2020 at 7:26 am UTC Likes: 3

Quoting: KallestofelesDoes it keep the games up to date or is manual patching needed when updates are released?
Nope, but I expect it's on their roadmap:

Expect to see the following issues:
  • Changing the installation directory makes Minigalaxy unable to detect previously installed games

  • Updating games has not been implemented yet
I'm still out of luck with this. After my disastrous multi-screen foray into Ubuntu 20.04, I ended up on Mint 19.3, which is based on Ubuntu 18.04 - which MiniGalaxy doesn't support due to, apparently, a lack of an up to date pygobject:

Minigalaxy does not ship for the following distributions because they do not contain the required version of PyGObject:
  • Ubuntu 18.04

  • Linux Mint 19.3

  • openSUSE 15.1

It's a shame. I'd love to give it a shot.

Into the Breach from Subset Games (FTL) now supports Linux
20 Apr 2020 at 6:02 pm UTC Likes: 2

Quoting: TcheySo soon ? Nice...

I’m curious if they will nag because the game doesn’t sell well on Linux, without considering the "hype" is gone.
It can still be a good game, but in 2 years many other games came out, and maybe i don’t want it anymore today.
Yeah, c'mon. There's no way that they did this expecting Linux sales. After two years? This was a simple consequence of them updating the back-end engine, I'm sure...

Epic space drone constructor 'Nimbatus' to leave Early Access on May 14 - new update out too
16 Apr 2020 at 7:17 pm UTC

I loved this when I last played it quite some time ago. I really enjoyed piloting the creations I made, but didn't enjoy the "program your drone" bit as much. Time to give it another shot!

Google has opened up their Stadia game streaming service, two months free Pro too
15 Apr 2020 at 11:12 am UTC

My brief experience in Destiny 2 - it's fine in the morning through mid-afternoon in the UK. But by early evening, the lag and jittering make the game unplayable.

My internet is 130 down, 20 up, and while I could play okay, or my son, if we tried to play at the same time as a fireteam - nope. Bear in mind that my wife is probably on zoom in the next room, and my other son is on youtube on his phone while he plays Minecraft hypixel, AND both my son and I are also on discord for voice... but still. This isn't the future of gaming I'm interested in.

I'd also echo Ehvis' comments above that the game should look far better than this. It's still pretty, but the 1080p I'm getting through Chromium fullscreen doesn't match my memory of playing this game on PS4, which was both more detailed and smoother.

Cross-save worked though, so I jumped straight in at 750 light, which is as far as the PSplus PS4 version let you play without prompting you, as all Destiny games do, to fork up cash to continue playing the expansions.

Stadia remains "not for me".

Unbound: Worlds Apart Prologue, a free intro to an upcoming metroidvania puzzle-platformer with portals
13 Apr 2020 at 10:23 pm UTC

Quoting: Liam Dawe
Quoting: scaine
Quoting: Liam Dawe
Quoting: scaineAw man, I really wanted to try this - looks like an accessible Hollow Knight. But it doesn't detect my wired Xbox360. I'm gonna give xboxdrv a shot, see if that does the trick.
Weird. My Logitech F310 worked out of the box, what I recorded with!
Yeah, first game I've come across that can't detect a wired 360! It's not working with xboxdrv either. I also tried launching it form big picture - obviously the gamepad is fine in that, but then nothing when I launch the game. I'll check the Steam discussions and see if it's a general thing, a wired 360 thing, or a Linux Mint thing.
Do you have "steam-devices" installed?
Nope - good shout! But it was still the same. Until... there's a thread on the discussion forum [External Link] which notes a few folk having issues. The dev notes that if you change the per-game controller setting to "Forced Off", this brings the gamepad to life!

I played for 20 minutes with the keyboard, which wasn't great. I'll give this a go tomorrow with the gamepad.