Here is a plausible reason why people might be more motivated to try Linux at home and at work there now, besides govt policies:
https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/microsoft-ending-support-to-windows-10-current-version-to-be-final-updates-101682831410557.html [External Link]

Combine India's huge mass of old PCs that can't be changed to a new PC and Win11's official minimal supported hardware restrictions, and you have effectively Microaoft to thank for any uptick in Linux usage there

ps: win11 can be installed on older hardware, but MS makes it abundantly clear this is not supported and puts several roadblocks on it
https://www.techrepublic.com/article/how-to-install-windows-11-on-older-unsupported-pcs/ [External Link]

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does it?

1) manage (fetch/update/delete, lets you choose and configure per game) wine/proton versions for use by windows versions of games

2) manage libretro emulator cores?

3) alternative native game engines (eg: dosbox, scummvm, openra, openrb, ...)

4) use runtimes/sandbox?

so far it looks a bit like its purpose is to be a launcher over launchers (just to have a unified games list somewhere with steam, heroic, lutris and etc still needed behind it), but i may have gotten the wrong impression from the article

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Quoting: cybik

Quoting: erik-reiderSo the APU in the Ally isn't so "custom" after all

It probably was, until AMD just had the realization they should standardize it :D

iirc AMD's custom cpu division has been spearheading several improvements that not much later end up in their normal CPUs at least since its creation when they poached the PS4 and Xbox Series consoles (eg: direct storage data loading to the gpu eliminating trip through ram/cpu)

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Quoting: Purple Library GuyI wonder if ad revenue for independent websites has gotten skimpier--is Google siphoning off more of the cash than it used to?

Maybe, but IIRC word from Michael himself is that adblocks trending up was a major factor and his premium subscriber audience didn't increase enough to make up for it.

Also there has been a baby involved, which is great news in itself but also means no sleep has been had and all that.

This has been ongoing for a couple years, not something that happened these last few months.

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How are Proton and Steam Linux Runtimes behaving atop Snap? Any better than over Flatpak?

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Michael Larabel is not backed by a pile of money from a big company, he basically lives off monetizing Phoronix, and is notoriously strapped for cash for a long while

He works almost round the clock on articles and benchmarks to make ends meet and this unfortunately reflects on the quality of the articles.

He used to have time to even do bissections and notify devs of the exact commit that caused an issue, but it's been a few years since I last read an article where he mentions doing so.

It's unfortunate, but he's only human and very tired (measurable by how well or poorly structured his phrasing is at each article, and trending down).

I'd cut him some slack or find him some professional money backing for his work (which everyone benefits off, by the way, because performance regressions aren't that easy to spot without his approach).

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yay, I can finally try it with my incomparable (bad) gaming skills!

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Quoting: itscalledreality

Quoting: EikeFile transfer ist okish for me at the moment - device discovery is not even that. More like hot and miss. And it's still a favourite of mine. Looking forward for the improvements!

Device discovery has been a joke. When I had problems and asked why I had to readd my phone after each restart the IRC channel told me it must be how my network was configured, which was clearly just an opt out of knowing anything (typical IRC). Glad this will finally be fixed (ideally).

recent enough Android phones default to a randomized MAC address when connecting to WiFi

if KDE Connect uses MAC Addresses to identify the device,rebooting the phone (and maybe even disconnecting and reconnecting only after a while or after going to other connections) might rotate the address and make it appear as a new device

you can change this behaviour for specific memorized wifis on the phone, maybe worth trying for you home network

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Quoting: Klaas

Quoting: LanzWe really need to start holding the developers to account for low-effort ports. Too many people will buy it anyway.

But how? The Windows users will buy it anyway – most of them even if the game has an additional layer of inconvenience (AKA always online launcher) sprinkled on top.

If a huge percentage of Linux users does not buy the game due to broken promises, the developers/publisher ends up saying that it wouldn't have been worth it to spend more to satisfy such a small percentage of users.

Edit: What I should have included is that with broken promises I'm talking about the “it will run on the Steam Deck” tweet.

You maje an interesting point... i'm left wondering if "buy, try, refund if it doesn't run fine" is better for linux than "don't buy if others have issues"

but then again some devs will say they'll never do linux again because it's not worth the effort with so many open support tickets, etc

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Quoting: elgatilHere goes a funny thought. Around 1% of the users who doesn't their steam client are running Linux, SD or otherwise. But how many people got steam to play some CS or pubg or other popular game but never pay anything else? Actually, probably a lot of users simply start steam because they marked the start on boot checkbox but they don't mind it at all.

Now, the steam deck is basically a console meant to play first and foremost, most of the people who wake the device are going to play.

So it stands to reason that people using SD are going to play and buy more than the average steam user on pc.

So maybe the weight of the steam deck in the market is far superior than our sad 1%. If other developers are having similar figures it would mean we are not negligible anymore ^^

Maybe Liam could reach to some developers to ask about sd sales and check whether this is a trend or an exception? 😁

there is a common trend among devs that do linux-native game releases to see a higher-than-1% linux purchase share

there are several takes on when and why this happens... your take for the Deck is novel to my eyes, quite interesting, and left me wondering if the same might also accounts for a portion of the non-deck linux purchase's extra weight too (after all linux users are more privacy and resource-conscious than average, so the ones that do run steam might be more prone to actually buy and play too)

we do know from previous takes that linux users tend to avoid piracy and also vote with their wallets (me included) when they see linux native titles

sheers!

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