Valve haven't given up on their home-grown Linux distribution yet, with SteamOS seeing another beta update. Additionally, there's another Steam Client Beta update about.
As far as updates to SteamOS go, the last time they actually announced anything was with the 2.170 update back in January but they have actually been doing multiple newer builds since then you can see here. Just today, they officially announced the SteamOS 2.183 beta and the gist of it is this:
- mesa 18.3.4
- nvidia-graphics-drivers 415.27
- security updates
Newer drivers are especially useful and it's good to see Valve start to move a little more quickly on this, especially to keep up with Steam Play fresh drivers are needed. For details on how to get the SteamOS beta, Valve have this guide although it doesn't sound easy to revert back to a normal SteamOS install from the beta so it might be worth waiting until it's pushed out for everyone (unless you want to help test of course). See their announcement here.
A quick note too, Valve are also still advertising for a SteamOS Software Engineer.
As for the Steam Client Beta update, it's quite a small one which includes:
- Updated embedded Chromium build in Steam to 72.0.3626.121
- Fixed audio artifacts in web audio / friends notification sounds / voice chat for users with certain headsets that create multiple devices and have mono/single-channel chat output devices
From what Valve said on Twitter, this is likely the build that will require at least glibc 2.19.
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
gradyvuckovic Mar 20, 2019
TheRiddick Mar 21, 2019
I'm eagerly waiting for Microsoft Windows to become a subscription service, THAT will be the day Linux shines!
Also confusing that MS is killing off windows7 (probably 8/8.1 soon also) yet also releases dx12 for windows7 at same time... shrug
u cannot load up tomb raider hitman and deus ex mankind and use dx12
Last edited by massatt212 on 21 March 2019 at 3:36 am UTC
TheRiddick Mar 21, 2019
Quoting: massatt212DX12 is not coming to windows 7 its coming to certain games
AAA publisher: that Vulkan thing looks interesting, it will support older Windows versions too
Microsoft: never mind that, we will let you use DX12 on older Windows too
Quoting: TheRiddickJust amazes me how a restrictive as all hell proprietary API can even exist this day and age, clearly Microsoft are tossing money around in order to incentives companies!
It's not as simple as that. While not my area of expertise, I've seen load of comments from developers as to why they choose DX over OpenGL/Vulkan. For one it boils down to previous experience and just being used to working with a specific set of libraries. Also, it seems Microsoft offers both excellent documentation and support. Now imagine this has been going on for, say, a decade while OpenGL was just trailing along. Then comes Vulkan and devs are probably like: "Yeah, really cool, but we're doing pretty fine with DX, here".
I can't blame them. It's the same reason I'm stuck with Windows - I make Wordpress websites for a living (among other things). I use raster and vector editing software a lot, even though not for particularly advanced stuff. Part of the reason I don't use GIMP is lack of certain features, but the other part is how different its interface and hotkeys are from Photoshop. I'm used to Photoshop - both as features and as hotkeys. When I use PS my workflow is fluent enough and I do whatever I want fast. I'm clumsy and slow with GIMP. So I don't use it. Then I discoverед Affinity Photo, half an year back, which does 90% of what Photoshop does, at the same quality level, for a fraction of the price. And it has almost the same interface and almost the same hotkeys - instant sell. Been happy with it ever since.
So to wrap the long post up - even if GIMP manages to catch up to PS and Affinity in terms of features, I'd still be hesitant to use it. I have my workflow and I don't want to change it - it works for me. In the end that's what counts most - how you get the best results the fastest. I'm positive it's similar with a lot of developers. It's not about hating on open source or not wanting to learn new things, but time is a finite resource.
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