Valve looking to drop support for Ubuntu 19.10 and up due to Canonical's 32bit decision (updated)

Quoting: GustyGhostThe problem is not 100% Canonical's decision. Consider also Valve's failure to build Steam for amd64, and the games industry (in general).

Yes, it is.
Even if Valve will finally ship the 64bit client they'll still have to include the 32bit steam APIs and runtime, because old games exist and they won't be ported to 64 bit.
Porting 10+ year old games to 64bit just isn't going to happen.

Quoting: scaineFor the third(?) time: Canonical have been talking about this for about 2 years. Can't say that I'm amazingly pleased about how it's been communicated, but at least lets get the facts straight, eh?

Yes, true, but it reminds me of Gnome's decision to eliminate the desktop OS icon tray. Just because they think it's a great idea, and just because they've been communicating it was coming for a long time, doesn't mean the entirety of the rest of the ecosystem can or will bend to that decision. Even if it's something they were long considering doesn't mean they had to do it.


Last edited by iiari on 22 June 2019 at 3:23 pm UTC

I was really hoping canonical was going to give me the 64-bit steam client of my dreams. I don't play any 32-bit games so steam is the only reason I even need it enabled on my distro. I'm personally disappointed, 32-bit needs to go. It's annoying having to have 2 separate versions of every library so I can run 32-bit software. I'm also a bigger fan of GTK/Gnome so I'm a bit disappointed they chose kwin to contribute to instead of something like mutter but oh well. It's nice to see them continuing to better the Linux space even if it's a project I'll never use.


Last edited by Scoopta on 22 June 2019 at 3:36 pm UTC

Quoting: gojul

Quoting: Thormack

Quoting: gojulSteamOS being Debian-based, recommending Debian or Mint/Debian would make a lot of sense. But it is true that Debian is not for beginners.

Agreed. Pure Debian is tricky to install, configure and maintain (compared to Ubuntu).
Perhaps Mint-Debian then...

Who knows.....

Installing Debian is tricky for newbies. Maintaining it is not harder than Ubuntu provided you're using stable.

Looks like Valve may not use a Debian-based distro : https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/155794864305471497/591834042437992448/Screenshot_20190622_053640.png

It's true that from a packager perspective RedHat tools are much more handy than Debian tools.

I will personally help anyone who wants help switching to Debian. I've been using it for close to two decades.

Redhat/CentOS is iffy for Desktop use, outside if you're using it as a workstation. Fedora (in my experience) isn't stable enough, with a constant change in their package versions even within their own release.

Debian is great because they do a very stable release every year or so, only release when they're damn sure it's ready. And upgrades from one release to the next are very smooth. And with Backports, and steam already being packaged for it, it's a complete win!

Quoting: ScooptaI don't play any 32-bit games so steam is the only reason I even need it enabled on my distro.

Do you check this before buying a game? How?

Quoting: Eike

Quoting: ScooptaI don't play any 32-bit games so steam is the only reason I even need it enabled on my distro.

Do you check this before buying a game? How?

No I don't, I wish there was a way...maybe there is but I don't know it. I just don't buy games very often and everything I play in my library is 64-bit. I guess in theory you could buy, check, and refund but that's inconvenient. I just got lucky that I don't really play any 32-bit games at this point. In my experience 32-bit is mostly source 1 games and indie games that don't use Unity. Almost everything else(outside of proton) is 64-bit in my experience. Of course I'm just a sample size of one. Might be that the games I play I just get lucky with.


Last edited by Scoopta on 22 June 2019 at 3:49 pm UTC

Quoting: ScooptaNo I don't, I wish there was a way...maybe there is but I don't know it.

I wonder if SteamDB might have this available somehow. Don't know.

Quoting: Eike

Quoting: ScooptaNo I don't, I wish there was a way...maybe there is but I don't know it.

I wonder if SteamDB might have this available somehow. Don't know.

Yeah, I was wondering the same thing. Some games are easy to tell based on their files. For example Unity games. There are a very rare few that are 32-bit only. The executable for unity games end with .x86 for 32-bit and .x86_64 for 64-bit. If there's only one executable and it's .x86 then you know it's only 32-bit. But that only works for unity games which are mostly 64-bit anyway, most actually come with both so they work everywhere.

Quoting: GuestWhat annoys me personally is i will of course drop ubuntu but some non FOSS stuff i use is supported on Ubuntu only. Or poorly supported on other distros.

Seriously? Apps that don't have good support on, say, the Arch AUR as well? What titles?

Maybe go for Endless OS whitch have already flatpack?

OK. Let's see if Valve will be consistent in their decision:
https://appletoolbox.com/2019/06/macos-catalina-and-your-32-bit-apps

Quoting: Satoru

Quoting: vectorI say this tongue-in-cheek so don't flame me, but perhaps Ubuntu would like to deprecate support for OpenGL as well; after all, Apple is deprecating OpenGL support :P

At least Apple

1) CLEARLY communicated that 32-bit and OpenGL was deprecated YEARS in advance
2) Did not hem and haw about 'well maybe we'll get rid of it in 20.04'
3) CLEARLY made an OS update that bugged users about their apps potentially not working in future releases
4) Only after 2-3 years of such updates, notification, etc is 32-bit support finally ending with OSX Catalina
5) OpenGL was declared deprecated last year, it still is not offically dead even in Catalina. yes its likely soon, but Apple has been screaming about converting to Metal for years. to the point where Aspyr and Feral back ported their entire steam library to Metal last year

Canonical's plan

1) "You have 4 months sorry!"

If Canonical is going to copy all of Apple's bad decisions, then they should also copy the part where Apple spent YEARS clearly communicating to both devs and users, with popups and warning. As opposed to dropping a bomb on people with 4 months notice, and then when users upgrade to 19.10 in 4 months suddenly 50% of the Linux games will stop working and Proton/Wine also dies with it.

So much this↑. Seriously, WTF do you mean you're removing an important part of the ecosystem with only 4 months notice? This is not a serious approach. If they wanted to test a 64 bit only Ubuntu, Canonical should have said it's a test. Deprecating 32 bit installers was clearly communicated and few people were taken by surprise. If Ubuntu announced they're marking 32-bit multilib as deprecated, they could have done so, but removing it out of the blue is a terrible idea.

I think one of the reasons steam is a 32-bit application despite supporting only 64-bit OSs is so that users don't notice whether the games themselves are 64 or 32-bit. Since installing the package pulls in 32 bit, you have both anyway.

I would be OK with openSuse Leap becoming the new Linux home for Steam. I remember that installing Nvidia drivers broke the package manager and that's how I ended up with Kubuntu, but I'm sure they could solve it. I head rumours steam was considering Flatpack as a way of cleanly packaging the old steam runtime and moving to a new one, but that was last year so it might have just been rumours.

Well with 32bit going away, it takes away that famous statement for Linux."Linux makes older computers come back to life". Yeah of course we could still use older versions of Distros, but that support wont be there any more.


Last edited by Orkultus on 22 June 2019 at 4:53 pm UTC

F**k...... :O

Quoting: gradyvuckovic

Quoting: keanI would even pay for it if everything works well.

I'd happily sign up to that, $10/month for a Valve developed Linux OS which provides the best possible gaming experience for Linux? Hell yes, give me that.

Kinda off-topic but I'm somewhat terrified that the idea of a 'subscription model' OS comes so naturally to people nowadays.

I seriously don't want to be pressured into changing distros, so this is a tragedy for me from both sides. I've been using Ubuntu-MATE for years and I'm very comfortable with it, so this feels in a way like being evicted from my home. It's not pleasant to say the least.

Quoting: NezchanI seriously don't want to be pressured into changing distros, so this is a tragedy for me from both sides. I've been using Ubuntu-MATE for years and I'm very comfortable with it, so this feels in a way like being evicted from my home. It's not pleasant to say the least.

Then write to Ubuntu, as the rest of you who are on Ubuntu and don't want to forced off the distro should do...

Quoting: mphuZOK. Let's see if Valve will be consistent in their decision:
https://appletoolbox.com/2019/06/macos-catalina-and-your-32-bit-apps

MacOS as different case. When Apple remove 32bit support, there is no other way. You want play Duke Nuke 3d? Valve on Mac can say "It Apple thing. We have hands cuffed. But you can be blamed, you know, Apple do this regularly, remember PowerPC and you chosed MacOS" but in Ubuntu case, Valve recomended distro and now what? I like to play old game sometimes. Yes they can build Steam client for 64bit. Now i think valve start distribute 64bit steam, and change officialy suported distro to another. For wine, i don't know what they do. CodeWeavers need their solution support 32 bit windows app, because without that they are done. "Your acounting windows software is 32bit? And you use ubuntu? Great, that we cant do... can you pls pay for nothink?"

Quoting: Arten

Quoting: mphuZOK. Let's see if Valve will be consistent in their decision:
https://appletoolbox.com/2019/06/macos-catalina-and-your-32-bit-apps

MacOS as different case. When Apple remove 32bit support, there is no other way. You want play Duke Nuke 3d? Valve on Mac can say "It Apple thing. We have hands cuffed. But you can be blamed, you know, Apple do this regularly, remember PowerPC and you chosed MacOS" but in Ubuntu case, Valve recomended distro and now what? I like to play old game sometimes. Yes they can build Steam client for 64bit. Now i think valve start distribute 64bit steam, and change officialy suported distro to another. For wine, i don't know what they do. CodeWeavers need their solution support 32 bit windows app, because without that they are done. "Your acounting windows software is 32bit? And you use ubuntu? Great, that we cant do... can you pls pay for nothink?"

I heard from an anonymous source on the Internet that Valve plans to pivot away from macOS to one of the many other interchangeable Darwin distributions which will be maintaining 32-bit support. Valve may be developing, or have already developed, its own Darwin distribution.


Last edited by vector on 22 June 2019 at 5:58 pm UTC

Quoting: riddleyAs a long-time Debian user, I have no dog in this fight, but man these comments are odd. First, Debian isn't difficult to install.

Second, we're half-way through 2019. When should we drop support for architectures that were obsoleted 20 years ago? Why is no one in these comments finding fault with Valve? Don't get me wrong, I'm very glad and grateful that they support Linux, but at the same time they don't do a very good job of it. Perhaps Steam is easy to install on Ubuntu, I'll never know. On Debain it's an exercise in frustration every time.

Technology moves forward. The people deserving of your ire are those refusing to move forward.

I want to be clear I agree with the first part, that Debian isn't difficult to install.

The other part... we support the libraries for compatibility because there is old software that is only available as binaries that we otherwise would not be able to run. This is why most people are pissed about this.

There are still many things that would break with ditching 32 bit library compatibility.
Someone should compile a list of all the things this breaks.
I know of Wine, dgen (genesis emulator), zsnes, PCSX2, steam.