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Valve continue rapidly iterating on SteamVR, as they attempt to push the limits of what VR can do both on the hardware and software side with SteamVR 1.10 out now. Not a Beta release either, a proper new version.

Quite a big update too, giving a huge revamp to the Dashboard that Valve claim "gets you into your games quickly". It has a new curved design that's closer for increased clarity, and presents a recent games list for jumping in right away. Looks pretty nice too.

This new launcher comes with a ton of other improvements too. There's the ability to quickly change volume, more settings have been added to toggle UI elements, a nicer/more refined keyboard appearance, performance improvements and some fixes. Additionally SteamVR Desktop View, SteamVR itself, SteamVR Home and SteamVR Input all got major improvements too.

On the Linux side of things, Valve gave it a little attention too as they also noted these fixes:

  • Fixed a case where the dashboard would disappear.
  • Fixed a vrwebhelper crash on shutdown.
  • Fixed the 'Restart SteamVR' and other URL based shortcuts that are part of the new settings interface.

Full SteamVR 1.10 release notes here.

On the subject of VR: sadly, we've had silence out of Valve on a Linux release of Half-Life: Alyx since the initial message to us (at the bottom of this article), we did reach out again quite recently but got no reply. So currently it seems to be a Windows-only game. While sad, VR is still an incredibly new thing for the industry as a whole and hopefully as it improves (on Linux especially it can be rough), maybe Valve will port it in future like they did with their other games.

Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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Ehvis Feb 28, 2020
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Looks like they've been so busy cleaning up SteamVR before the HL:Alyx release, that they didn't do anything for Linux this time.
cusa123 Feb 28, 2020
The problem is that htc lives told me that htc cosmos of moments have no compatibility with linux.
ElectricPrism Feb 29, 2020
Nice of them to include a clock. Kindof reminds me of Gnome a little bit :P This kind of stuff really intrigues me. Like instead of having screens with limited pixel density the ability to have a VR headset and virtual screens of any pixel density and scale really is interesting.
TheRiddick Feb 29, 2020
I'm guessing that HLAlyx will work fine via steamplay? is it a game that uses vulkan natively?
sub Feb 29, 2020
Thanks for the comment on HL:Alyx, Liam.

Very appreciated.

I have to admit, I'm very disappointed by the silence of Valve concerning this.
Why not communicating that they probably work on it and it's a technical thing for now.
Or if they really put the focus on the Windows release - why not telling *us* that?

It'd be sad but I can ofc respect that.
sub Feb 29, 2020
Quoting: EhvisLooks like they've been so busy cleaning up SteamVR before the HL:Alyx release, that they didn't do anything for Linux this time.

Then again, they said more than a month ago that HL:Alyx is basically done and in an extremely good shape (which has to include SteamVR obviously).
Doesn't sound like crunch-time panic to me. :)

That's why I had some hope, they could find the time to wire up Linux (and Mac).
But I guess that is sadly out of question now.
slaapliedje Mar 1, 2020
Quoting: sub
Quoting: EhvisLooks like they've been so busy cleaning up SteamVR before the HL:Alyx release, that they didn't do anything for Linux this time.

Then again, they said more than a month ago that HL:Alyx is basically done and in an extremely good shape (which has to include SteamVR obviously).
Doesn't sound like crunch-time panic to me. :)

That's why I had some hope, they could find the time to wire up Linux (and Mac).
But I guess that is sadly out of question now.
It would be hilarious if they just came out and said everyone would have to switch to Linux to play it. Just to see how many actually would. I mean if there were a game franchise that would make people switch to both VR and Linux, it would be this one.
jrt Mar 4, 2020
Sadly not even the SteamVR Home destinations for HL:A work on Linux :'(
jrt Mar 6, 2020
Quoting: jrtSadly not even the SteamVR Home destinations for HL:A work on Linux :'(
Update: The Half-Life Alyx SteamVR Home environments are getting fixed linux support with the next SteamVR beta release: https://github.com/ValveSoftware/SteamVR-for-Linux/issues/304#issuecomment-595790309
sub Mar 6, 2020
Quoting: jrt
Quoting: jrtSadly not even the SteamVR Home destinations for HL:A work on Linux :'(
Update: The Half-Life Alyx SteamVR Home environments are getting fixed linux support with the next SteamVR beta release: https://github.com/ValveSoftware/SteamVR-for-Linux/issues/304#issuecomment-595790309

Hmm, that's promising.
Maybe we'll see Alyx get an unannounced beta release on Linux too?

Crap communication nevertheless, though.
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