Valve releases Steam Deck shell CAD files

Quoting: poiuz

Quoting: Purple Library GuyValve is frankly a really weird company. I'm sure all the other companies look at it and think, to quote a certain Dr. from Austin Powers, "Not Evil enough".

Why would they? Valve is nowhere near the open source contributions of other closed source companies (e.g. Apple & Microsoft).

Comparing private (game related software and limited hardware) company with few billion in pocket and few hundred employees with mega software and hardware (hundreds working on input devices alone) corporations with hundred of billions and counting employees in hundred thousand plus...

Quoting: poiuz

Quoting: Purple Library GuyValve is frankly a really weird company. I'm sure all the other companies look at it and think, to quote a certain Dr. from Austin Powers, "Not Evil enough".

Why would they? Valve is nowhere near the open source contributions of other closed source companies (e.g. Apple & Microsoft).

Apple is a mixed bag on their love of open source. They bought CUPS... then just left it to languish. They use Webkit... but forked it for their own use. So now we have multiple webkit based engines and they all are incompatible. They hate GPLv3, so some software stays far out of date on their newest systems (it is the bit about modifiable binaries, or something.)

Microsoft is also a little strange. They do commit some stuff to Linux, though of course a lot of that is fir their own benefit. Same with VSCode being open source, but the normal binaries have telemetry turned on.

Valve does open source contributions 'the right way'

Quoting: mindedie

Quoting: poiuz

Quoting: Purple Library GuyValve is frankly a really weird company. I'm sure all the other companies look at it and think, to quote a certain Dr. from Austin Powers, "Not Evil enough".

Why would they? Valve is nowhere near the open source contributions of other closed source companies (e.g. Apple & Microsoft).

Comparing private (game related software and limited hardware) company with few billion in pocket and few hundred employees with mega software and hardware (hundreds working on input devices alone) corporations with hundred of billions and counting employees in hundred thousand plus...

Ha, yeah was going to mention in my previous post, the key here is Private Company. They can do whatever they want, and don't have shareholders to please.

Quoting: slaapliedje

Quoting: mindedie

Quoting: poiuz

Quoting: Purple Library GuyValve is frankly a really weird company. I'm sure all the other companies look at it and think, to quote a certain Dr. from Austin Powers, "Not Evil enough".

Why would they? Valve is nowhere near the open source contributions of other closed source companies (e.g. Apple & Microsoft).

Comparing private (game related software and limited hardware) company with few billion in pocket and few hundred employees with mega software and hardware (hundreds working on input devices alone) corporations with hundred of billions and counting employees in hundred thousand plus...

Ha, yeah was going to mention in my previous post, the key here is Private Company. They can do whatever they want, and don't have shareholders to please.

I guess it really makes sense for the stay that way. It's not like they need extra funds in order to be able to do stuff.

Quoting: mindedieComparing private (game related software and limited hardware) company with few billion in pocket and few hundred employees with mega software and hardware (hundreds working on input devices alone) corporations with hundred of billions and counting employees in hundred thousand plus...

They're just the tip of the iceberg & known for their closed products.

And as you're saying: Valve has billions, so it's nothing to them to pay a few developers. (To remind you: $1 billion = $1000 million, a developer will cost something from, I don't know, $100.000 to $1.000.000 per year?).

Quoting: slaapliedje[…] They hate GPLv3, so some software stays far out of date on their newest systems (it is the bit about modifiable binaries, or something.)
[…]
Same with VSCode being open source, but the normal binaries have telemetry turned on. […]

Please explain why this has anything to do with open source contributions.

Valve makes open source contributions and yet provide a DRM system (in fact, most of their business is based on the availability of, partly invasive, DRM). What's your point here?

Quoting: slaapliedje[…]
They use Webkit... but forked it for their own use. So now we have multiple webkit based engines and they all are incompatible.
[…]
Valve does open source contributions 'the right way'

Valve uses a forked Wine full of hacks, uses & maintains a D3D implementation outside of Wine with no chance of upstreaming it. What makes this right & better than Apple & Microsoft?

As I was saying: Nothing special, nobody but Linux kids are thinking anything about it.

Quoting: poiuzValve uses a forked Wine full of hacks, uses & maintains a D3D implementation outside of Wine with no chance of upstreaming it. What makes this right & better than Apple & Microsoft?

As I was saying: Nothing special, nobody but Linux kids are thinking anything about it.

The wine used in Proton is not "full of hacks", it just has hooks into Steam's platform. And the decision to not use vkd3d-proton in wine is not because Valve is grubby about it, it's entirely the wine maintainers' choice.

Valve is paying Codeweavers to work on wine, who will not be doing anything to wine that will not be available to everyone.


Last edited by rustybroomhandle on 12 February 2022 at 5:18 pm UTC

Quoting: rustybroomhandleThe wine used in Proton is not "full of hacks", it just has hooks into Steam's platform. […]

Valve is paying Codeweavers to work on wine, who will not be doing anything to wine that will not be available to everyone.

hacks @https://github.com/ValveSoftware/wine/
hacks @https://github.com/wine-mirror/wine/

Quoting: rustybroomhandleAnd the decision to not use vkd3d-proton in wine is not because Valve is grubby about it, it's entirely the wine maintainers' choice.

Please explain in more detail with an emphasis on 'the right way' of the contribution?

Quoting: poiuz

Quoting: rustybroomhandleThe wine used in Proton is not "full of hacks", it just has hooks into Steam's platform. […]

Valve is paying Codeweavers to work on wine, who will not be doing anything to wine that will not be available to everyone.

hacks @https://github.com/ValveSoftware/wine/
hacks @https://github.com/wine-mirror/wine/

Yeah, they flag compatibility kludges as "hacks"- this is good. It means they are conscious of what is clean and what not.

Quoting: poiuz

Quoting: rustybroomhandleAnd the decision to not use vkd3d-proton in wine is not because Valve is grubby about it, it's entirely the wine maintainers' choice.

Please explain in more detail with an emphasis on 'the right way' of the contribution?

vkd3d-proton is LGPL-2.1. Wine project chooses not to use it. And that's fine. They do not have to.

You seem to imply that Proton development is not benefitting wine.

EDIT: Ignore everything I said, I think we have a communication gap here. Can you explain why what Valve is doing is the wrong way? Because from where I sit it's just open source functioning as intended.


Last edited by rustybroomhandle on 12 February 2022 at 6:24 pm UTC

Quoting: poiuz

Quoting: Purple Library GuyValve is frankly a really weird company. I'm sure all the other companies look at it and think, to quote a certain Dr. from Austin Powers, "Not Evil enough".

Why would they? Valve is nowhere near the open source contributions of other closed source companies (e.g. Apple & Microsoft).

Valve isn't primarily a software company though. If you write 5% as much software as another company, but contribute 30% as much to open source, and in more key areas, who is more open source friendly?

And of course it's much smaller, but the main thing is just that this is an apples/oranges comparison. Apple and Microsoft do open source contributions mainly when they have no other choice; it's just that they do so much business that revolves around areas that have been taken over, despite their determined resistance, by open source software that the number of areas where they've had no other choice is quite large.
Valve actually chooses to use open source, and do it responsibly, in areas where they would have other choices.


Last edited by Purple Library Guy on 12 February 2022 at 6:10 pm UTC

Quoting: poiuz

Quoting: Purple Library GuyValve is frankly a really weird company. I'm sure all the other companies look at it and think, to quote a certain Dr. from Austin Powers, "Not Evil enough".

Why would they? Valve is nowhere near the open source contributions of other closed source companies (e.g. Apple & Microsoft).

Valve has a market cap of 78 billion. Apple has the highest market cap in the world, 2.752 trillion - some 35 times the size of Valve. Microsoft has 2.211 trillion, Google 1.773 trillion. We are talking about one or two orders of magnitude of difference. Valve are a store that sells games, a super large store in its niche, but those others are world powers comparable to the richest countries in the world. And software is one of their main products, though ever more giving way to "software-as-a-service".

Edit: to make it clearer, Valve is 0.078 trillion, and less than 3% of Apple.


Last edited by eldaking on 12 February 2022 at 7:30 pm UTC