While Elgato continue to ignore the Linux market, developers from around the community end up creating applications to fill the gap. Now there's Boatswain, which allows Linux users to control Elgato Stream Deck devices.
It's not the first of its kind, with streamdeck_ui also being an option (I covered it back in 2019) that is still being updated. More options are good though! Why make a new one anyway? In a blog post, the developer mentioned they "did not find these apps adequate to my usage".
Some of what they're focusing on for the first release includes:
- Backend code to detect Stream Deck devices, open them, upload images to buttons, and change the brightness of the device
- Folders, profiles, and multiactions
- OBS Studio integration: start & stop streaming, start & stop recording, switch to a scene
- Sound player, initially focusing on playing sound effects
- App launching
They will also be considering these too:
- Chat integration with various streaming services (Twitch, YouTube, etc)
- Window management actions through a custom GNOME Shell extension
- More features to OBS Studio integration, such as showing & hiding sources, recording to the replay buffer, etc
- Enhanced sound player with different playlists and MPRIS integration
The developer of Boatswain even made a little introduction video:
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I'll be keeping an eye on this one to let you know how it goes.
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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Hi, guys.
Do you happen to know can I use Loupedeck Live under Linux?
I found it when searching for Elgato's stream deck alternatives, but the writer of the article https://streammentor.com/stream-deck-alternative/ couldn't help me.
I thought of ordering it, but won't if it's noncompatible with Linux.
Do you happen to know can I use Loupedeck Live under Linux?
I found it when searching for Elgato's stream deck alternatives, but the writer of the article https://streammentor.com/stream-deck-alternative/ couldn't help me.
I thought of ordering it, but won't if it's noncompatible with Linux.
0 Likes
Hi, guys.
Do you happen to know can I use Loupedeck Live under Linux?
I found it when searching for Elgato's stream deck alternatives, but the writer of the article https://streammentor.com/stream-deck-alternative/ couldn't help me.
I thought of ordering it, but won't if it's noncompatible with Linux.
I doubt that would work. These Elgato devices are absolutely non-functional bricks without the software to drive them. For the Streamdeck that's either Boatswain or streamdeck-ui, but I don't see any mention of the Loupedeck in those tools. Audio controls would be a very different set of interfaces to support.
1 Likes, Who?
Follow-up article about your personal experience trying out Boatswain, or maybe a comparison between the two?
That's a great idea. I feel like it might be a little unfair, given that Boatswain is only three weeks old (not even a teenager!) and I'll be testing on Plasma, not Gnome, but in terms of how fiddly it is to get streamdeck-ui working, it would make for a nice short comparison.
I'll keep the idea in mind!
Quoting myself to add - although I'm probably not going to write a whole article on streamdeck-ui vs Boatswain as suggested above, I did get around to trying out Boatswain a couple of weeks ago. It's easily installed via Flathub and detected my v2 Streamdeck with no issues. But, there's this - you can't run custom commands using Boatswain. You can only do what the app lets you do - which is a decent amount, but I have two or three scripts which I trigger with a keypress, and you just can't do that with Boatswain.
It's a real shame. The author of the app doesn't want to add it, and there's been no movement on the ticket I linked since that refusal, five months ago. As a result, I won't be using Boatswain.
1 Likes, Who?
Dear lord, the maintainer just frankly seems a self-absorbed and petty.
I posted in support of desiring such a feature with a few arguments of why it should be done, etc.
But the maintainer just closed the entire ticket, edited my post to "(not very nice comment)".
Oh and a "you can all thank TheSHEEEP for this...", of course.
There was not a single rude remark in my post, no name calling, nothing.
Just stating the obvious that he cannot believe he could ever add every single thinkable use-case as a full feature (as that is obviously impossible), and therefore should add one "imperfect" feature as a fallback so users don't have to switch to other apps as soon as they reach the point of "Boatswain doesn't have this feature".
Some people are waaayyy too thin skinned and seriously not made for the discussion with other people online.
I honestly struggle to see how one could even be offended by my comment, but now that edit just makes me look like I was slinging insults or sth like that... :/
If you cannot handle a few direct suggestions and people pointing out a flaw in your argument without going on an ego-trip and shutting all discussion down (not just removing my comment if he didn't like my tone or whatever), you are a horrible person to be put in charge of a project.
My guess is he just waited for someone to stop posting "use cases" (there were already a dozen or more vastly different ones that could've all been solved by the feature) to give him an opportunity to shut down a ticket he never had any intention of taking care of.
Last edited by TheSHEEEP on 23 January 2023 at 6:37 pm UTC
I posted in support of desiring such a feature with a few arguments of why it should be done, etc.
But the maintainer just closed the entire ticket, edited my post to "(not very nice comment)".
Oh and a "you can all thank TheSHEEEP for this...", of course.
There was not a single rude remark in my post, no name calling, nothing.
Just stating the obvious that he cannot believe he could ever add every single thinkable use-case as a full feature (as that is obviously impossible), and therefore should add one "imperfect" feature as a fallback so users don't have to switch to other apps as soon as they reach the point of "Boatswain doesn't have this feature".
Some people are waaayyy too thin skinned and seriously not made for the discussion with other people online.
I honestly struggle to see how one could even be offended by my comment, but now that edit just makes me look like I was slinging insults or sth like that... :/
If you cannot handle a few direct suggestions and people pointing out a flaw in your argument without going on an ego-trip and shutting all discussion down (not just removing my comment if he didn't like my tone or whatever), you are a horrible person to be put in charge of a project.
My guess is he just waited for someone to stop posting "use cases" (there were already a dozen or more vastly different ones that could've all been solved by the feature) to give him an opportunity to shut down a ticket he never had any intention of taking care of.
Last edited by TheSHEEEP on 23 January 2023 at 6:37 pm UTC
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He obviously has some kind of "vision" for what his little app will be, but as with any such pet project, it'll narrow the usefulness for anyone else. Nice he put it on github, I suppose, but it's not a tool for other people to use, clearly. And yes, after five months of ignoring the ticket outright, this was just a handy way for him to close it down cleanly.
What a waste. Thankfully, steamdeck-ui is still going strong. I only tried Boatswain at all because streamdeck-ui needs to be built in a venv environment right now due to incompatibilities with Python 3.11. Hopefully that'll get fixed in the coming months though.
What a waste. Thankfully, steamdeck-ui is still going strong. I only tried Boatswain at all because streamdeck-ui needs to be built in a venv environment right now due to incompatibilities with Python 3.11. Hopefully that'll get fixed in the coming months though.
2 Likes, Who?
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