OBS Studio arrives on Steam but no Linux build for now so stick to Flatpak

weird that there's no Linux version under Steam o.O ...seems like an obvious inclusion

also re: downloading:
you can also, ya know.. just get it from the Ubuntu repository for those that run it

you can also, ya know.. just get it from the Ubuntu repository for those that run it

Maybe that's why they don't hurry with the Linux version. Possibly they're just trying to make it available easier to combat that streamlabs thing, which is only for windows anyway.

you can also, ya know.. just get it from the Ubuntu repository for those that run it

You mean the outdated, potentially broken version (just like most packages in universe/multiverse)?


Last edited by AsciiWolf on 22 Mar 2022 at 1:38 pm UTC

weird that there's no Linux version under Steam o.O ...seems like an obvious inclusion

also re: downloading:
you can also, ya know.. just get it from the Ubuntu repository for those that run it

Shipping Linux versions of an app on Steam isn't super easy since it has to be "portable", meaning that it has to include (most of) its dependencies and be compiled against an older glibc to run on a wide variety of systems.
In OBS' case this is just a lot of work since it has a fuckton of dependencies that need to be compiled essentially from scratch to work in the Steam Linux Runtime or at least on an older LTS distro.

All in all we just didn't have the time yet. There were many other things in the works that should make this easier though.

you can also, ya know.. just get it from the Ubuntu repository for those that run it

You mean the outdated, potentially broken version (just like most packages in universe/multiverse)?

I guess? I mean, it's worked fine for me... just letting people know it exists (besides flatpak)

"For Linux users though, you should just stick to Flatpak from Flathub."

obs-studio 27.2.3-1
Build Date: 2022-03-14 20:45 UTC

Why should (Arch) "Linux users" "just stick to Flatpak from Flathub" ?
What are the advantages by using it and not the distribution provided package, if any?
Also, If I am not failing in seeing only disadvantages in this case, could I kindly ask to put a stop in unconditionally promoting Flathub packages?

Also, and absolutely not rhetoric, but really, REALLY out of curiosity:
Why someone on earth could have an interest in opening the whole steam to start obs!?
(it is even possible that running it could prevent other games to even launch because of how steam works, but i might be wrong here, but that's not the point anyway -edit- nope, it doesn't).


Last edited by kokoko3k on 22 Mar 2022 at 3:19 pm UTC

you can also, ya know.. just get it from the Ubuntu repository for those that run it

You mean the outdated, potentially broken version (just like most packages in universe/multiverse)?

There is also the official PPA with the newest version.

Why should (Arch) Linux users stick to Flatpak from Flathub? What are the advantages by using it and not the distribution provided package, if any?
If I am not failing in seeing only disadvantages in this case, could we please stop unconditionally promoting Flathub packages?

The advantage is that it's first-party, fully supported, and contains all the features including service integrations, browser sources, etc. that are often missing from third-party packages. Flathub also makes it possible to install various popular plugins that may or may not be available as system packages.

In this specific case that Flatpak also allows us to patch the dependencies to work around bugs that haven't been fixed in upstream yet, or enable features that aren't available in the specific release it's using.

Why should (Arch) Linux users stick to Flatpak from Flathub? What are the advantages by using it and not the distribution provided package, if any?
If I am not failing in seeing only disadvantages in this case, could we please stop unconditionally promoting Flathub packages?

The advantage is that it's first-party, fully supported, and contains all the features including service integrations, browser sources, etc. that are often missing from third-party packages. Flathub also makes it possible to install various popular plugins that may or may not be available as system packages.

In this specific case that Flatpak also allows us to patch the dependencies to work around bugs that haven't been fixed in upstream yet, or enable features that aren't available in the specific release it's using.

Thanks for the explaination, but this should be clearly stated in the article, because the advantages provided by the service integrations,browser sources etc are not always needed by every Linux user.
On the other side, someone that uses flatpak will always suffer from his disadvantages.

You may have understand that i don't need/use obs, but still, while i might understand that some features might be missing, (or not?)

aur/cef-minimal-obs-bin
aur/cef-minimal-obs-rc-bin
aur/cef-minimal-obs-studio-browser-bin
aur/droidcam-obs-plugin
aur/droidcam-obs-plugin-bin
aur/droidcam-obs-plugin-git
aur/obs-advanced-scene-switcher
aur/obs-audio-monitor
aur/obs-audio-pan-filter
aur/obs-backgroundremoval
aur/obs-backgroundremoval-git
aur/obs-build
aur/obs-build-git
aur/obs-cli
aur/obs-cli-bin
aur/obs-cli-leafac-bin
aur/obs-color-monitor
aur/obs-command-source
aur/obs-controller-git
aur/obs-dir-watch-media
aur/obs-downstream-keyer
aur/obs-dvds3
aur/obs-dynamic-delay
aur/obs-face-tracker
aur/obs-freeze-filter
aur/obs-ghostscript
aur/obs-glcapture-git
aur/obs-gnome-screencast
aur/obs-gnome-screencast-git
aur/obs-gphoto
aur/obs-gradient-source
aur/obs-gstreamer
aur/obs-hevc-vaapi-git
aur/obs-image-reaction
aur/obs-image-reaction-bin
aur/obs-infowriter
aur/obs-media-controls
aur/obs-midi
aur/obs-motion-effect-git
aur/obs-move-transition
aur/obs-multi-rtmp
aur/obs-multi-rtmp-git
aur/obs-multisource-effect
aur/obs-ndi
aur/obs-ndi-bin
aur/obs-ndi-git
aur/obs-nvfbc
aur/obs-nvfbc-git
aur/obs-openvr-git
aur/obs-pipewire-audio-capture-bin
aur/obs-plugin-input-overlay
aur/obs-plugin-input-overlay-bin
aur/obs-plugin-looking-glass
aur/obs-plugin-looking-glass-git
aur/obs-plugin-spectralizer-bin
aur/obs-plugin-tuna-bin
aur/obs-plugin-tuna-git
aur/obs-ptz-controls
aur/obs-qtwebkit-git
aur/obs-recursion-effect
aur/obs-rendering-lag
aur/obs-replay-source
aur/obs-rgb-levels-filter-git
aur/obs-rtmp-nicolive-git
aur/obs-rtspserver
aur/obs-rtspserver-bin
aur/obs-rtspserver-git
aur/obs-scale-to-sound
aur/obs-scale-to-sound-bin
aur/obs-scene-collection-manager
aur/obs-scene-notes-dock
aur/obs-scene-switcher
aur/obs-scrab
aur/obs-service-download_files
aur/obs-service-download_url
aur/obs-service-format_spec_file
aur/obs-service-format_spec_file-git
aur/obs-service-recompress
aur/obs-service-set_version
aur/obs-service-source_validator
aur/obs-service-tar_scm
aur/obs-service-tar_scm-git
aur/obs-service-verify_file
aur/obs-shaderfilter-git
aur/obs-source-copy
aur/obs-source-dock
aur/obs-source-record
aur/obs-source-switcher
aur/obs-spectralizer
aur/obs-streamfx
aur/obs-streamfx-git
aur/obs-studio-browser
aur/obs-studio-ftl
aur/obs-studio-git
aur/obs-studio-rc
aur/obs-studio-tytan652
aur/obs-teleport
aur/obs-text-pango
aur/obs-text-pthread
aur/obs-time-warp-scan
aur/obs-transition-matrix-git
aur/obs-transition-table
aur/obs-tuna
aur/obs-v4l2sink-git
aur/obs-virtual-cam-filter
aur/obs-vkcapture-git
aur/obs-vnc
aur/obs-websocket
aur/obs-websocket-git

In this specific case that Flatpak also allows us to patch the dependencies to work around bugs that haven't been fixed in upstream yet

I still fail to understand why an opensource project offers full support to a binary release only, this way of offering support is kinda new to me.
Resolving deps should be a distro work for their provided packages and imho upstream should take care of developing code that targets specific deps and provide hints to distro mantainers, instead.


Last edited by kokoko3k on 22 Mar 2022 at 2:41 pm UTC

I list the Flatpak as it's the only official cross-distro solution used by the developer. Simple as that. I shall continue to link to Flathub / Flatpak whenever it's available because it works across any distribution AND Steam Deck too. You can argue about preferred packaging all you want, stick to whatever you like, this is the easiest for users so we don't have to list a million ways of installing things across many different distributions.

I list the Flatpak as it's the only official cross-distro solution used by the developer. Simple as that. I shall continue to link to Flathub / Flatpak whenever it's available because it works across any distribution AND Steam Deck too. You can argue about preferred packaging all you want, stick to whatever you like, this is the easiest for users so we don't have to list a million ways of installing things across many different distributions.

I am not objecting the listing of flatpak per se, but the assertion that every linux user should stick with it without motivation provided right in the article.

I shouldn't need to explain the same thing over and over and over again to give in to pedantic attitudes over packaging.

I shouldn't need to explain the same thing over and over and over again to give in to pedantic attitudes over packaging.

...Crystal clear.

Also, and absolutely not rhetoric, but really, REALLY out of curiosity:
Why someone on earth could have an interest in opening the whole steam to start obs!?

Presumably the people likely to do this would be people who are opening Steam anyway to play games?

Also, and absolutely not rhetoric, but really, REALLY out of curiosity:
Why someone on earth could have an interest in opening the whole steam to start obs!?

Presumably the people likely to do this would be people who are opening Steam anyway to play games?

If it were true, then i'd expect fro those people to add every program they use as a non steam application to their steam library.
And while using steam like a start menu may even be a viable solution, I really don't expect them to do so, that's the problem.

Also, and absolutely not rhetoric, but really, REALLY out of curiosity:
Why someone on earth could have an interest in opening the whole steam to start obs!?

Presumably the people likely to do this would be people who are opening Steam anyway to play games?

If it were true, then i'd expect fro those people to add every program they use as a non steam application to their steam library.

So you mean, like, they'd add things they do while not playing games to their game-library software because that's exactly the same as adding things they do while playing games to their game-library software?

Also, and absolutely not rhetoric, but really, REALLY out of curiosity:
Why someone on earth could have an interest in opening the whole steam to start obs!?

Presumably the people likely to do this would be people who are opening Steam anyway to play games?

If it were true, then i'd expect fro those people to add every program they use as a non steam application to their steam library.

So you mean, like, they'd add things they do while not playing games to their game-library software because that's exactly the same as adding things they do while playing games to their game-library software?

Ah, understood.
So the use case is that since obs may be used even while they are playing steam games, then it makes sense to take the burden to package and release it as a steam application, because people will prefer to start it from their library.
This honestly I haven't thought to.
Well then, but this still does not help my progress in understanding the motivations, because i don't think they are installing a browser as a steam specific app or any other app one may think of one can use while they are playing.
Ofc I may be wrong, but I really don't believe the number of users starting obs from steam justifies the release in their store.
Probably is just a matter of having more visibility or I just don't know.

OpenSUSE also has OBS Studio in its community repos, so from my point of view it's not a major issue that there isn't a native Linux binary on Steam.

weird that there's no Linux version under Steam o.O ...seems like an obvious inclusion

also re: downloading:
you can also, ya know.. just get it from the Ubuntu repository for those that run it

Shipping Linux versions of an app on Steam isn't super easy since it has to be "portable", meaning that it has to include (most of) its dependencies and be compiled against an older glibc to run on a wide variety of systems.
In OBS' case this is just a lot of work since it has a fuckton of dependencies that need to be compiled essentially from scratch to work in the Steam Linux Runtime or at least on an older LTS distro.

All in all we just didn't have the time yet. There were many other things in the works that should make this easier though.

Additionally, you have to build against Ubuntu 12.04 for SteamOS. Meanwhile OBS 27.2 supports 18.04 LTS at minimum (mainly so that the modern browser component works), which'll likely change to 20.04 LTS minimum in the next major version.

Also, and absolutely not rhetoric, but really, REALLY out of curiosity:
Why someone on earth could have an interest in opening the whole steam to start obs!?

Presumably the people likely to do this would be people who are opening Steam anyway to play games?

If it were true, then i'd expect fro those people to add every program they use as a non steam application to their steam library.

So you mean, like, they'd add things they do while not playing games to their game-library software because that's exactly the same as adding things they do while playing games to their game-library software?

Ah, understood.
So the use case is that since obs may be used even while they are playing steam games, then it makes sense to take the burden to package and release it as a steam application, because people will prefer to start it from their library.
This honestly I haven't thought to.
Well then, but this still does not help my progress in understanding the motivations, because i don't think they are installing a browser as a steam specific app or any other app one may think of one can use while they are playing.
Ofc I may be wrong, but I really don't believe the number of users starting obs from steam justifies the release in their store.
Probably is just a matter of having more visibility or I just don't know.

Take Display Fusion for windows as example. It's a standalone app that can run without steam turned on after it's installed through steam. Steam does not enforce drm. If I could I would rather have all the apps (or even free) I bought under one umbrella to install/remove instead of remembering going to 10 places to install apps. While steam is primarily for gaming, seeing it as an appstore works perfectly fine.