Bottles, a free and open source application for Linux (that works well on the Steam Deck), has another new release out bringing in major new features.
Since a previous version, it came with support for pre-configured environments (Gaming and Applications), which has been massively extended in version 2022.3.28. Now, you can setup your own configuration and share these environments with others, so in a way it's sliding closer to some capabilities of Lutris. These environments are configured with a YAML file making them easy to parse and read.
On top of that, there's improved support for Steam Play Proton directly. It's under heavy development and still experimental but Bottles can now read Steam Launch Options for games installed via Proton and deal with them in Bottles directly and configure certain settings in Bottles. This eventually might make it far easier than manually editing Steam launch options.
This release also brings a command-line environment for Bottles too, amongst other things.
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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10 comments
Bottles development is going impressively quickly. I have the few WINE things I need already comfy in Lutris and have only played around with Bottles, but next time I have something I am going to try sticking with Bottles (and maybe eventually migrate over). It's UI is intuitive and sleek and to the point while I can still configure all I need.
Not trying to diminish Lutris and all the hard work the team there has done, but I always thought it was a bit of a mess on the UI end. The install scripts are the strong point, and if bottles gets those right, I can see it gaining good traction.
Not trying to diminish Lutris and all the hard work the team there has done, but I always thought it was a bit of a mess on the UI end. The install scripts are the strong point, and if bottles gets those right, I can see it gaining good traction.
2 Likes, Who?
Having not tried this yet, can someone tell me how the Bottles approach works vs a solution like Lutris and why one would use one vs another? Thank you!
1 Likes, Who?
Well, it figures. After all, Bottles is a much more modern technology than Amphorae or even Casks.
4 Likes, Who?
Having not tried this yet, can someone tell me how the Bottles approach works vs a solution like Lutris and why one would use one vs another? Thank you!
At a high level, lutris is a general purpose application launcher and installation frontend for various types of apps. Wine is just one of its available runners and setting up wine prefixes is not its primary purpose. It has community made installation scripts for many games and utils that make it really easy for users to get their favourite app up and running. Applications first approach.
Bottles is completely focused on wine prefix creation and management. You set up a "bottle" and then launch the desired apps. Wine prefix first approach.
The killer features of Bottles are being able to "bottle up" and export it so other people can easily import it in their Bottles app and versioning of the wine prefix. You can save the state of your bottle so if you mess something up or simply want to rollback to a previous state then that's all possible with one click.
If you use the flatpak version of Bottles (which is highly recommended) then you get some great out of the box sandboxing preventing things from leaking out of a bottle into your personal folder or the rest of the system.
It comes with easy ui toggles to enable the usual suspects like dxvk, vkd3d, FSR, DLSS, etc... common windows dependencies installers are one click away.
Launcher scripts for the popular game launchers are included with protondb like ratings (Platinum, Gold, Silver, Bronze) but the whole library of lutris installer scripts is missing for now. They should be mostly compatible however, in the future it's very likely bottles will be able to make use of the lutris community installers.
My personal use cases for Bottles so far were running "normal" windows apps or setting up a bottle for windows itch.io games where I can quickly and without hassle launch many itch games and then rollback if they make a mess (+the out of the box sandboxing with flatpak, with flatseal you can toggle off the network access for bottles to network sandbox as well). Or I set up an external windows game only to add it as non-steam game to the steam client. For any other application that already has a neat lutris installation script, lutris still is the most comfortable and easy solution to keep up to date.
Last edited by popsulfr on 5 April 2022 at 3:59 pm UTC
7 Likes, Who?
Comandante Ñoñardo Apr 5, 2022
Why Bottles creates a .var/app/com.usebottles.bottles/ folder in my home folder?...
0 Likes
Comandante Ñoñardo Apr 5, 2022
Why Bottles creates a .var/app/com.usebottles.bottles/ folder in my home folder?...
Welcome to flatpak!
But, why it doesn't use the /var folder?
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...Bottles is completely focused on wine prefix creation and management. You set up a "bottle" and then launch the desired apps. Wine prefix first approach...Terrific explanation, thank you.
It sounds like Bottles works more like the old Playonlinux app, where you set up your prefix first and then did whatever you want app wise with it after.
The ability to share wine bottles on the app, though, sounds like a potentially terrific feature.
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Cloversheen Apr 6, 2022
Why Bottles creates a .var/app/com.usebottles.bottles/ folder in my home folder?...
Welcome to flatpak!
But, why it doesn't use the /var folder?
Basically because some of the main developers have a hard time admitting to doing mistakes: https://github.com/flatpak/flatpak/issues/1651
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