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Two updates rolled out over the last day, one for the Preview channel and a big one for Stable. Here's a run over what's changed. The Preview update is quite small but I saw a lot of people having issues with Vampire Survivors, so nice to know they're on it but the Stable update includes quite a lot (and not to be confused with SteamOS 3.4 that's still only in Preview).

A video with some highlights:

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Preview Changes:

  • Fixed Chinese Pinyin and Zhuyin input for the on-screen keyboard not functioning correctly
  • Added a workaround for an underlying Steam/Proton issue causing some games -- notably Vampire Survivors -- to fail to launch

Changelog link.

Stable Client Changes:

General

  • Reduced client startup times for users with large game libraries
  • Fixed issue where launching a game would take longer to start if there was no network connection.
  • Fixed VR flags not showing up in app details for some games
  • Fixed downloads page crashing when starting in offline mode
  • Downloads page now properly responds to online/offline status
  • Collections view can now show more than two rows of collections and allow scrolling
  • Reduced size of Steam client download
  • Fixed bluetooth failing to turn on in gaming mode if it was disabled in desktop mode
  • When installing a game always show the install location picker if there is more than one library folder, and automatically focus the default library folder when the dialog shows up
  • Added error dialog for when the user clicks on a mailto link
  • Fixed the 'Cancel' button in the wifi password dialogue for a new connection causing the current network to disconnect
  • Re-worked "Gifts Pending" page to be gamepad navigable

Docked Mode

  • Fixed incorrect size of Main Menu in docked mode with 4k displays
  • Virtual Keyboard now has a maximum width, so that it doesn't stretch to an unusable size on large screens
  • Set scale for startup movies so that the top and bottom of the movie are cropped for 16:9 aspect ratio

Desktop Mode

  • Fixed issue preventing the Virtual Keyboard from accessing the clipboard and being unable to perform paste operations
  • Center the popup controller configurator window when viewing controller layout
  • Fixed circular download progress indicator being broken in game entry list

Sign In

  • Added login flow that supports new QR code functionality
  • Fix a case where if the sign-in UI had cached credentials which had become invalid, it could get stuck and not accept valid credentials thereafter
  • Fixed an edge case in handling of invalid cached credentials affecting reauthentication

Steam Input

  • Gyro Enabling: The "Touch" option is now available to controllers which do not have capacitive touch sensors - Moving joysticks out of their deadzone now counts as a "Touch".
  • All controller types can each now optionally choose to use a Nintendo-style layout. This flips the A and B button and X and Y button universally in Steam and in games.
  • The Xbox extended features driver has been updated for Windows 11
  • Fixed hang when the Amazon Luna controller rumbles on macOS
  • Fixed issue with the touch binding in As Mouse mode releasing before the end of a swipe
  • Fixed doubled input for Nintendo Joy-Cons controllers
  • Gyro Yaw & Roll Combined now allows negative contribution values from both sources.
  • FlickStick output can now be Inverted, and can be sent to X or Y Mouse axis.
  • Fix for FlickStick turning when exiting an overlay layer with the stick still thrown.
  • Desktop Controller Layout Now defaults to a desktop friendly set of controls. Long-Pressing Menu Button will toggle back and forth to a Gamepad friendly layout.
  • Updated Steam Controller LB and RB button images

Remote Play

  • Fixed glyphs for third party Nintendo controllers while streaming

New Big Picture Mode

  • Updated Big Picture is now available for testing. You can read more about it in this blog post. Modify your Steam client shortcut and add -gamepadui on the command-line to automatically start Steam in the new Big Picture Mode. Alternatively, pass -newbigpicture to start in Desktop mode and have access to the new Big Picture Mode at any time.

Changelog link.

Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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I am the owner of GamingOnLinux. After discovering Linux back in the days of Mandrake in 2003, I constantly checked on the progress of Linux until Ubuntu appeared on the scene and it helped me to really love it. You can reach me easily by emailing GamingOnLinux directly. You can also follow my personal adventures on Bluesky.
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3 comments

Julius Nov 17, 2022
In case anyone is looking for an easy way to edit the Steam startup parameter on Gnome:
https://github.com/donadigo/appeditor
(available in the Fedora repos)
carlbraun Nov 18, 2022
Known issue: Startup pointless vibration with custom animation, wanted to disable it forever 6 month ago(I also mentioned it in Beta before this new Release)
Mitsie Nov 18, 2022
The latest Stable release has broken nearly all Native Linux games on the Deck including Valve's own games Portal 2, Halflife 2 ect. So if you have started a game on a Native Linux game, your saves will not sync with a Windows PC. As steam sees them as two completely different games. So you are basically screwed until the provide a fix.

I've persevered with Steam OS up until now. But installing Windows on the Deck looks more and more appealing.

The Windows client is working fine, the Windows drivers are now better, Windows Client has the Steam OS UI. Except on Windows, we wouldn't have these cross-platform cloud sync issues.

The "Stable" update channel on Steam OS is no longer Stable..
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