10mo ago

Valve made the right decision

132 comments

Steam Linux Runtime is based on Debian Stable releases. It's literally the Why Not Both? meme.
- Where does valve use Arch? because i thought steamOS was a fork of Debian , and i am kinda confused by the meme
  
  SteamOS before 3.0 was based on Debian, but with 3.0 they decided to move away from Debian and now use (immutable) Arch.
  
  The Steam Deck runs Arch
- Totally why not both

In a world where Valve controls 90% of what is running on a device with immutable / containerized images, yeah I think Arch makes a lot more sense. A distro focused on rolling release is a lot less likely to hang you up when you choose to update.
Debian is great, but depending on where you are in the release cycle it can be a pain in the ass to stay up to date and, frankly, the last time I ran it, shit like apt/dpkg configuration and so many /etc files and structures just felt like mis-features or too complex for their own good.

Can anyone explain anything in this meme? I don’t know the anime, I don’t know the symbols, all I recognize is the steam logo.
- I don’t know the anime either, but the steam logo is walking away from the debian logo and then staring into the eyes of the arch logo. OP is saying that valve made the right choice by ditching debian (I thought they were using ubuntu, but that’s just a debian derivative with a bad UI on top) for arch as the basis for steamOS. For a gaming platform, I agree. You want the latest updates and software versions for gaming purposes (and proton/wine purposes), and they can hire employees to ensure they have tackled arch’s bleeding-edge instabilities before rolling the updates out to the general population.
  
  You know every time I think I understand enough about Linux to consider moving over an innocent post like this sets me back to square one.
  
  but that’s just a debian derivative with a bad UI on top
  What is, Ubuntu, or the pre-Arch based SteamOS? I ask because Ubuntu has so many different variants that you can pick a UI that works for you.
- SteamOS (the operating system for the Steam Deck) is based on Arch Linux (the blue A), so that's what's going on in the bottom panel.
  The red swirl is for another Linux operating system, called Debian. I don't know what OP is referring to by Steam 'leaving' Debian in the top panel.
  
  Versions of SteamOS before 3.0 were Debian-based.
  
  The SteamOS running on "steam machines" when they were a thing were debian
- Says on google lens that the anime is Ao-chan can't study.

If I had a nickel every time I see meme that is just some anime characters with linux world logos slapped on them...
- All image macros are are random pictures with text on them

Didn't I read somewhere they were considering using NixOS instead of messing with unstable Arch and forcing it do stuff it wasn't made for?
- Anti Commercial AI thingy
  Just out of curiosity, do you think that licensing your posts under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 makes it illegal to use them to train an AI? If so, why do you think that? I post GPL licensed code online, so I'm interested in this topic.
  
  If you write code, you might be aware of the AI coding assistants out there. Most notable is probably Github's Copilot. Well, that AI assistant has an ongoing case against it to answer the question you're asking. So, just like you add a GPL (or other) license to your code, creative commons licenses are for text and media that aren't code and I add it to my comments.
  Whether they will have an impact has yet to be determined, so we'll see if creative commons with a non-commercial clause is for naught or not.
- Switching to Nix could certainly simplify a lot of things. I wouldn't be surprised if they went that direction soon.
  
  The ironic part here is that NixOS and Steam don't really play that well together: Nothing is where pre-built binaries expect it to be on NixOS, including ld.so, so pre-built binaries simply won't run without patching. NixOS can do that for Steam... but as Steam is also downloading binaries, essentially being its own package manager, those binaries then run into the same issue.
  OTOH you can just run the whole shebang in a chroot, exposing exactly what Steam expects (couple of libraries and the graphics drivers) which is what NixOS does and I never had any issues.
  Another hurdle would be that NixOS is not end-user friendly. It just hasn't been a focus, Valve would need to write a graphical configuration/package management utility. NixOS also doesn't tend to go easy on disk space and network bandwidth which might be considerations, OTOH probably not an issue if they manage their own release channel. Things like flatpack also aren't an issue they get the same treatment Steam does.

What anime is the yuri one from?
- Ao-chan can't study. It drove me insane for a bit because I could have sworn I watched it. I didn't but I think maybe I saw this scene somewhere.
  *it hit me that I definitely saw this scene somewhere, probably a pretty high number of times without context.
  
  tank u

Of course it's gay, I use Arch btw
- Hey, that rhymes. That’s sublime.

context?
- SteamOS 1 and 2 were Debian based, but SteamOS 3 (the version that launched with the Steam Deck) is Arch based.
- SteamOS

😄rolling for the win
- SteamOS isn't rolling release, though.
  
  But arch tho

Contains anime, bad post
- Yuri though, so good post
  
  Yuri enjoyer spotted instant upvote
- I think you mean Linux + Anime, good post.

Are they upset they didn't get hit with the xz backdoor?
- Neither hit the backdoor. Arch didn't patch OpenSSH and the library wasn't linked as a result.
- If they wanted backdoors, they would use windows

Making a proprietary operating system is not the right decision. It's unethical to take away people's ability to control their own devices.
- How does Valve prevent you from controlling your own device? Their version of Linux isn't locked down, you can fully customize it like any Linux afaik.
  
  Their system (and the Steam client) is proprietary, which means you can't easily see what the software does or change it. If you can't control the software then you don't control the device. People deserve to have the 4 essential freedoms. This is why Windows is bad and it's the same with SteamOS.
- Just because they made steam start on boot. Doesn't mean you can't control your device...
  
  Steam (and other parts of SteamOS) is non free software, it can do anything on your system and there is no easy way for you to change that or even know what it does. Valve developers put themselves in a position of power over you. They keep secrets from you on your own device. This in itself is unethical, but they also abuse their users with DRM. How can you say that you have control in this case?

132 comments