Made the switch during Christmas to Cachyos. I am extremely glad I did, and so relieved to finally be free of Microsofts clammy grasp.
I already stopped playing online competitive games long ago, so the anti-cheat thing isn’t really a problem for me. All the games I want to play works fine, even better in fact than they did on Windows.
I’ll go ahead and share my experience with Mint so far. Gaming worked mostly fine which is pleasing.
I couldn’t get many basic features working correctly for my dual monitor set up. Even after putting in the time to research.
I couldn’t get multiple proprietary programs to work for my job.
The customization in settings is extremely limited.
I have to mess around with complex terminal commands I do not fully understand every time I need to do something more than use my browser.
I will try another distro this year, but it is definitely not a foolproof experience.
A lot of things Windows does easily, I took for granted.
That article applies to very few people. I do wonder if since this person has some disability that requires this orca program, maybe they could contribute and help? Just a thought.
I am on Linux and never looking back to Windows (except if I have to use Microsoft Teams for interviews).
I have to use Teams for work and it works fine in a (Chrome-based) browser. I have a Chromium install that I only use for work stuff.
I had several issues using teams on browsers before so I felt compelled to use Windows for the app. But I admit that I never tried using it on Chromium so I will try next time.
Doesn’t Teams work in browsers, though (as a guest at least)?
If you can handle the browser version, works fine on Linux with Firefox.
Wow. So brave.
If your job is paid by advertising, yes.
Why, this will only want Microsoft to pay more for advertising, as clearly it’s becoming more necessary to do so.
I’ve been gaming on Linux mostly if not entirely full time since 2014. Back when you had to look to see if there was a Steam icon alongside the Windows and sometimes Apple logo because Proton wasn’t the “everything works” magic it is now.
Anyone complaining about the state of Linux today look like diaper shitting babies. “WAAAH! My privacy invading rootkit requiring multiplayer CoD Fortnite meme slop sippy cup game is specifically designed to not run on Linux. WAAAAH!” Yeah, I remember when hair didn’t grow near my genitals too, but then I stopped acknowledging any of my feelings in public except anger and pretended to like beer out of sheer force of peer pressure, and thus became a fully grown man by the standards of my culture. Get on my level.
What were we talking about?
You keep up the good fight.
You’re definitely living up to your username 👌
I always have since before joining this experiment in mediocrity we call the Fediverse.
In an age of enshitification, pretty ok most of the time is to be celebrated
Entering my 12th year as a Linux user, I can’t disagree with that.
I only have one problem with my linux mint distro: Sometimes cheats for video games don’t work.
Like I like to use savegame editors for Cyberpunk 2077, but they don’t work on linux despite all my attempts, and PINCE (Pince Is Not Cheat Engine) works for almost all games but just not for some.
And that, ladies and gentlemen (and all those in between or neither) is when I finally found a reason to actually code after tinkering on-off for decades: I want to make those save game editors for linux! That is something that legit doesn’t exist but needs to.
our university put linux mint on all the desktop computers this year.
Compsci labs or everywhere?
the department where i am. don’t wanna say which one because privacy concerns.
Wir petzen schon nicht.
Cool. Which university is that? How did it go?
they put linux mint (cinnamon edition) on computers. people more or less used it normally, i’d say most people barely bothered that it’s not windows. essential software that we needed to use was pre-installed (with neatly visible icons on the desktop to click on), and web browser was installed too. that covers basically all use-cases.
one colleague asked how to do screenshots. i showed her.
That’s the main reason, Linux is still not as widespread as Windows - marketing. If you’d ship all of the sold PCs with a pre-installed Linux, nobody would give a shit.
And why would they? The vast majority of ALL computer users just use functions (email, office, browsing) instead of programs. Oh, I know, I know. If you ask, you always hear Word, Excel, Outlook. But to me that are just synonyms for the tedious everyday tasks most users perform. And if you’d stop training people to repeat tasks and klick buttons and instead train them to understand what they’re actually doing … sigh
For everyday computer use, the experience is pretty similar. Unsurprisingly so because that’s how they designed Cinnamon. Funny though, your colleague didn’t think of typing “screenshot” into the search bar of the start menu.
Let us know, I’m very curious. At our school (cal poly pomona), our comp sci professors were upset Ubuntu got put on their lab computers and they were upset because IT didn’t give warning and some didn’t know how to use it.
That sounds like the dumbest possible way to go about this.
If you’re curious about migrations, there will be several talks at this years FOSSDEM from people sharing their experiences migrating whole organizations /municipalities to FOSS.
I’ll take whatever positive press Linux can get at this point. More people switching over is a good thing.
I made the switch this year
Seriously, all the lutris & co mess is obsolete now.
Open Steam > add non-steam game > properties > compatibility > force proton 10 > profit
Worked for all the cough responsibly ripped .exe’s I’ve thrown at it so far
do steam games run on linux already or something? Like do you only have to do that for non steam games?
do steam games run on linux already or something?
Oversimplification coming, but…
Most (modern) games can actually just run on Linux already, because Linux is where the best cross platform developer tools are.
Today, if a developer wants to publish their game to Windows, Mac, Android, Playstation, Nintendo Switch and XBox - the odds are strong that the developer is actually (possibly unwittingly) writing a Linux native game and then using an engine to port the Linux version to the other platforms.
The reasons for this are complicated, but mainly boil down to Linux being the simplest target to reliably build developer tools for - because every part of Linux is open and public.
Like do you only have to do that for non steam games?
If a game is purchased through Steam, Steam launcher knows enough to choose the best available version of the game for the operating system - whether the best version is the Windows executable running under wine/proton, or a native Linux executable.
I still use bottles to have a persistent virtual drive for things like modding tools.
Most things work perfectly in Steam though.
Yeah. I also use Bottles for GOG / itch games that don’t have a native linux version. And I’m pretty happy with how it works. Things install smoothly and easily, and it has a very nice menu for the games I’ve installed. Here’s what it looks like:
However, there have been some hiccups along the way that might have caused less patient people to give up. In particular, it took me awhile to work out that although I could tell bottle to launch a windows .exe from anywhere on my computer, it would only actually work properly if I first move the exe into the virtual drive - which deep inside a confusing directory structure. (The “troubleshooting” menu option goes directly into talking about this issue; but even finding that menu option isn’t totally straight forward, especially if you’re just launching the exe from a file browser or something.)
Anyway, the upshot is that I like bottles; because it is easy to use but also very transparent about how it works and what it is doing, which I like. But I wouldn’t say it’s the best option for everyone.
Lutris has allowed me to use battle.net though which I don’t think steam can do, afaik. I’m happy to be proven wrong, though
I also had no(*) trouble installing Battle.net in Heroic Launcher, FWIW. Steam probably shouldn’t be much different.
(*) ok, well, not any more trouble than Battle.net usually is on Linux. The point is after prodding at it for awhile it eventually finished installing and updating and started up properly and has worked fine ever since.
I run battle.net through Steam. Works just fine.
Personally I prefer having Battle.net in Lutris (or something else like Bottles) even if you can run it through Steam. I just dislike using a launcher to open another launcher and Lutris avoids that.
I can understand that the Steam method would be a little easier for some people, but using Lutris for something as popular as Battle.net is really easy too. You just click “Add” and search for “Battle.net” and it does the rest automatically, even downloading the installer. The only thing to be aware of is that you should close the launcher when it gets to the point you are asked to log in which completes the installation, but Lutris tells you that as well.
how did you do it? mine does not start after installing.
I added Battle.net-Setup.exe as a non-steam game and set the compatibility tool to Proton Experimental. This seems to have worked for me. Running on Garuda.
‘Works fine’ is not true yet, currently.
Especially annoying on steam deck. Is this a Linux issue? No. It absolutely is not.
If I have an .exe from the high seas that still needs to be unpacked/installed how do I deal with it?
Just started using Linux for playing, currently playing Dispatch (highly recommend it), used Lutris to first install the compacted .exe and then run the launcher .exe. Is there a better way to go about it?
In heroic, you can add the game and while adding it, click “run installer first” and then install the EXE and copy whatever cracks needed. I needed to do that with a few games that are literally not available anymore on stores.
Lutris had been so janky for me the past 10 years and many of the installer scripts literally don’t install any dependencies anyways that I switched to heroic last year and I no longer have games that work completely fine and then next launch they don’t work.
Hell, I’ve got a game I legally purchased on CD back in the Win XP days I’d like to play, and the farthest I got is installed but fails to run.
This may or may not help. But I’ll give you the basic steps using wine only and no Proton magic to run a game from disk:
- Create an empty folder to be your wineprefix (emulated system folder) or use the default.
- run
WINEPREFIX=[full path to new folder] winecfgcommand in terminal (justwinecfgif you will use the default prefix). - mount your CD so that you can see it in your file browser. (Might be simply clicking that device in the file browser when a CD is in the drive bay)
- In the winecfg set drive D: to point to the folder where you mounted the CD.
- run the CD installer with wine… e.g
WINEPREFIX=/some/path wine /media/something/cdrom1/setup.exe, install the game to C: - run the game with WINE on the same prefix and with the CD inserted and mounted (if there are resources on the CD or basic DRM) e.g.
WINEPREFIX=/some/path wine '/some/path/drive_c/Program Files (x86)/Cool Game/coolgame.exe - if that works, you might be able to create an image of the disc and mount that instead of the physical CD, you’d then rerun winecfg and set D: to the correct folder where the disk image is mounted.
So, I’m actually very drunk right now and my eyes just slid right off all that, but I want to set my default misanthropy aside for a second and genuinely thank you for taking the time to write up some genuine helpful tech advice. That’s really cool of you to have done. I might try that day after tomorrow.
Definitely do not recommend trying to set up a winecfg environment while drunk. The two kinds of wine do NOT mix.
You know what they say about wine and beer…
Thanks, I need to give that a try. Most of my non-Steam games (“Deus Ex”, “Giants: Citizen Kabuto”) run just fine under Wine, using the default settings. The only one that doesn’t work is NOLF 1. (Everything works except music).
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Some of y’all are showing your bubble side; outside of our communities here, Linux very much is obscure. That said, there really does seem to be a leak in the mainstream and it’s nice to see it mentioned in a publication. Even if just a little gain, thanks in large part to Steam raising awareness for gamers, US decline in Europe and Canada, and Windows 11 blunders with security.
I’ve gone from people being completely oblivious when I mention Linux, to going “oh, like steam deck?” but there’s still plenty of others who still are oblivious. Then again, mentioning file extensions goes over the heads of 95% of who I talk to, so I wouldn’t have too high hopes.
I think it’s also down to windows 11 being increasingly enshitified, and unwanted AI stuff being forced on users. A lot of people are frustrated and are more open to alternatives.
Everyone acts like it’s all about gaming, but people want to use Lightroom, Photoshop, Excel, their banking and tax software etc. They don’t want the alternatives because they’re not integrated well, they can’t access their Dropbox/Apple Cloud/whatever and they gave Linux their Google password already, why does it need it again for that mail software that has some stupid bird name instead of “mail”.
If you’re setting up an email client you’re almost certainly doing work on the computer and anyone who has setup outlook can setup any other email client so that’s maybe not the example to use. But you’re right in the sense gaming, office environments and schools are the major groups that train window users.
Competitive gamers want edges - a better mouse, a better keyboard, a better internet connection. The latest performance metrics show linux running many games better than windows so this means a major inflow to windows is losing out to linux.
The weird part about all of this is that macbook sales are also up like 4%, suggesting overall a move away from windows. And for most of those apps you listed they also work on mac.
If linux is eating the gaming environment and the mac office experience is better than windows (due to MS enshittification)… the thing keeping windows in place is legacy software, corporate products, oem deals and like historical precedence.
A bunch of the issues you mention aren’t issues anymore, thanks to fully featured web applications.
Sure. There’s always an exception like graphics editing.
We talk about exceptions a lot. But being in a niche professional can lead to either early or late adoption. A job is a job, and we just use the tools we need.
But for stuff like email, banking, and various document services, the average user’s experience is identical:
- Type the product name into Google.
- Register or Sign in.
- Use product.
I do think a good file backup service is one of the big remaining challenges.
Ironically you mentioned two that are I believe are still fully Linux native (Dropbox and Google).
But to your point, people need file backups that just work, and plenty of popular cloud sync services choose not to provide Linux support.
Yup. Although I’ve become a fan of things like GIMP, you do need to learn a new software and depending on who you are, it might take a while. Lucky (?) for me, I was too poor to afford it for school and since it was for official assignments, I didn’t want to pirate.
That said, Microsoft integration is more a curse than a blessing at this point. Privacy and junk aside, it’s dumped hundreds of GB of files onto my tiny SSD C: since it kept changing settings and ignoring my preferences. That’s why Microsoft messing things up is converting people who even prefer integration, when there’s an option to anyway!
Linux very much is obscure
To paraphrase Bill Hicks about drugs…
See, I think
drugsLinuxes have done some good things for us! I really do. And if you don’t believedrugsLinuxes have done good things for us, do me a favor. Go home tonight, take all youralbumsbookmarks, all yourtapeslinks and all yourCDswebsites and burn 'em. 'Cause you know what? Themusiciansservers whomadehost all that greatmusicweb content that’s enhanced your lives throughout the years?Rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrreal fuckin’
highhosted ondrugsLinux.:3 Well, that nearly worked. n_n
(I had intended to add a “they[servers]'re all running linux” meme… but failed to find… instead, this’ll do nicely too…)
https://images3.memedroid.com/images/UPLOADED455/6859360c6abcc.jpeg
Wish I didn’t cave in and bought an NVidia card back in 2022. But well now we’re served with severe shortage of PC hardware all thanks to fucking AI and I’m stuck with a 500GB main SSD and an almost full 2TB spinning disk with a 3050 and I’m sick of MS getting slower by the day it’s ridiculous; I’m still on 10 and not actually paid MS for it ;), but still.
The plan was to get a new 2TB SSD and install a distro, but see above fuckery because of AI.
I’m going to check if I moved all my installed Steam games to the spinning disk will Steam on Linux be able to read it. Because I’m sure as hell am not downloading the game files again if I can help it. If the answer is yes, I’ll just nuke the current SSD to install a distro. I’ll figure how to move installs again later in 2029 or something when SSD prices have gone down again and I can get 2 or 4TB SSD for less than 2 kidneys.
Fuck Microsoft. Fuck NVidia.
I’m going to check if I moved all my installed Steam games to the spinning disk will Steam on Linux be able to read it.
I advise against trying to use the same library for windows and linux, but if you just want to migrate, it should be possible to use Steam’s backup feature.
Thanks. I have a feeling that might be the case. I’ll have to research properly.
I’d say it worked. Bravo. Haha
Idk one of my siblings who I never chalked up as a non-windows user and not particularly tech savvy sent me a screenshot of their linux install. If like the tech barriers to linux are falling then the only thing left to fall is software developers for commercial software.
Idk one of my siblings who I never chalked up as a non-windows user and not particularly tech savvy sent me a screenshot of their linux install.
Yes. 2026 was an interesting year for Linux desktop.
More of my friends installed Linux in response to Windows 11 than I imagined possible.
I think I noticed a correlation with their having a kid in the house who owned a SteamDeck. There’s a generation who are learning Linux in order to mod their games.
We have a time traveller over here.
“Like an Android, but without Google’s control.”
Since Android was built off Linux, just way locked down. Might appeal to a wider range of folk since it isn’t strictly to do with gaming and more people are likely to be familiar with Android than a Steam Deck.
I built a high end Steam machine in October. I haven’t played many Windows games since. There are games I can’t play, like Space Marine 2, but I have so much that I can play I’m kind of fine with it. Being able to PC game in the living room with an OS that is well formatted for TV play is wonderful.
Space Marine 2 no Linux?
It runs like butt. It’s optimized for Windows, apparently.
That’s a shame. But hopefully by the time I’ll buy it in 2 years or something on deep discount, it has better support or optimization.
THIS is the year.
Posts 30 year old photo of Linus
Posts 30 year old photo of Linus sourced from Getty Images. They paid for the image to discuss FOSS.
While talking about the PC desktop in a gaming magazine.
I am brave enough to say it: The ocean has water in it.
Praise me for my braveness.
I get the sentiment but the article is more targeted at the PC gaming crowd that isn’t exactly tech-illiterate but probably only knows Linux from memes about it requiring you to recompile a kernel to install Chrome or some other BS like that
I think a good portion of Lemmy and the fediverse already know it’s been at this level for a long while now but I’m excited to see articles like this since it means the tide is turning against Windows for the average user
but probably only knows Linux from memes about it requiring you to recompile a kernel to install Chrome or some other BS like that
Yeah just look at the article’s comment section (not recommended). Still full of ignorant misinformation. Borderline disinformation IMO.
Yeah, though would be better if the well were not poisoned, misleading perceptions, with words like “brave” and “now”.
How do you live so dangerously, sir? Aren’t you worried about retribution?
i think this bravery is worthy of a marble carving. 12 stories tall, of you pointing at the ocean
Pretty sure Trump’s already building one, but I guess you could put this guy’s next to it.
Wtf. MODSSSSS
I heard somewhere that by the time the scientific community officially announces life on mars the rest of us will have already concluded that there is life on mars. I feel like this is the same thing.
The problem is there’s a large difference between the 50% the average person needs and the 99.9% the scientific community needs. It’s just a different level of proof they’re looking for.
I realize that scientific rigor demands more to assert a claim. I was more commenting on mainstream gamer media embracing Linux after it seems like a well proven option.
Because science doesn’t work on circumstantial evidence, but hard proof.
Next you’ll say the ocean is a soup.
Salt, meat, vegetables–it is soup.
Big if true.
Valorant DaddleDew,
Doth proudly proclaim.
Sees that the sea is due
To torrential rain.Dew truly polymath,
Paragon of deep.
Scrolls Lemmy in the bath
And nods right off to sleep.'zacly.
Best reply.
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I switched my gaming pc to Linux and all the games I tried so far worked good.
Switching the household’s PCs to avoid the Windows 11 BS here. All my stuff is good so far, but the kids have a few games that don’t work - Minecraft Bedrock, Fortnite, and Roblox.
That makes Linux even more attractive!
time to switch them to java edition, bedrock sucks anyway
If your kids really need Roblox to work, they could try Sober. I personally don’t play Roblox, so I’ve never tried it, but I’ve heard good things about it.
Probably for the best, lol. At the very least, Roblox isn’t particularly good for kids.
Also, modded Minecraft through Prism beats bedrock any day of the week. I’m hoping when my kids are of age, they’ll be down for an expert pack. My daughter sure as hell will be, she’s as weird as I am. I’m sure more normal kids have packs they’d enjoy, though.
Have you seen the Schlep controversy? Personally, I would be glad if my family PC suddenly couldn’t run Roblox and “sorry kiddo it just doesn’t work anymore”
Use PrismLauncher for Minecraft! :)
Isn’t that just for Java Edition though? Bedrock has a different launcher, with more modes and mtx to “enjoy”
honestly it’s a good excuse to switch them to java edition, bedrock kinda sucks
Mine are playing Minecraft and Roblox under Linux without problems. I don’t remember what I did for Minecraft, but for Roblox you need something called ‘Sober’.
Minecraft runs natively. One version is Java, so thats easy enough. I think the C++ version has an installer.
