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I hadn't heard of Proton before and the article doesn't explain. Here's what the GitHub repo for it says [1]: > Proton is a tool for use with the Steam client

by tgb 7y ago

I hadn't heard of Proton before and the article doesn't explain. Here's what the GitHub repo for it says [1]: > Proton is a tool for use with the Steam client which allows games which are exclusive to Windows to run on the Linux operating system. It uses Wine to facilitate this. My question is, what's the "secret sauce"? If this is in fact that much more successful than Wine, what's different? Is Valve putting lots of dev time into it? Or is it just pre-configured for ease of use? [1] https://github.com/ValveSoftware/Proton https://github.com/ValveSoftware/Proton

chipperyman573 7y ago
It's valve putting a lot of dev time into it. Part of that dev time was spent on making it pre-configured for ease of use
- joerickard 7y ago
  Yes, it will also use a known good version of wine for a particular game. Switching versions manually to find one that worked for old or newer games had been a headache; that work is now done by proton.
m4rtink 7y ago
To me it seems like a kind of Wine staging, with patches not ready to be merged into the Wine mainline, yet could make some game run or run better. Over time as the code is proven in production and/or is cleaned up to upstream standards, it can be merged to upstream Wine, reducing the difference. Also IIRC there are some other pieces that are not (yet?) part of Wine, that are distributed with it, such as the various DirectX->Vulkan translation layers.
ekianjo 7y ago
It's Wine + DXVK (including D9VK since they merged together) + ESync with a different Wine environment for each game. Valve also helped Codeweavers developers to implement controllers support thru Wine.
- blaser-waffle 7y ago
  > ESync with a different Wine environment for each game This is where Proton was a win for me. It's not super hard to make many of the popular games work, but managing the different wineprefix's or making sure some random DLL is or isn't installed was a pain. Proton keeps 'em clean, separate, and up to date.
bayesianbot 7y ago
I'd be really surprised if there wasn't fixes and configs for a lot of games in Proton, but also that now you at least can install and run Windows games on Linux from Steam. Before Proton, even when I owned a Windows game, I had to pirate it to run it through Wine.
rataerix 7y ago
It's alot more convenient then wine as it's built into steam. You could get a lot of games working on wine before but setup could be a bit of a pain. With Proton you just install and play on steam like you would with a native Linux game.
Zhyl 7y ago
In addition to the what others have said (DXVK, pre-configured WINE, D9VK), the Steam client integration is also a MASSIVE quality of life boost and a serious lowering of the barrier to entry. With Proton, the Windows versions of games appear in your library [1] and you just click to download and install [2]. And then that's it! No faff, no managing wine versions. If someone is intending to play a whitelisted game then for all intents and purposes their UX is exactly the same as playing the game on Windows - which is to say "very straightforward". [1] By default only whitelisted games appear. While this whitelist is expanding, it's also possible to enable Proton to automatically run for all non-native games. [2] A warning window will pop up to inform the user that a compatibility layer is being used, but otherwise it's identical.
- snvzz 7y ago
  >[1] By default only whitelisted games appear. While this whitelist is expanding, it's also possible to enable Proton to automatically run for all non-native games. Or better, enable it for the game you want to try. Properties -> use compatibility tool.
  - Zhyl 7y ago
    This also allows you to use different version of Proton for different games (e.g. it's fixed in a beta build or broken in the latest build) and to enable Proton for games which have a native version!
- nialv7 7y ago
  Add to what you have said, Proton also has out-of-the-box SteamVR integration, which is very handy if you play VR games.
- sdenton4 7y ago
  In my experience, random non-whitelisted indie games work pretty great. My guess is that the average small shop is using more 'default' tooling with less custom engine stuff, meaning things are more likely to work under proton out-of-the-box than a giant AAA megabeast. (I've had very similar experiences in a very different context with OEM Android. Small manufacturers don't screw around with the OS internals, while big shops (eg, the one rhyming with HamStrung) are more likely to change things in non-obvious ways.)
adev_ 7y ago
> My question is, what's the "secret sauce"? If this is in fact that much more successful than Wine, what's different? Mainly configuration. You can almost run everything with wine but it implies quite a lot of tiny config changes and know how. The force of proton has been to do all of that out of the box without user knowledge. It's honestly a success, and a big one.
pmarreck 7y ago
There's also this handy reference: https://www.protondb.com/ https://www.protondb.com/

by tgb 7y ago

chipperyman573 7y ago

It's valve putting a lot of dev time into it. Part of that dev time was spent on making it pre-configured for ease of use

joerickard 7y ago
Yes, it will also use a known good version of wine for a particular game. Switching versions manually to find one that worked for old or newer games had been a headache; that work is now done by proton.

m4rtink 7y ago

To me it seems like a kind of Wine staging, with patches not ready to be merged into the Wine mainline, yet could make some game run or run better. Over time as the code is proven in production and/or is cleaned up to upstream standards, it can be merged to upstream Wine, reducing the difference. Also IIRC there are some other pieces that are not (yet?) part of Wine, that are distributed with it, such as the various DirectX->Vulkan translation layers.

ekianjo 7y ago

It's Wine + DXVK (including D9VK since they merged together) + ESync with a different Wine environment for each game. Valve also helped Codeweavers developers to implement controllers support thru Wine.

blaser-waffle 7y ago
> ESync with a different Wine environment for each game This is where Proton was a win for me. It's not super hard to make many of the popular games work, but managing the different wineprefix's or making sure some random DLL is or isn't installed was a pain. Proton keeps 'em clean, separate, and up to date.

bayesianbot 7y ago

I'd be really surprised if there wasn't fixes and configs for a lot of games in Proton, but also that now you at least can install and run Windows games on Linux from Steam. Before Proton, even when I owned a Windows game, I had to pirate it to run it through Wine.

rataerix 7y ago

It's alot more convenient then wine as it's built into steam. You could get a lot of games working on wine before but setup could be a bit of a pain. With Proton you just install and play on steam like you would with a native Linux game.

Zhyl 7y ago

In addition to the what others have said (DXVK, pre-configured WINE, D9VK), the Steam client integration is also a MASSIVE quality of life boost and a serious lowering of the barrier to entry. With Proton, the Windows versions of games appear in your library [1] and you just click to download and install [2]. And then that's it! No faff, no managing wine versions. If someone is intending to play a whitelisted game then for all intents and purposes their UX is exactly the same as playing the game on Windows - which is to say "very straightforward". [1] By default only whitelisted games appear. While this whitelist is expanding, it's also possible to enable Proton to automatically run for all non-native games. [2] A warning window will pop up to inform the user that a compatibility layer is being used, but otherwise it's identical.

snvzz 7y ago
>[1] By default only whitelisted games appear. While this whitelist is expanding, it's also possible to enable Proton to automatically run for all non-native games. Or better, enable it for the game you want to try. Properties -> use compatibility tool.
- Zhyl 7y ago
  This also allows you to use different version of Proton for different games (e.g. it's fixed in a beta build or broken in the latest build) and to enable Proton for games which have a native version!
nialv7 7y ago
Add to what you have said, Proton also has out-of-the-box SteamVR integration, which is very handy if you play VR games.
sdenton4 7y ago
In my experience, random non-whitelisted indie games work pretty great. My guess is that the average small shop is using more 'default' tooling with less custom engine stuff, meaning things are more likely to work under proton out-of-the-box than a giant AAA megabeast. (I've had very similar experiences in a very different context with OEM Android. Small manufacturers don't screw around with the OS internals, while big shops (eg, the one rhyming with HamStrung) are more likely to change things in non-obvious ways.)

adev_ 7y ago

> My question is, what's the "secret sauce"? If this is in fact that much more successful than Wine, what's different? Mainly configuration. You can almost run everything with wine but it implies quite a lot of tiny config changes and know how. The force of proton has been to do all of that out of the box without user knowledge. It's honestly a success, and a big one.

pmarreck 7y ago

There's also this handy reference: https://www.protondb.com/ https://www.protondb.com/