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What do you mean "skewing the results"?

by Hamuko 3y ago

LeoPanthera 3y ago
They mean that most people don't think of Steam Deck users as "Linux Gamers". SteamOS is essentially an appliance OS. It's what comes with the Steam Deck. People don't choose it, it's the default.
- itsboring 3y ago
  This feels like a double standard to me. If you exclude Steam Deck users because it comes with Linux by default, then you should also exclude all the people who bought laptops that come with Windows by default, no? They’re not Windows gamers, they’re just using what came with their computer.
  - LeoPanthera 3y ago
    That would be true if Windows could be described as an appliance OS designed only to play games, but it's not. SteamOS is.
    - itsboring 3y ago
      I disagree. I don’t believe that distinction is relevant. My reasoning is that the large number of SteamOS users allows Valve to justify spending time and resources improving things like Mesa and amdgpu (edit: and of course Proton, which is huge), which benefits many Linux gamers that do not own Steam Deck. I use the SteamOS compositor (gamescope) on my desktop PC because it’s great—-and it probably wouldn’t exist without SteamOS. The only reason I care about the number of Linux users is because more users means more development resources. Using that criteria, Steam Deck users very much “count”.
    - Hamuko 3y ago
      SteamOS is just Arch. You can use it for anything you could use Arch for. The fact that people elect to mainly use it for gaming doesn't really mean that's all it's designed for. I also have a gaming PC that runs Windows 11 and I never use it for anything other than gaming. Doesn't mean it couldn't be used for other things.
      - LeoPanthera 3y ago
        > SteamOS is just Arch. That's technically true, but oversimplified enough to be misleading. SteamOS boots from a read-only OS partition from which you can change nothing. You can only write to your "home folder", and you can only add new software using Flatpak, or Steam itself.

What do you mean "skewing the results"?

by Hamuko 3y ago

What do you mean "skewing the results"?

They mean that most people don't think of Steam Deck users as "Linux Gamers". SteamOS is essentially an appliance OS. It's what comes with the Steam Deck. People don't choose it, it's the default.

itsboring 3y ago
This feels like a double standard to me. If you exclude Steam Deck users because it comes with Linux by default, then you should also exclude all the people who bought laptops that come with Windows by default, no? They’re not Windows gamers, they’re just using what came with their computer.
- LeoPanthera 3y ago
  That would be true if Windows could be described as an appliance OS designed only to play games, but it's not. SteamOS is.
  - itsboring 3y ago
    I disagree. I don’t believe that distinction is relevant. My reasoning is that the large number of SteamOS users allows Valve to justify spending time and resources improving things like Mesa and amdgpu (edit: and of course Proton, which is huge), which benefits many Linux gamers that do not own Steam Deck. I use the SteamOS compositor (gamescope) on my desktop PC because it’s great—-and it probably wouldn’t exist without SteamOS. The only reason I care about the number of Linux users is because more users means more development resources. Using that criteria, Steam Deck users very much “count”.
  - Hamuko 3y ago
    SteamOS is just Arch. You can use it for anything you could use Arch for. The fact that people elect to mainly use it for gaming doesn't really mean that's all it's designed for. I also have a gaming PC that runs Windows 11 and I never use it for anything other than gaming. Doesn't mean it couldn't be used for other things.
    - LeoPanthera 3y ago
      > SteamOS is just Arch. That's technically true, but oversimplified enough to be misleading. SteamOS boots from a read-only OS partition from which you can change nothing. You can only write to your "home folder", and you can only add new software using Flatpak, or Steam itself.