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Presumably the EU/etc. would go after them if they tried something like this? Besides desktop isn’t really as important to MS these days as it used to be. > fo

Presumably the EU/etc. would go after them if they tried something like this? Besides desktop isn’t really as important to MS these days as it used to be. > fostered a native GNU/Linux Wouldn’t that require a stable ABI and such? Making Linux binary/proprietary software friendly seems like a much harder task than [potentially] fighting MS over the right to reimplement their APIs.

pjmlp 2y ago
Yes, and? SteamOS can provide such ABI, just like Google does with Android.
- wqaatwt 2y ago
  So it wouldn’t be native Linux? Why build something from scratch when Wine/Proton is already there and is pretty much the same thing? Of course that would be the trivial (if still very complicated and expensive on its own) part, incentivizing developers to invest the amount of resources needed to port their games to a new platform (which would have single digit % market share at best) would be a lot harder. Sure there might be some risks. But I don’t really see why MS would be bothered to actually try and kill Wine. The risk of antitrust etc. would be very high and MS wouldn’t gain too much from this anyway. Besides.. the Supreme Court already ruled in favor of Google over the Java/Oracle thing not sure how would this be much different.
  - pjmlp 2y ago
    It would be native SteamOS, which is more native Linux than Android or ChromeOS will ever be, and still people call those Linux distributions. Because Valve castle is on Windows kingdom, and it might learn about OS/2 the hard way.
    - wqaatwt 2y ago
      > It would be native And? I fail to see how is that so valuable on its own. I mean don’t get me wrong I do see some merits but realistically if Valve went that way they would struggle getting of the ground and it would just be a waste of time/money. Possibly one pathway that could actually be feasible would be to leverage Wine to gain significant marketshare and then incrementally transition to a more “native” approach. > the hard way. How? I mean what could MS actually do about this? Besides trying to compete by offering alternative options.
      - Vilian 2y ago
        Just the existence of steam deck is the transition to a native approach, they put pressure on devs and game engines to support, but proton is a weird middle layer, it would be easier to support Linux and vulkan natively and that's growing
        pjmlp 2y ago
        There is zero pressure on the devs, as it is currently, they target Windows and Valve does the work if they care to make it work, just like IBM tried with OS/2 and its "Runs Windows better than Windows" campaign. Also good luck supporting DirectX 12 Ultimate features not available on Vulkan, or what Microsoft and NVidia just announced at CES, AI Shaders.
        wqaatwt 2y ago
        > Also good luck supporting If Nvidia and game developers care about supporting Linux they’ll try to figure something out. If they don’t they won’t. But surely the cost required to do so is lower when targeting Wine/Proton than native Linux? If they are unwilling to do that when the cost is relatively low (or at least e.g. making these new features toggle-able/optional) they certainly wouldn’t even provide a native Linux if Proton wasn’t a thing.
        pjmlp 2y ago
        Playstation is based of FreeBSD and Android NDK has OpenGL ES, Vulkan, OpenSL ES, OpenMAX. Porting is relatively easy for those studios, they don't because that development costs of having a Linux build and QA isn't worth it. With Valve pushing WINE/Proton is even better, they don't need to care at all that Linux exists, Valve will do the work for free for them. Which as IBM discovered, isn't really the future proofing way to build an ecosystem with someone's else OS.
        wqaatwt 2y ago
        > isn't worth it. Exactly. If Valve went the native route why would that have changed? > Which as IBM discovered You keep repeating that in every comment but I don’t quite understand how is this some conclusive argument. Especially when you don’t elaborate on what specifically do you think could happen.

pjmlp 2y ago

Yes, and? SteamOS can provide such ABI, just like Google does with Android.

wqaatwt 2y ago
So it wouldn’t be native Linux? Why build something from scratch when Wine/Proton is already there and is pretty much the same thing? Of course that would be the trivial (if still very complicated and expensive on its own) part, incentivizing developers to invest the amount of resources needed to port their games to a new platform (which would have single digit % market share at best) would be a lot harder. Sure there might be some risks. But I don’t really see why MS would be bothered to actually try and kill Wine. The risk of antitrust etc. would be very high and MS wouldn’t gain too much from this anyway. Besides.. the Supreme Court already ruled in favor of Google over the Java/Oracle thing not sure how would this be much different.
- pjmlp 2y ago
  It would be native SteamOS, which is more native Linux than Android or ChromeOS will ever be, and still people call those Linux distributions. Because Valve castle is on Windows kingdom, and it might learn about OS/2 the hard way.
  - wqaatwt 2y ago
    > It would be native And? I fail to see how is that so valuable on its own. I mean don’t get me wrong I do see some merits but realistically if Valve went that way they would struggle getting of the ground and it would just be a waste of time/money. Possibly one pathway that could actually be feasible would be to leverage Wine to gain significant marketshare and then incrementally transition to a more “native” approach. > the hard way. How? I mean what could MS actually do about this? Besides trying to compete by offering alternative options.
    - Vilian 2y ago
      Just the existence of steam deck is the transition to a native approach, they put pressure on devs and game engines to support, but proton is a weird middle layer, it would be easier to support Linux and vulkan natively and that's growing
      - pjmlp 2y ago
        There is zero pressure on the devs, as it is currently, they target Windows and Valve does the work if they care to make it work, just like IBM tried with OS/2 and its "Runs Windows better than Windows" campaign. Also good luck supporting DirectX 12 Ultimate features not available on Vulkan, or what Microsoft and NVidia just announced at CES, AI Shaders.
        wqaatwt 2y ago
        > Also good luck supporting If Nvidia and game developers care about supporting Linux they’ll try to figure something out. If they don’t they won’t. But surely the cost required to do so is lower when targeting Wine/Proton than native Linux? If they are unwilling to do that when the cost is relatively low (or at least e.g. making these new features toggle-able/optional) they certainly wouldn’t even provide a native Linux if Proton wasn’t a thing.
        pjmlp 2y ago
        Playstation is based of FreeBSD and Android NDK has OpenGL ES, Vulkan, OpenSL ES, OpenMAX. Porting is relatively easy for those studios, they don't because that development costs of having a Linux build and QA isn't worth it. With Valve pushing WINE/Proton is even better, they don't need to care at all that Linux exists, Valve will do the work for free for them. Which as IBM discovered, isn't really the future proofing way to build an ecosystem with someone's else OS.
        wqaatwt 2y ago
        > isn't worth it. Exactly. If Valve went the native route why would that have changed? > Which as IBM discovered You keep repeating that in every comment but I don’t quite understand how is this some conclusive argument. Especially when you don’t elaborate on what specifically do you think could happen.