this post was submitted on 12 Nov 2023
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Good, I believe that SteamOS has the ability to bring Linux to the masses, but we don’t need a repeat of last time.
Genuine question: what happened last time?
Steam Machines. They were supposed to bring PC gaming to the living room but didn't live up to that promise.
StreamOS was a bitch to install on an ordinary PC then. I tried multiple times and just got a black screen or it didn't boot at all.
It sucked.
I ran it. it was fine for the games I played but it made my fans rev up like jet engines.
Nothing. Nothing at all.
Steam Machines were something Valve tried to do back in the early 2010’s. If I remember correctly, it was around the time that Windows 8 was coming out, and Microsoft was making noises that sounded like they wanted to run every game purchase through the Microsoft Store. The same way Apple forces devs to sell iOS apps on the App Store, so Apple can shave a cut off the top of every purchase.
Valve basically went “fuck that with a rusty spike. We’ll just write our own OS instead.” So they started working on Steam Machines, which were meant to be an out-of-the-box solution for steam games. They contracted with established PC builders (like Alienware) to provide machines with set specs, similar to the way console gaming works. The idea was that you’d be able to buy a small MicroATX machine which you could plug into any available screen. Valve was hoping that more players would shift towards playing on TV’s with controllers. Basically, they realized that gamers were split into “desk” (PC) players and “couch” (console) gamers. And prior to Steam Machines, Valve had almost entirely focused on targeting desk gamers. So they figured that if they could move PC gaming to the couch, they could capture the couch gaming market.
This is where the Steam Controller came from, as it was developed to help bridge the gap between controllers and mouse+keyboard games. It’s also where the (now delisted) SteamLink came from, which was basically mirroring Valves desire to capture the couch gaming market.
Isn't Android very heavily based on Linux too (even if a lot of it is hidden at the surface level)? I can't think of anything more mainstream than that.
I'm old enough to remember the Phantom Console bringing PC gaming to the masses too. Safe to say the Steam Deck is quite a lot more successful than that, given the only part they ended up making was a keyboard and mouse you could use from the sofa.
Android is Linux. It's funny because this is the rare case where Stallman's pedantry comes in handy. Android is absolutely not GNU/Linux, the OS family known as 'Linux', but the kernel is the Linux kernel.
If people don't see Android as bringing Linux to the masses (which I don't), then it's dubious SteamOS would either. If it's just a container for Steam, it's not really the same thing as Linux adoption. ChromeOS actually is GNU/Linux, but I doubt many would count that either.
Even so, more consumer products with Linux inside means more improvements that benefit everyone.
Because it's not. The kernel is meaningless if the user space is gimped.