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  (Source: geek.com)
For those who want to participate in the Steam for Linux beta program, download the most recent Steam Linux client or upgrade

Valve Corporation has announced that the Steam for Linux beta program is now open to the public.

Up until this point, the Steam for Linux beta program was closed to the public, but making it available itsn't the only Steam-related news. Steam for Linux beta client bugs will be tracked through GitHub, which is a change from the use of forums in the closed version. Anyone can access the Steam for Linux repository with a free GitHub account in order to create, edit and track new issues as well as search others in the database.

There are a few other changes as well, such as the Steam installer package repository, and fixes to excessive CPU usage by the Steam client during Team Fortress 2 as well as overlay crash in Cubemen and better back navigation behavior/added discount behaviors in Big Picture.

For those who want to participate in the Steam for Linux beta program, download the most recent Steam Linux client or upgrade your current client to the latest version.

Back in October, Valve announced that it was allowing users to apply for the Steam for Linux beta. Valve said it was specifically looking for experienced users familiar with Linux and are running Ubuntu 12.04 or above. There were only 1,000 spots available in the registry.

Source: Steam


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RE: Dawn of a new Day
By inighthawki on 12/20/2012 11:10:39 PM , Rating: 2
quote:
On the plus side, OpenGL optimizations have been going very well for Valve. In the two years since Steam launched for OS X they got Source to run very fast on it, and they currently have Source games running faster under Linux than they do in Windows. Granted, 315fps in Linux vs 270fps in Windows gives no practical benefits since it is already so fast, but it is still worth noting.


I'm still very suspicious of this claim, since they've released no details. Is it one particular scenario, one particular configuration of hardware. Did they use DX9 or DX11. If DX9, then LOL of course OpenGL 4.2 will be better. Lets compare a brand new API to one that's 10 years old...


RE: Dawn of a new Day
By TakinYourPoints on 12/20/2012 11:48:05 PM , Rating: 2
Incorrect, they released all of those details. Hardware was a GTX 680, Intel i7-3930k, and 32GB of RAM, and the operating systems were Windows 7 and Ubuntu 12.04. All current Source engine games use DX9, not DX10 or 11, so that part is irrelevant. The version of OpenGL being newer is also beside the point, it took months of optimizations and custom driver work to get L4D2 on Linux to go all the way up from 6fps to what they're running now.

Either way, I'm all for cross-platform to work. It has been in Microsoft's best interests to make sure that the best gaming experiences are on their platforms, despite the fact that OpenGL ports and original games on Mac, PS3, and iOS (through OpenGL ES) have been solid for years.

Valve (and Blizzard) are mostly responsible for keeping PC gaming viable in the first place, so if they want to open things up to platforms other than Windows or Mac, I'm all for it.


RE: Dawn of a new Day
By inighthawki on 12/21/2012 12:59:30 AM , Rating: 2
quote:
Incorrect, they released all of those details. Hardware was a GTX 680, Intel i7-3930k, and 32GB of RAM, and the operating systems were Windows 7 and Ubuntu 12.04

Sorry I should have clarified, I worded that very poorly. I meant whether or not it only did that well on one hardware configuration, or others as well? What were their OTHER tests. They could have easily tested it on 100 machines and cherry picked the one that worked best. They could've had dozens of lower end systems that run significantly worse.

quote:
Source engine games use DX9, not DX10 or 11, so that part is irrelevant.

That doesn't mean they don't have internal builds with different rendering engines. Knowing what they tested against is incredibly relevant.

quote:
The version of OpenGL being newer is also beside the point, it took months of optimizations and custom driver work to get L4D2 on Linux to go all the way up from 6fps to what they're running now.

No I think that's great, but when you claim "OpenGL runs better on Windows 7 than DirectX" you need to know which one you're referring to, because DX11 is much more optimized than DX9.


RE: Dawn of a new Day
By TakinYourPoints on 12/21/2012 3:07:20 AM , Rating: 1
I didn't say that OpenGL is faster than DirectX, I said that they got Left 4 Dead 2 running faster in OpenGL, huge difference. :)

I don't expect this to be the same for everyone. For example, I wouldn't automatically assume that Blizzard would get similar results with Starcraft 2 or Diablo 3, it all depends.


RE: Dawn of a new Day
By inighthawki on 12/21/2012 12:33:33 PM , Rating: 2
Again, poor wording, I apologize. I was using "you"generically to mean Valve, not literally you.


RE: Dawn of a new Day
By TakinYourPoints on 12/21/2012 6:32:25 PM , Rating: 2
No worries!


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