Elite:Dangerous for Linux?

Quick update on getting it running in WINE. As of 1.75.3 we now have a new error, which is a WINE error and not a windows crash. The error is 'The operating system was unable to create a window for the game to run in, please check your display drivers' This is promising as it appears from reading logs that this is due to dx11 and stuff that is still to be implemented. Given that there are on average around 5-6 dx11 commits a day, we might get this running just yet.
 
I hope they eventually getting it running native on Linux. I remember running a dual boot and running Unreal Tournament 2004 on both. Running it under Linux allowed you to move all the graphics sliders to the right, when that would crawl the windows implementation.

I'd dual boot my PC just to play Elite Dangerous on Linux!!!
 
Its not going to happen until Vulkan is launched, and becomes more of a viable option. This is the reason why MAC isn't getting Horizons at the same time as PC, due to the lack of Compute Shaders support in current OpenGL.

I am hoping Vulkan will address this as its multi platform, and so should be just fine on Linux, Mac, and even Windows if they so desired.. Hopefully Frontier will support it and there should be no reason after that point for them not to port it to Linux.
 
with OpenGL 4.x and GLSL, all the comput shaders Dx11 can muster, GLSL can do to. so I don't know where you get that from..

Well, that and poor OSX doesn't support OpenGL4.x, so technically, a current OpenGL Linux port would be WAY better than it is on Mac.

alas, i'm afraid your probably right about Vulkan, but it's just an excuse.

I still believe Frontier just dislikes Linux and refuses to port on that basis.
 
SteamOS is a Debian derivative. (Debian 7 to be specific)
Ubuntu is a Debian derivative.

There was talk originally of SteamOS being built of off Ubuntu instead. I think that's where the confusion came from. While being built from Debian, Ubuntu seems to be more its own OS in comparison to SteamOS which seems more like Steam running ontop of Debian, at least from what I've seen so far.

Either way, it's nice seeing Valve take such initiative, even with things such as Vulkan, especially since I won't be using DirectX 12, since I doubt we'll be seeing it for Windows 7. The future looks bright for us Linux users. Now to get FD on board... :)
 
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I'm glad they came to their senses, and used Debian.
If memory serves, Ubuntu 32-bit was the first working distro to use for steamOS, 64-bit wasn't supported.
 
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Its not going to happen until Vulkan is launched, and becomes more of a viable option. This is the reason why MAC isn't getting Horizons at the same time as PC, due to the lack of Compute Shaders support in current OpenGL.

I am hoping Vulkan will address this as its multi platform, and so should be just fine on Linux, Mac, and even Windows if they so desired.. Hopefully Frontier will support it and there should be no reason after that point for them not to port it to Linux.

It would be better (for me) if any hypothetical port was distro agnostic. I like my cutting edge versions, as close to upstream as possible. Really you only need to specify an OpenGL version and driver version. The rest should be up to us (i.e. me). ;)
 
It would be better (for me) if any hypothetical port was distro agnostic. I like my cutting edge versions, as close to upstream as possible. Really you only need to specify an OpenGL version and driver version. The rest should be up to us (i.e. me). ;)

I agree. Though Vulkan seems to make the most sense going forward for... well everyone except Microsoft. :D

[video=youtube;quNsdYfWXfM]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=quNsdYfWXfM[/video]
 
Its not going to happen until Vulkan is launched, and becomes more of a viable option. This is the reason why MAC isn't getting Horizons at the same time as PC, due to the lack of Compute Shaders support in current OpenGL.

I am hoping Vulkan will address this as its multi platform, and so should be just fine on Linux, Mac, and even Windows if they so desired.. Hopefully Frontier will support it and there should be no reason after that point for them not to port it to Linux.

The compute shaders you speak of are supported in OGL 4.3. The Mac is currently only running OGL 4.1, hence the problem with horizons for Mac.

Also it may appear that Apple are not going to be implementing Vulcan at all (they haven't even updated OGL), but in going with their own 'Metal' api instead (which I believe does not support compute shaders either).
 
The compute shaders you speak of are supported in OGL 4.3. The Mac is currently only running OGL 4.1, hence the problem with horizons for Mac.

Also it may appear that Apple are not going to be implementing Vulcan at all (they haven't even updated OGL), but in going with their own 'Metal' api instead (which I believe does not support compute shaders either).

Additionally, shaders written in GLSL on OGL 4.5 (which again, Linux supports and Mac does not), are VulKan compatible, and require littl to no effort to port..

and as for SteamOS, it is now based on Debian 8.2 (http://news.softpedia.com/news/valv...l-distro-now-based-on-debian-8-2-493962.shtml)

Valve is not waiting for FD, even though we still are. =/

I conjected earlier in this thread that the Mac port would be more trouble than a linux port to maintain. Seems like it's going to be. I further maintain a Linux port is worth more money and will cost less to support, too.

We're all here wishing, have been for years.. why wouldn't we all be here helping too, if not more of us, if there was a Linux version?

anyway.. another wasted US$0.02++
 
Additionally, shaders written in GLSL on OGL 4.5 (which again, Linux supports and Mac does not), are VulKan compatible, and require littl to no effort to port..

and as for SteamOS, it is now based on Debian 8.2 (http://news.softpedia.com/news/valv...l-distro-now-based-on-debian-8-2-493962.shtml)


Valve is not waiting for FD, even though we still are. =/

I conjected earlier in this thread that the Mac port would be more trouble than a linux port to maintain. Seems like it's going to be. I further maintain a Linux port is worth more money and will cost less to support, too.

We're all here wishing, have been for years.. why wouldn't we all be here helping too, if not more of us, if there was a Linux version?

anyway.. another wasted US$0.02++

That is the thing. Even if FD released a YMMV quick and dirty ED linux port with every release with no support the community would do serious $$ worth of work testing and tweaking to get it to work across distros.
 
I agree with the previous few. I also think that there's a solid chance it could be a free fix to the AMD driver issues some of us are experiencing. OGL pipeline is much closer to the hardware. DX12 might be something else, but we only have marketing to go on there.
 
That is the thing. Even if FD released a YMMV quick and dirty ED linux port with every release with no support the community would do serious $$ worth of work testing and tweaking to get it to work across distros.

The thing I am most interested in is that, with Valve releasing their own SteamOS linux API, it will go a long long way to help consolidate some of the fragmentation issues that we have within the Linux community regarding distros and compatibility. If companies release a SteamOS compatible game, then the rest of us WILL be able to get it working with little to no effort.

I agree with the previous few. I also think that there's a solid chance it could be a free fix to the AMD driver issues some of us are experiencing. OGL pipeline is much closer to the hardware. DX12 might be something else, but we only have marketing to go on there.

Ironically AMD's Mantle has been a significant factor in the development and implementation of DX12 and (to a lesser effect) Vulkan. With the definite reality that there will be a PS4 version, then it makes perfect sense that they could indeed use OGL/Vulkan
as their main graphics API, even on Windows machines.
 
That is the thing. Even if FD released a YMMV quick and dirty ED linux port with every release with no support the community would do serious $$ worth of work testing and tweaking to get it to work across distros.

Here we go again. Valve is not full of stupid people. That's why they have created "Steam Runtime" so that when you install Steam on your favourite distro, you get all libs pretending to be Ubuntu 12.04 environment. In a layman terms, With steam you get unified linux stuff. No fragmentation.

https://github.com/ValveSoftware/steam-runtime

My first post. Reporting for duty.

Even if ED would release quick and dirty port, there would be an Arch Wiki page with workarounds same day. I am betting on Wine to be first though.
 
Here we go again. Valve is not full of stupid people. That's why they have created "Steam Runtime" so that when you install Steam on your favourite distro, you get all libs pretending to be Ubuntu 12.04 environment. In a layman terms, With steam you get unified linux stuff. No fragmentation.

https://github.com/ValveSoftware/steam-runtime

My first post. Reporting for duty.

Even if ED would release quick and dirty port, there would be an Arch Wiki page with workarounds same day. I am betting on Wine to be first though.

Nice post, repped, and thanks for stepping in. Valve is pretty serious about enforcing Steam Runtime on SM and rest of Linux distros. About time.
 
Trouble is with (some of) the linux userbase/maintainers really. As long as Valve don't step on the free (as in liberty) crowd, it'll be gravy.

You will find some distros will force you to jump through hoops to install non-free software and that is also a form of fragmentation, there are good reasons for this, but the people who just want to play games will find it annoying. If it takes off there will be official supported distros, because that just makes sense.
 
+1 for the Linux version.

I too didn't pledge to the kickstarter at the time because Linux was my main OS. I'd like to get a Valve Steam Machine console when they move on a bit and a Linux version of ED would make that even more attractive.
 
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Trouble is with (some of) the linux userbase/maintainers really. As long as Valve don't step on the free (as in liberty) crowd, it'll be gravy.

You will find some distros will force you to jump through hoops to install non-free software and that is also a form of fragmentation, there are good reasons for this, but the people who just want to play games will find it annoying. If it takes off there will be official supported distros, because that just makes sense.

The thing is with Linux, is that it will adapt. Valve have been pretty forthcoming with how they see the whole Linux/SteamOS gaming setup evolve.
One of the major problems with the perception of linux users is that we want everything to be open sourced, and to a lesser extent, free. I don't really care that my Nvidia drivers are closed source, or that Steam is using closed source API's. I bought the graphics card and I installed Steam on Manjaro. I want to play some games :D. (on a great OS that cost me nothing and I can Monitor it like crazy if I ever get paranoid enough to want to :p ).
 
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