Valve: singlehandedly pushing the adoption of Linux. :blobcatbuffed:
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Toromino #Team9€ (foxhkron@cybre.club)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 18:44:36 JST 
Toromino #Team9€
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SuperDicq (superdicq@minidisc.tokyo)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 18:44:35 JST
SuperDicq
@foxhkron@cybre.club But they are not doing that single-handedly?
There are literally thousands of organizations pushing for GNU/Linux adoption worldwide.翠星石 likes this. -
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SuperDicq (superdicq@minidisc.tokyo)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 18:45:51 JST
SuperDicq
@hj@shigusegubu.club @foxhkron@cybre.club Are they though? Wouldn't any mainstream GNU/Linux distro such as Debian have a higher install count than SteamOS?
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narcolepsy and alcoholism :flag: (hj@shigusegubu.club)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 18:45:52 JST 
narcolepsy and alcoholism :flag:
@SuperDicq @foxhkron valve so far most successful at it. The power of gamers is supreme. -
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SuperDicq (superdicq@minidisc.tokyo)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 19:01:26 JST
SuperDicq
@hj@shigusegubu.club @foxhkron@cybre.club Yes sure by developing SteamOS they contribute to existing free software projects, but they are not doing that single-handedly.
The single-handedly part is what I'm upset about, it is unfair to discount literally everyone else's contributions like that. -
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narcolepsy and alcoholism :flag: (hj@shigusegubu.club)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 19:01:28 JST
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@SuperDicq @foxhkron op said (gnu+)linux, not steamos specifically, valve's linux efforts can be enjoyed even without steamos. -
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翠星石 (suiseiseki@freesoftwareextremist.com)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 20:14:18 JST 
翠星石
@SuperDicq @hj @foxhkron Valve isn't really doing much "steamOS" development - they leave that up to volunteers.
They've paid codeweavers to make improvements to wine and paid developers to work on DVXK and some other projects - but it's clearly not value that is doing the development - at most they pay for some of it. -
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翠星石 (suiseiseki@freesoftwareextremist.com)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 20:21:40 JST
翠星石
@foxhkron @hj @SuperDicq Valve frankly does not care about the popularity of LiGNUx - it's purely a business decision.
"Powered by" is not correct when it comes to Linux - that kernel frankly mostly schedules processes and does stuff like packet routing.
Valve knows that microsoft is desperate to make software installing on windows be only possible via the microsoft store - so they can charge a fat 30% like apple and google.
Valve also knows that microsoft will eventually succeed despite their bungling.
So, Valve looked for the most technically suitable OS available and for "no particular reason" found the GNU OS with Linux added and determined that how Linux being proprietary just doesn't soil GNU enough - they would go and soil it with more proprietary software, with the eventual result of sales no longer being dependent on microsoft. -
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Toromino #Team9€ (foxhkron@cybre.club)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 20:21:41 JST
Toromino #Team9€
@hj@shigusegubu.club @SuperDicq@minidisc.tokyo The undervaluation of voluntary contributions to free software is an issue, but that was not the point of my comment. The use of 'single handedly' was meant as a joke, no need to expand it into an analysis. It was only meant to convey my excitement about Valve releasing a few new products/consoles powered by Linux, which will (most likely) expand the user base beyond existing Linux users. :neofox:
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narcolepsy and alcoholism :flag: (hj@shigusegubu.club)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 20:21:42 JST
narcolepsy and alcoholism :flag:
@SuperDicq @foxhkron yeah it's a bit annoying. -
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翠星石 (suiseiseki@freesoftwareextremist.com)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 20:25:43 JST
翠星石
@hj @foxhkron @SuperDicq Linux is already popular enough - it's running on several billion Android devices as proprietary software that doesn't respect the users freedom.
GNU/Linux is already also installed on almost all internet routers and all computers that matter.
Yes, 3.7-4 million steam decks have been sold - but that is not a good thing, as the software doesn't respect the users freedom and the hardware is handcuffed to ensure that won't ever happen.
It's not good to drive faster if you're driving in the complete wrong direction towards proprietary hell. -
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narcolepsy and alcoholism :flag: (hj@shigusegubu.club)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 20:25:44 JST
narcolepsy and alcoholism :flag:
@Suiseiseki @foxhkron @SuperDicq their hardware is also popularising Linux tbh. -
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翠星石 (suiseiseki@freesoftwareextremist.com)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 20:29:55 JST
翠星石
@hj @foxhkron @SuperDicq How they call it a "Linux PC", not a GNU/Linux or LiGNUx or "GNU PC with Linux" or some other reasonable name indicates what Valve's intentions are.
The processor is handcuffed to stop you from flashing another BIOS. -
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narcolepsy and alcoholism :flag: (hj@shigusegubu.club)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 20:29:56 JST
narcolepsy and alcoholism :flag:
@Suiseiseki @foxhkron @SuperDicq at least valve treats linux and their hardware a lot better than google. Their devices can be re-flashed with any OS no hassle, there's no awful terminology like "sideloading" - it's just a linux PC -
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翠星石 (suiseiseki@freesoftwareextremist.com)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 20:31:28 JST
翠星石
@hj @foxhkron @SuperDicq Yes, modern Intel and AMD processors are all handcuffed - but there are some non-handcuffed PC's available. -
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narcolepsy and alcoholism :flag: (hj@shigusegubu.club)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 20:31:30 JST
narcolepsy and alcoholism :flag:
@Suiseiseki @foxhkron @SuperDicq that's not different from other PCs now innit? -
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翠星石 (suiseiseki@freesoftwareextremist.com)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 20:34:28 JST
翠星石
@a1ba @foxhkron @SuperDicq @hj That message will only be successful if people actually learn that it is basically the GNU OS with Linux added and that the GNU stuff is written to be 100% free software - while Linux and the stuff Valve supplies is proprietary software. -
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:umu: :umu: (a1ba@suya.place)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 20:34:29 JST 
:umu: :umu:
@Suiseiseki @foxhkron @SuperDicq @hj exposing it to people far from computers and tech still good as it helps to avoid some misconceptions and myths about free software being less efficient, unusable or unstable. -
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翠星石 (suiseiseki@freesoftwareextremist.com)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 20:38:40 JST
翠星石
@hj @foxhkron @SuperDicq @a1ba Rather crass, but it seems that people are always ready to take the proprietary "dildo" at >9000 rpm without lube - but they just cannot handle some gentle freedom?
Simply mentioning that GNU exists and that it was written to be free software isn't extreme. -
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narcolepsy and alcoholism :flag: (hj@shigusegubu.club)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 20:38:41 JST
narcolepsy and alcoholism :flag:
@Suiseiseki @foxhkron @SuperDicq @a1ba people need to be spoon fed and gently introduced into it. Carefully lube up their brainhole and slowly insert the freedom horsecock dildo. Most people just ram the said dildo with no lube and maximum force, get upset they reject it and make it even worse. -
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翠星石 (suiseiseki@freesoftwareextremist.com)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 20:39:58 JST
翠星石
@hj @foxhkron @SuperDicq When hundreds of million is on the line, you tend to do what the customer asks for. -
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narcolepsy and alcoholism :flag: (hj@shigusegubu.club)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 20:40:00 JST
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@Suiseiseki @foxhkron @SuperDicq their SoCs are still AMD, i'm not sure how the deal between them goes and if AMD would even allow such change. -
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翠星石 (suiseiseki@freesoftwareextremist.com)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 20:40:01 JST
翠星石
@hj @foxhkron @SuperDicq It would be a simple matter for Valve to order non-handcuffed SoC's - as their number of units is large enough. -
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narcolepsy and alcoholism :flag: (hj@shigusegubu.club)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 20:40:02 JST
narcolepsy and alcoholism :flag:
@Suiseiseki @foxhkron @SuperDicq keyword being "some". Most of the AFAIK are old/obsolete models. I'm saying it's not valve's fault it is what it is. -
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SuperDicq (superdicq@minidisc.tokyo)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 20:41:43 JST
SuperDicq
@a1ba@suya.place @Suiseiseki@freesoftwareextremist.com @foxhkron@cybre.club @hj@shigusegubu.club Calling it GNU is not about who has the most amount of lines of code (because that means that most bloated package would automatically win), but it's about who giving credit to the one project who started the idea and the movement in the first place. Without GNU none of everything else would even exist in the first place.
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:umu: :umu: (a1ba@suya.place)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 20:41:45 JST
:umu: :umu:
@Suiseiseki @foxhkron @SuperDicq @hj to be honest there isn't that much of GNU left in modern distros. glibc and coreutils, mostly. -
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翠星石 (suiseiseki@freesoftwareextremist.com)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 20:43:15 JST
翠星石
@SuperDicq @hj @foxhkron @a1ba Valve has enough leverage to ask AMD to supply a non-handcuffed SoC (or even all the init software as free software too, but AMD might say no to that).
If AMD says no, the solution could be to show that you mean it by going with a non-handcuffed Aarch64 SoC instead for a while, despite the drawbacks and then suddenly AMD in the future might be ready to stop committing fraud if it means not missing out sales. -
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SuperDicq (superdicq@minidisc.tokyo)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 20:43:16 JST
SuperDicq
@Suiseiseki@freesoftwareextremist.com @hj@shigusegubu.club @foxhkron@cybre.club @a1ba@suya.place I think what Suiseiseki means here is that Valve has the power to choose a different brand other than AMD, for example Valve could invest money into a RISC-V SoC instead to avoid the handcuffs.
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翠星石 (suiseiseki@freesoftwareextremist.com)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 20:48:37 JST
翠星石
@a1ba @foxhkron @SuperDicq @hj glibc and coreutils are only 2 GNU packages.
There are far more GNU packages than that; https://www.gnu.org/software/
Modern distros need gcc, binutils, bash, ncurses, gimp, parted, units, grub, gzip, tar, sed, awk, grep, wget, gsl, gettext, gdbm, groff, make, texinfo, unifont, libidn, libiconv, less, autotools, gnupg, libgcrypt, gnuTLS, GNU r, gimp, octaive, gmp and most of the rest of the GNU packages.
Despite all the efforts to bloat up Linux, GNU is still larger than Linux - thus if you want to go by contribution by percentage - Linux is out. -
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SuperDicq (superdicq@minidisc.tokyo)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 20:49:56 JST
SuperDicq
@hj@shigusegubu.club @foxhkron@cybre.club @Suiseiseki@freesoftwareextremist.com @a1ba@suya.place AMD could make x86-64 CPUs without handcuffs if they wanted to, but they choose not to do so because it makes them more money.
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narcolepsy and alcoholism :flag: (hj@shigusegubu.club)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 20:49:58 JST
narcolepsy and alcoholism :flag:
@SuperDicq @foxhkron @Suiseiseki @a1ba they are handcuffed to x86-64 because of videogames, and only now started venturing into ARM and x86-64 emulation, maybe someday we'll see RISC-V Steam Mast or idk Steam Sail with x86-64-to-RISC-V emulation. -
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翠星石 (suiseiseki@freesoftwareextremist.com)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 20:53:24 JST
翠星石
@hj @foxhkron @SuperDicq China has no control over AMD.
While AMD subcontracts fabbing to TSMC in Taiwan - the primary places where hardware is designed is in the USA and Israel.
Of course the NSA and mossad demand backdoors - but clearly there is no requirement that the hardware is handcuffed - just that the proprietary software needed for the hardware is backdoored. -
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narcolepsy and alcoholism :flag: (hj@shigusegubu.club)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 20:53:25 JST
narcolepsy and alcoholism :flag:
@Suiseiseki @foxhkron @SuperDicq maybe chinese government pays more or holds them at gunpoint :chad_xi: -
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翠星石 (suiseiseki@freesoftwareextremist.com)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 20:56:37 JST
翠星石
@a1ba @foxhkron @SuperDicq @hj Many Aarch64 SoC's are handcuffed - but quite a few of them aren't - with any handcuffing being an optional "feature" in the SoC suppliers bootloader.
Also, generally the handcuffs in Aarch64 SoC's have a fatal flaw that allows complete bypassing, while AMD has had enough practice to not screw up that hard - with the result being that the ability to run 100% free software is denied - but of course malware that only needs to make partial changes can work. -
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:umu: :umu: (a1ba@suya.place)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 20:56:38 JST
:umu: :umu:
@Suiseiseki @foxhkron @SuperDicq @hj bold of you to think aarch64 socs aren't handcuffed. -
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翠星石 (suiseiseki@freesoftwareextremist.com)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 20:57:30 JST
翠星石
@hj @foxhkron @SuperDicq I don't think the NSA considers GNUboot enjoyers to be enough of a threat at the moment really.
I don't think the NSA really wants to force people to make handcrafted computers, free of any backdoors. -
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narcolepsy and alcoholism :flag: (hj@shigusegubu.club)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 20:57:32 JST
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@Suiseiseki @foxhkron @SuperDicq having backdoors demands handcuffing, otherwise backdoors could be removed -
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翠星石 (suiseiseki@freesoftwareextremist.com)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 21:01:59 JST
翠星石
@a1ba @foxhkron @SuperDicq @hj Yes, the boot software is always proprietary and lacks firmness.
The complexity of booting is not necessarily a problem as long as the hardware isn't handcuffed to deny the development of free replacements. -
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:umu: :umu: (a1ba@suya.place)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 21:02:00 JST
:umu: :umu:
@Suiseiseki @foxhkron @SuperDicq @hj it really depends on the vendor but boot process in general is much more complicated starting with ARMv8, which has separate software running on each privilege level.
And quite often it's proprietary.
Not to mention the firmware of everything else in the SoC. -
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SuperDicq (superdicq@minidisc.tokyo)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 21:02:26 JST
SuperDicq
@Suiseiseki@freesoftwareextremist.com @a1ba@suya.place @foxhkron@cybre.club @hj@shigusegubu.club Also people often use glibc as an example, but the GNU project has many more libraries that are used in a ton of software.
I recently became aware that there's actually a ton of software using GNU Bison for example. It's a lot more common than I initially thought.翠星石 likes this. -
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SuperDicq (superdicq@minidisc.tokyo)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 21:06:02 JST
SuperDicq
@Suiseiseki@freesoftwareextremist.com @a1ba@suya.place @foxhkron@cybre.club @hj@shigusegubu.club I'm pretty certain you can't bootstrap Golang without GNU Bison. It's also a hard dependency for Perl and PHP. And PostgreSQL too.
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SuperDicq (superdicq@minidisc.tokyo)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 21:06:39 JST
SuperDicq
@Suiseiseki@freesoftwareextremist.com @phnt@fluffytail.org @foxhkron@cybre.club @hj@shigusegubu.club @a1ba@suya.place Yes, even the missing GNU stuff is all available in the Alpine repos so it can be installed conveniently.
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翠星石 (suiseiseki@freesoftwareextremist.com)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 21:06:40 JST
翠星石
@phnt @foxhkron @SuperDicq @hj @a1ba Yes, windows was developed with GNU, same as macos, same as NeXTSTEP - but those weren't GNU systems, as there was by default no GNU packages shipped and not really empty slots for the missing GNU to go.
Alpine is a BusyBox/Linux distro, but the typical use case is to install the missing GNU to make it a GNU/Linux distro. -
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Phantasm (phnt@fluffytail.org)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 21:06:41 JST 
Phantasm
@a1ba @foxhkron @Suiseiseki @SuperDicq @hj
>using GCC and GNU toolchain doesn't make system GNU
If that was true Windows XP would be GNU, because some parts of the build system used GNU make. Which is one of the arguing points in the Alpine copypasta. Even Mac OS X would be GNU, because it had gcc as the default compiler. Same with NeXTSTEP. -
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:umu: :umu: (a1ba@suya.place)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 21:06:42 JST
:umu: :umu:
@Suiseiseki @foxhkron @SuperDicq @hj most of them are optional, like gimp you listed two times, and using GCC and GNU toolchain doesn't make system GNU (I think that's actually told somewhere on GNU website) -
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翠星石 (suiseiseki@freesoftwareextremist.com)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 21:08:18 JST
翠星石
@SuperDicq @hj @foxhkron @a1ba I don't think you can bootstrap goland without go in gcc.
You'll also need yacc to go with bison. -
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翠星石 (suiseiseki@freesoftwareextremist.com)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 21:09:34 JST
翠星石
@a1ba @foxhkron @phnt @SuperDicq @hj Installing MSYS2 or Cygwin or "WSL1" makes GNU/kWindows; https://mikegerwitz.com/2016/04/gnu-kwindows -
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:umu: :umu: (a1ba@suya.place)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 21:09:35 JST
:umu: :umu:
@Suiseiseki @foxhkron @phnt @SuperDicq @hj would installing mingw on windows make it gnu/windows then -
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翠星石 (suiseiseki@freesoftwareextremist.com)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 21:25:23 JST
翠星石
@a1ba @foxhkron @SuperDicq @hj GIMP is not seems as optional by many users.
Only really GNU r, gimp, octave and rarely grub could be optional - if you want to build even nonGNU software on the GNU system - you'll need many GNU libraries.
You cannot even use LLVM without using GCC to bootstrap it.
Using any nontrivial amount of the GNU system to craft a system makes a GNU system. -
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翠星石 (suiseiseki@freesoftwareextremist.com)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 21:27:39 JST
翠星石
@hj @foxhkron @SuperDicq Most people aren't interesting enough to the FBI to make direct surveillance be carried out.
But that may change in the future depending on the situation, as I pointed out in my comment. -
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narcolepsy and alcoholism :flag: (hj@shigusegubu.club)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 21:27:41 JST
narcolepsy and alcoholism :flag:
@Suiseiseki @foxhkron @SuperDicq that's what you think. It's the same argument as "i'm nobody, fbi has better things to do than to spy on me" -
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翠星石 (suiseiseki@freesoftwareextremist.com)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 21:29:06 JST
翠星石
@eric @foxhkron @phnt @SuperDicq @hj @a1ba I was professionally diagnosed not autistic.
You would have to be autistic to deny that such installation is indeed GNU/kWindows. -
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Eric Zhang 2: Episode 1 (eric@pl.starnix.network)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 21:29:07 JST 
Eric Zhang 2: Episode 1
@Suiseiseki @foxhkron @phnt @SuperDicq @hj @a1ba autistic -
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翠星石 (suiseiseki@freesoftwareextremist.com)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 21:30:37 JST
翠星石
@phnt @foxhkron @SuperDicq @hj @a1ba GNU/GNU Linux-libre and GNU/Hurd and GNU GRUB are GNU OS's that do not use any microsoft software. -
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Phantasm (phnt@fluffytail.org)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 21:30:38 JST
Phantasm
@Suiseiseki @foxhkron @SuperDicq @hj @a1ba GNU is not an operating system unto itself, but a free component of a fully proprietary Windows system made useful by the NT kernel, Win32 and Win64 APIs and other vital components comprising a full OS as defined by Microsoft. -
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翠星石 (suiseiseki@freesoftwareextremist.com)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 21:44:51 JST
翠星石
@eric @foxhkron @phnt @SuperDicq @hj @a1ba uname --version -
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Eric Zhang 2: Episode 1 (eric@pl.starnix.network)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 21:44:52 JST
Eric Zhang 2: Episode 1
@Suiseiseki @foxhkron @phnt @SuperDicq @hj @a1ba whatever you say kid -
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SuperDicq (superdicq@minidisc.tokyo)'s status on Thursday, 13-Nov-2025 22:09:27 JST
SuperDicq
@a1ba@suya.place @Suiseiseki@freesoftwareextremist.com @foxhkron@cybre.club @phnt@fluffytail.org @hj@shigusegubu.club Oh you better watch it. He's gonna link the GNU/Windows article again now.
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翠星石 (suiseiseki@freesoftwareextremist.com)'s status on Monday, 17-Nov-2025 22:19:13 JST
翠星石
@nexussfan Yes, window's kernel doesn't have a particular name - most commonly it is called; "the NT kernel".
MSYS2 and Cygwin do not implement Linux SYSCALLs, but they do contain a port of glibc to the windows API - allowing the execution of GNU software and software that uses GNU after compiling into .exe's.
"WSL1" Linux SYSCALL translator does use windows API calls - but GNU software in that case isn't even compiled to interface with windows - it interfaces with the NT kernel (which has taken the place of Linux) - so it's best described as GNU/kWindows.
>on the Windows BSOD
It doesn't run on the BSOD - it uses a BugCheck callback to launch an OS - except for some reason rather than taking control of the hardware - that's left in control of windows and bootvid.dll is used to display the output. -
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NexusSfan (nexussfan@posts.nexussfan.cz)'s status on Monday, 17-Nov-2025 22:19:16 JST 
NexusSfan
@Suiseiseki NT is another name for the Windows kernel IIRC.
WSL1 is the only true GNU on NT, because it is actually running on the NT kernel. Not sure if MSYS2 or Cygwin run on the NT kernel. If it doesn't, then it's GNU on top of Windows user space on top of Windows kernel. So it wouldn't be direct GNU/kWindows. Same with WSL2, as that's a VM.If you really want to run GNU without Windows userspace but on Windows kernel, there is a way to run BusyBox/musl/Linux on the Windows BSOD, which runs kernel level. https://github.com/NSG650/BugCheck2Linux Sadly it's on GitHub
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