Discussion How many of you develops for Linux?

C

CleanWater

Guest
Hi there!

I just wanted to know how many of you give support to Linux on your games?

Whenever I try to look for content teaching how to develop for Linux, or ask for help about some code that isn't running well on Linux, I rarely receive some answers.
 
S

Shatter

Guest
No support for Linux at all. As Amon said, it's way too much hassle for what you get in return (which is nothing).

Linux is less than about 1% of users. A good portion of that figure would be corporate servers. Desktop users would be a fraction of that 1%.

Present market share
Windows - 95.79%
OSX - 3.31%
Linux - 0.80%

Doesn't make sense to port to the other desktop OS's.
 
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C

CleanWater

Guest
I use to develop and support Linux but had to stop as pulling out my hair and gauging my eyeballs out trying to get the games to work was not too healthy for me.
Yeah, I think I understand your feeling. No matter what I do, I just can't get the gamepads working for Linux, and can't find any help for that anywhere either.
 
J

Jafman

Guest
I read there's gamepad libraries to install "jstest-gtk" and "joystick" that might work?
 
C

CleanWater

Guest
I read there's gamepad libraries to install "jstest-gtk" and "joystick" that might work?
Yes I know, I installed everything from the guide of YoYo Games and the Manual, and I can play test and compile the game on Linux without any problem, except for that gamepad issue. I managed to use the gamepad once, but now it recognizes the gamepad as inserted, but the game don't respond to button presses.

The funniest thing, is that the very same code I use for gamepad input works perfectly on Windows. I simply don't understand what's the error there.
 
D

Dark

Guest
My laptop runs Kubuntu so I do, but I both run GM itself on it and test games on it using Wine. Much less of a hassle than the actual Ubuntu export. Therefore I'm also forced to make sure all my GM games will work fine in Wine.

As for non-GM stuff I develop for .NET and make sure to only use pure C# and all libraries are either compiled for multiple platforms or are purely done in some .NET language as well. Mono makes developing applications and games for both Windows and Linux with the same code pretty easy (often you can even just run the same .exe file on both unless it's a WPF application or uses DirectX or something)
 
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½

½ a cup

Guest
I won't develop for any desktop other than Windows. The market share isn't there. Hardcore gamers don't use Linux or OSX.

For me, it isn't worth the headache and additional support for under used operating systems. The only advantage of covering all operating systems is to get that warm and fuzzy feeling to be able to say 'I support everyone'.

Sadly this can backfire if things don't work as they should because of events which are out of our hands - For example Apple deprecating OpenGL. If your game breaks as a result of this, the users will knock on your door, not Apple's.

At least Microsoft are predicatable. Things get deprecated, but they still work even sometimes decades later.
 
C

CleanWater

Guest
My laptop runs Kubuntu so I do, but I both run GM itself on it and test games on it using Wine. Much less of a hassle than the actual Ubuntu export. Therefore I'm also forced to make sure all my GM games will work fine in Wine.

As for non-GM stuff I develop for .NET and make sure to only use pure C# and all libraries are either compiled for multiple platforms or are purely done in some .NET language as well. Mono makes developing applications and games for both Windows and Linux with the same code pretty easy (often you can even just run the same .exe file on both unless it's a WPF application or something)
Did you managed to get gamepads working on your Ubuntu games?
 
C

CleanWater

Guest
I wish GameMaker Studio was available on Ubuntu. That would be just awesome.
This would be good for me too, since I have another PC with Ubuntu installed. So if something happens to my Windows PC, I still could work with the Ubuntu one.
 
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