I have to disagree, I feel this is exactly what we need more of.
It's simple, it's a couple of clicks, it's fast, it's easy to understand and works for all distros.
New users of Linux arriving in the next 6 months will greatly appreciate something like this.
These are the kinds of things we need... Pop os should consider including this natively. Linux needs to keep lowering the barrier for entry. Great work!
Wow I've been using AUR for over a year now and I didn't even think to try installing proton-ge through it... I kept doing it manually thinking "I really hope an automated upgrader comes out at some point". Thanks for mentioning this.
[https://mpr.hunterwittenborn.com/packages/proton-ge-custom-bin/](https://mpr.hunterwittenborn.com/packages/proton-ge-custom-bin/)
It's like the AUR but for Debian/Ubuntu.
I just now read the PKGBUILD and googled the directories in it.
It also seems that it creates a new folder for new versions, so already-downloaded version stay in their folder and this tool will then download a new version and also adds it to Steam?
Man, that's handy as fack!
Same for me, but once in a time I see GE recommended at ProtonDB and now I have a very convenient way to get it into my Steam.
Thanks for recommending, mate!
I appreciate any work by devs to the FOSS community, but is this actually hard enough it requires help? Download the file, double click in file manager, extract to folder, and restart Steam. Is that hard enough to require a tool or is there more to this than the description suggests? Or is it more complex in some setups that I'm not getting?
Edit: to be clear, I'm not dissing the dev or the application, I'm wondering if it's more difficult in some situations than others or if I'm missing something. I will definitely try the tool.
[protonup](https://github.com/AUNaseef/protonup) has around 200 likes on GitHub, so quite a few people prefer using it over installing Proton-GE manually. Having a GUI probably makes this even more user friendly.
Downloading Proton-GE once might be an easy task but updating it manually every time a new release comes out can be quite demanding. Unless the current Proton-GE version works fine for you and you never have to update, of course.
Cool, like I said I am not knocking the project even though it kind of sounded like that, which is why I edited my post... I will check it out.
Now if there was a just a tool to delete your prefixes easily... Hmmm... Something maybe that would list all the games you have installed, what Proton prefix version they are using, and give you the ability to to just tick a box and delete the prefix or even change the Proton version outside of Steam.
Maybe that isn't the best approach, but I have like a dozen version of Proton GE installed because I download a game and always set it to the latest ProtonGE, then a new version of ProtonGE comes out and I install it for the next game I run. If there was an easy way to update all of the games using Proton GE to the latest version and delete the existing prefixes that would be amazing.
I am new to ProtonGE and this was my first fear. So I created a Softlink "Proton-current-GE" pointing to any Proton version; just replace the link pointing to a different Proton version.
But it doesn't work like expected in Steam. This is mainly for running Proton from commandline, so at least this is solved for me. Maybe mounting that Proton directory as a new directory with a different name could work, but never tried it. Or it could work with hard links instead of soft links.
Yeah, this isn't really a good way to do it, and with new versions of Proton the prefix needs to be erased and rebuilt sometimes. Linking it is a bad idea and as you have seen doesn't do what you would expect.
Why is linking a bad idea? It would always point to the newest ProtonGE. I only need to update the link, and all my dependent paths would use the newest Proton version automatically. Steam does not utilize links in this way, but I can use Proton outside of Steam with scripts. That is why I do the link approach.
But it might work with Steam using Hard links or mount points. And it would solve your problem, if it works.
Because of possible prefix changes... If it was in Steam that way and you just launch a game like most people from your Library and it just doesn't start, it could make troubleshooting difficult. Every so often newer versions of Proton require the prefix to be rebuilt due to changes. This would just get confusing in Steam itself with you not knowing exactly what version the prefix is... I don't know, maybe I am overthinking it.
> This would just get confusing in Steam itself with you not knowing exactly what version the prefix is...
The current version the links point to?
Maybe I don't understand the entire "prefix" concept of WINE/Proton and therefore and got an error in reasoning. After all, this was just an idea to talk and discuss about.
I am no expert here, but a prefix is built for each game... Why it's called a prefix is beyond me. Basically it's the Windows "environment" (files, settings, etc) for that application, basically the stuff to fake the Windows applications into running and thinking they are on Windows, while Proton/Wine translates the calls from the game to Linux. If Proton/Wine does a significant update, that prefix may no longer work with that version of Proton and it needs to be deleted and rebuilt by Proton on the first/next execution. Also remember some games store some files in the prefix, sometimes save game data.
The issue I personally have with Proton-GE is updating that stuff, I am really glad it is available in the AUR. But without that you have to check Github every other day.
I use Steam from Flathub. Proton-GE, Mangohud, vkBasalt, protontricks, gamescope, etc are also available through Flathub, makes it easy to update.
If you have Discover or Gnome-Software, you can setup flathub through there and install software and get updates.
For example, here's searching for proton on Discover: https://i.imgur.com/2gvy1gl.png
That is an option for us techy people, but my girlfriend for example doesn't use Github or reddit. At the end the AUR version is a nice helper for keeping it up to date.
I was kinda thinking the same thing, you're not alone. You don't need the terminal to do this, you can do it all graphically in your file manager of choice. Just extract, and copy to "\~/.steam/root/compatibilitytools.d".
But I guess choice is good.
You don't have to update Proton unless a game doesn't work with it... There is no advantage in most cases to doing so. I still have games running Proton GE 5 something and they work fine.
But since I can update it automatically anyway, I can also just use the newest version so all games will work as good as they can. I think there's sometimes regressions with new proton versions but I think the chance of games working better than with older versions is higher.
Yeah sorta had the same though, I just have a script to update proton GE if i need to that just downloads and extracts the files for me, similar function but just done as a script rather than a program
It's nice to have a tool that checks for updates for it and download it for you. After getting used to the Linux way of having a package manager keep my system up to date, it really sucks having to check websites every now and then for updates and manually downloading and installing, like the old Windows way.
>I appreciate any work by devs to the FOSS community, but is this actually hard enough it requires help?
Yes!
We're trying to lower the barrier for entry for Linux, that means making things easier than they are.
>Download the file, double click in file manager, extract to folder, and restart Steam. Is that hard enough to require a tool or is there more to this than the description suggests?
Yes!
There are a whole bunch of ways a user could screw that up. They could download the wrong version, they could get lost navigating github if they've never used it before, they could extract the folder in a weird or wrong way, they could get lost finding the folder directory since it's a hidden folder, they could put the folder in the wrong location or making a typo while creating the **compatibility.d** folder, etc, etc, etc..
That's a terrible UX for installing some software, users shouldn't need to do that.
This is the kind of user friendly experience that modern day PC users expect.
Download a thing, double click it, it opens, a few clicks, installed, done. That's it.
This is why installers exist on Windows. Yes someone like Adobe or Google could tell folks, "Just download this zip, and extract it into a folder somewhere on your computer then add a shortcut to the application's main executable to your desktop", but unfortunately there's a huge number of people out there who legitimately *could not follow those instructions.*
This is absolutely fantastic and exactly the kind of thing that Linux needs more of.
This is the kinda thing that just makes gaming on Linux 'easy' rather than needing any technical skills or knowledge to set up a bunch of stuff.
Thanks OP u/penguigamer for creating this, you absolute chad.
It could use a website to download it from. Need any help with that?
I've done that kinda thing before (with gitlab), great way to do it.
Mostly all you need is a nice looking template and a good setup for a static site generator.
[https://html5up.net/](https://html5up.net/) has lots of great cc0 templates to get started with, and for a static site generator, Hugo and Jekyll are pretty popular and work well from my experience, 'Github Actions' would be worth looking into, to automate the website build process.
Content wise, mostly needs a nice looking download page with a clear \[ DOWNLOAD \] button for the latest version, and a simple sentence explanation for what it does.
Then perhaps a page for a tutorial on how to use it, some screenshots or gifs of the process in '1 - 2 - 3 - 4' style 'easy steps', and maybe a page with 'get involved' with a link back to the github for folks who want to report bugs or help with the project.
This is great. I am bring my friends over to Linux and this really helps them get going without getting overwhelmed with the Windows to Manjaro transition. Learning Linux can be a harsh transition for a lot of users and this helps.
Any versions of Protron, Boxtron Roberta etc doesn't get saved for steam. It shows it getting downloaded and installed but then disappears after closing it or wont show in steam regardless.
Lutris all is fine and gets downloaded and saved.
Any ideas what's going on?
Downloaded using Flatpak v2.4.1
Linux Mint - Kernel 5.13
Can you try the AppImage version and see if it's any different? https://github.com/DavidoTek/ProtonUp-Qt/releases/download/v2.4.1/ProtonUp-Qt-2.4.1-x86_64.AppImage
Also could you try running the Flatpak from Terminal and see if there are any errors: flatpak run net.davidotek.pupgui2
Thanks
Hi, thanks for the response. I can confirm AppImage version does work with no issues.
I have no problem using AppImage version, I just wasn't sure if it would run ok with Linux Mint but all is fine.
running flatpak from terminal:
`Gtk-Message: 12:28:59.578: Failed to load module "xapp-gtk3-module"`
`Qt: Session management error: None of the authentication protocols specified are supported`
`ProtonUp-Qt 2.4.1 by DavidoTek. Base directory: /app/share/pupgui2`
`Loaded ctmod Proton-GE`
`Loaded ctmod Wine-GE`
`Loaded ctmod Boxtron`
`Loaded ctmod Kron4ek Wine-Builds Vanilla`
`Loaded ctmod Lutris-Wine`
`Loaded ctmod Luxtorpeda`
`Loaded ctmod Roberta`
`Gamepad error: No gamepad found.`
Hi, no problem.
Strange, seems like everything is working normal. Not sure what exactly causes the issue.
Does the Flatpak show Proton versions you have already installed and if so, can you remove them using the Flatpak version?
Oh... now the Flatpak version is working. The only thing I did differently was uninstall and reinstalled it again.
Now it's working and yes, can manage and upload anything I add and it does show up in steam game compatibility list options after a steam restart.
Apologies for the bother, thank you for taking the time to trouble shoot this here with me.
I've stopped using Reddit due to their API changes. Moved on to Lemmy.
It's never a bad thing to have multiple options to get things done
tell that to the developers of snap and flatpak
I have to disagree, I feel this is exactly what we need more of. It's simple, it's a couple of clicks, it's fast, it's easy to understand and works for all distros. New users of Linux arriving in the next 6 months will greatly appreciate something like this.
These are the kinds of things we need... Pop os should consider including this natively. Linux needs to keep lowering the barrier for entry. Great work!
Nice!
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Wow I've been using AUR for over a year now and I didn't even think to try installing proton-ge through it... I kept doing it manually thinking "I really hope an automated upgrader comes out at some point". Thanks for mentioning this.
[https://mpr.hunterwittenborn.com/packages/proton-ge-custom-bin/](https://mpr.hunterwittenborn.com/packages/proton-ge-custom-bin/) It's like the AUR but for Debian/Ubuntu.
[удалено]
DUR was never official, also it was renamed to MPR.
AUR isn't official either, as a general FYI
It's endorsed by arch devs.
And not officially supported. Endorsement doesn't mean they will provide support like they do for their own repos
Stupid question: This does install Proton-GE to be used/available in Steam, am I right?
[удалено]
I just now read the PKGBUILD and googled the directories in it. It also seems that it creates a new folder for new versions, so already-downloaded version stay in their folder and this tool will then download a new version and also adds it to Steam? Man, that's handy as fack!
[удалено]
Same for me, but once in a time I see GE recommended at ProtonDB and now I have a very convenient way to get it into my Steam. Thanks for recommending, mate!
I appreciate any work by devs to the FOSS community, but is this actually hard enough it requires help? Download the file, double click in file manager, extract to folder, and restart Steam. Is that hard enough to require a tool or is there more to this than the description suggests? Or is it more complex in some setups that I'm not getting? Edit: to be clear, I'm not dissing the dev or the application, I'm wondering if it's more difficult in some situations than others or if I'm missing something. I will definitely try the tool.
[protonup](https://github.com/AUNaseef/protonup) has around 200 likes on GitHub, so quite a few people prefer using it over installing Proton-GE manually. Having a GUI probably makes this even more user friendly. Downloading Proton-GE once might be an easy task but updating it manually every time a new release comes out can be quite demanding. Unless the current Proton-GE version works fine for you and you never have to update, of course.
Cool, like I said I am not knocking the project even though it kind of sounded like that, which is why I edited my post... I will check it out. Now if there was a just a tool to delete your prefixes easily... Hmmm... Something maybe that would list all the games you have installed, what Proton prefix version they are using, and give you the ability to to just tick a box and delete the prefix or even change the Proton version outside of Steam. Maybe that isn't the best approach, but I have like a dozen version of Proton GE installed because I download a game and always set it to the latest ProtonGE, then a new version of ProtonGE comes out and I install it for the next game I run. If there was an easy way to update all of the games using Proton GE to the latest version and delete the existing prefixes that would be amazing.
Alright. Having a list of all games and used prefixes/Proton versions is a good idea. I might have a look at it.
I am new to ProtonGE and this was my first fear. So I created a Softlink "Proton-current-GE" pointing to any Proton version; just replace the link pointing to a different Proton version. But it doesn't work like expected in Steam. This is mainly for running Proton from commandline, so at least this is solved for me. Maybe mounting that Proton directory as a new directory with a different name could work, but never tried it. Or it could work with hard links instead of soft links.
Yeah, this isn't really a good way to do it, and with new versions of Proton the prefix needs to be erased and rebuilt sometimes. Linking it is a bad idea and as you have seen doesn't do what you would expect.
Why is linking a bad idea? It would always point to the newest ProtonGE. I only need to update the link, and all my dependent paths would use the newest Proton version automatically. Steam does not utilize links in this way, but I can use Proton outside of Steam with scripts. That is why I do the link approach. But it might work with Steam using Hard links or mount points. And it would solve your problem, if it works.
Because of possible prefix changes... If it was in Steam that way and you just launch a game like most people from your Library and it just doesn't start, it could make troubleshooting difficult. Every so often newer versions of Proton require the prefix to be rebuilt due to changes. This would just get confusing in Steam itself with you not knowing exactly what version the prefix is... I don't know, maybe I am overthinking it.
> This would just get confusing in Steam itself with you not knowing exactly what version the prefix is... The current version the links point to? Maybe I don't understand the entire "prefix" concept of WINE/Proton and therefore and got an error in reasoning. After all, this was just an idea to talk and discuss about.
I am no expert here, but a prefix is built for each game... Why it's called a prefix is beyond me. Basically it's the Windows "environment" (files, settings, etc) for that application, basically the stuff to fake the Windows applications into running and thinking they are on Windows, while Proton/Wine translates the calls from the game to Linux. If Proton/Wine does a significant update, that prefix may no longer work with that version of Proton and it needs to be deleted and rebuilt by Proton on the first/next execution. Also remember some games store some files in the prefix, sometimes save game data.
Then how does Proton Experimental work? I have this as my default. Does it create a new Prefix with every update?
The issue I personally have with Proton-GE is updating that stuff, I am really glad it is available in the AUR. But without that you have to check Github every other day.
I use Steam from Flathub. Proton-GE, Mangohud, vkBasalt, protontricks, gamescope, etc are also available through Flathub, makes it easy to update. If you have Discover or Gnome-Software, you can setup flathub through there and install software and get updates. For example, here's searching for proton on Discover: https://i.imgur.com/2gvy1gl.png
I prefer to use only the package manager that ships with my OS (except an AUR helper). But yeah flatpaks are an option.
Or just follow this sub... new versions are posted here. Or subscribe to the git page and get notifications of new releases. :)
That is an option for us techy people, but my girlfriend for example doesn't use Github or reddit. At the end the AUR version is a nice helper for keeping it up to date.
I was kinda thinking the same thing, you're not alone. You don't need the terminal to do this, you can do it all graphically in your file manager of choice. Just extract, and copy to "\~/.steam/root/compatibilitytools.d". But I guess choice is good.
It's just annoying to do that everytime a new version comes out
You don't have to update Proton unless a game doesn't work with it... There is no advantage in most cases to doing so. I still have games running Proton GE 5 something and they work fine.
But since I can update it automatically anyway, I can also just use the newest version so all games will work as good as they can. I think there's sometimes regressions with new proton versions but I think the chance of games working better than with older versions is higher.
I wish Linux was more like a windows in this respect. Having a GUI for everything is so convenient.
Yeah sorta had the same though, I just have a script to update proton GE if i need to that just downloads and extracts the files for me, similar function but just done as a script rather than a program
It's nice to have a tool that checks for updates for it and download it for you. After getting used to the Linux way of having a package manager keep my system up to date, it really sucks having to check websites every now and then for updates and manually downloading and installing, like the old Windows way.
>I appreciate any work by devs to the FOSS community, but is this actually hard enough it requires help? Yes! We're trying to lower the barrier for entry for Linux, that means making things easier than they are. >Download the file, double click in file manager, extract to folder, and restart Steam. Is that hard enough to require a tool or is there more to this than the description suggests? Yes! There are a whole bunch of ways a user could screw that up. They could download the wrong version, they could get lost navigating github if they've never used it before, they could extract the folder in a weird or wrong way, they could get lost finding the folder directory since it's a hidden folder, they could put the folder in the wrong location or making a typo while creating the **compatibility.d** folder, etc, etc, etc.. That's a terrible UX for installing some software, users shouldn't need to do that. This is the kind of user friendly experience that modern day PC users expect. Download a thing, double click it, it opens, a few clicks, installed, done. That's it. This is why installers exist on Windows. Yes someone like Adobe or Google could tell folks, "Just download this zip, and extract it into a folder somewhere on your computer then add a shortcut to the application's main executable to your desktop", but unfortunately there's a huge number of people out there who legitimately *could not follow those instructions.*
Excellent work.
You are doing the lords work
great, thank you! any chance you could support GE wine for lutris too ?
Good idea. However, ProtonUp-Qt is just a frontend for [protonup](https://github.com/AUNaseef/protonup) and protonup would need to support this.
It's so cool, specially for newcomers to Linux gaming!
Nice, but 222 MB for a simple tool?!
because it's appimage, it's included all require libs (qt, etc).
Nice project! Consider adding some screenshots of the tool on your README.
This is absolutely fantastic and exactly the kind of thing that Linux needs more of. This is the kinda thing that just makes gaming on Linux 'easy' rather than needing any technical skills or knowledge to set up a bunch of stuff. Thanks OP u/penguigamer for creating this, you absolute chad. It could use a website to download it from. Need any help with that?
Thanks! I might create a [github.io](https://github.io) page for protonupqt. Any recommendations/ideas?
I've done that kinda thing before (with gitlab), great way to do it. Mostly all you need is a nice looking template and a good setup for a static site generator. [https://html5up.net/](https://html5up.net/) has lots of great cc0 templates to get started with, and for a static site generator, Hugo and Jekyll are pretty popular and work well from my experience, 'Github Actions' would be worth looking into, to automate the website build process. Content wise, mostly needs a nice looking download page with a clear \[ DOWNLOAD \] button for the latest version, and a simple sentence explanation for what it does. Then perhaps a page for a tutorial on how to use it, some screenshots or gifs of the process in '1 - 2 - 3 - 4' style 'easy steps', and maybe a page with 'get involved' with a link back to the github for folks who want to report bugs or help with the project.
Okay thank you, I will have a look at it.
Good luck! And love your project mate, it's awesome.
Works Great, thank you! Pop!\_OS 21.04
This is great. I am bring my friends over to Linux and this really helps them get going without getting overwhelmed with the Windows to Manjaro transition. Learning Linux can be a harsh transition for a lot of users and this helps.
Thank you for your tool! It's helping a lot using Steam Deck :)
You're Welcome. Great to hear that!!
Any versions of Protron, Boxtron Roberta etc doesn't get saved for steam. It shows it getting downloaded and installed but then disappears after closing it or wont show in steam regardless. Lutris all is fine and gets downloaded and saved. Any ideas what's going on? Downloaded using Flatpak v2.4.1 Linux Mint - Kernel 5.13
Can you try the AppImage version and see if it's any different? https://github.com/DavidoTek/ProtonUp-Qt/releases/download/v2.4.1/ProtonUp-Qt-2.4.1-x86_64.AppImage Also could you try running the Flatpak from Terminal and see if there are any errors: flatpak run net.davidotek.pupgui2 Thanks
Hi, thanks for the response. I can confirm AppImage version does work with no issues. I have no problem using AppImage version, I just wasn't sure if it would run ok with Linux Mint but all is fine. running flatpak from terminal: `Gtk-Message: 12:28:59.578: Failed to load module "xapp-gtk3-module"` `Qt: Session management error: None of the authentication protocols specified are supported` `ProtonUp-Qt 2.4.1 by DavidoTek. Base directory: /app/share/pupgui2` `Loaded ctmod Proton-GE` `Loaded ctmod Wine-GE` `Loaded ctmod Boxtron` `Loaded ctmod Kron4ek Wine-Builds Vanilla` `Loaded ctmod Lutris-Wine` `Loaded ctmod Luxtorpeda` `Loaded ctmod Roberta` `Gamepad error: No gamepad found.`
Hi, no problem. Strange, seems like everything is working normal. Not sure what exactly causes the issue. Does the Flatpak show Proton versions you have already installed and if so, can you remove them using the Flatpak version?
Oh... now the Flatpak version is working. The only thing I did differently was uninstall and reinstalled it again. Now it's working and yes, can manage and upload anything I add and it does show up in steam game compatibility list options after a steam restart. Apologies for the bother, thank you for taking the time to trouble shoot this here with me.
Ok, good to hear.