To check which version of glibc you have, run ldd --version in the terminal.
You: *2 day old account*
Also you: *comes into linux gaming community and starts insulting everyone*
You’re definitely the pinnacle of chill mate :)
What’s that got to do with anything? What does account age have to do with anything or are you just unnecessarily flexing to make yourself feel special?
That’s like some 30 year old going up to a 13 year old and flexing because of where they are in life. It’s just…pointless.
Look at it this way: You just entered a clubhouse. Nobody there knows you. You have not yet put any time or work into maintaining the club or into establishing your credentials and social status among the members. After entering, you immediately make a controversial (and arguably badly-researched) statement.
Would you not expect to be much less likely to get away with a stunt like this than a long-established club member?
What was that promise Valve made some years ago? That they’d keep Steam running regardless of the OS version?
You, umm, got a source for that? Because that sounds like an insane promise to make.
Dudes not worth my time to look this up for sure, but I’m fairly certain the statement was they’d support any Linux distro.
OK… You do understand the difference between distribution and version, right?
You need to have a 5 year old distribution with no updates whatsoever to be at risk of losing Steam.
So, what exactly is the problem here?
Regardless of OS version? That sounds like nonsense. Only someone who doesn’t know how Linux works would believe that.
glibc is a fundamental library that underpins Linux. Its been going since the 1980s and is constantly updated and patched.
Similarly the Linux kernel undergoes constant evolution and change.
No one can promise to support Linux regardless of the OS version because by necessity it is constantly changing. Even slow release cycle distros like Debian move forward with each major release. Backwards compatibility is actually a bit of a nightmare on Linux. Ironically it can be easier to get old windows software running on Linux than old Linux software.
People running systems older than glibc 2.31 really should patch and update their systems. That package itself is already 5 years old.
Backwards compatibility is actually a bit of a nightmare on Linux. Ironically it can be easier to get old windows software running on Linux than old Linux software.
I’ve been discovering this on Steam, actually. Square Enix released Linux versions of some games, like Life is Strange or the most recent Tomb Raider trilogy, but they’ll crash at the main menu if you try to run them. Similarly, the Shadowrun games from Harebrained Schemes assume that you have a configured .asoundsrc file in your home directory, which likely isn’t true if you’re on a distro that has migrated to pipewire. The .asoundsrc issue is easy to fix by just making the file yourself, but LIS and TR have to use the Windows versions via Proton to run at all.
That glibc version might not be that old but they do this most likely because of security reasons. There will be a time when Valve will drop 32-bit support entirely as well. Also, you shouldn’t use old distros because of the same reason. Currently glibc v2.31 is on Debian Bullseye which is the old-stable version and Valve still supports it. Technically there is no problem with that announcement.
