On August 15th, 2025, Steam will officially stop supporting Linux distributions with a version of glibc older than 2.31
Steam Support :: Steam Linux Support
To check which version of glibc you have, run ldd --version in the terminal.
I use Arch (btw) so I'm not worried about it
For reference, even Deban Stable has been at glibc 2.31 or newer for three major versions now, and another major version is on its way this year. I don't think this will affect many people.
2.31 was released on 2020-02-01.
That's surprisingly new. Wonder what causes the incompatibility
The changelog for 2.31 is here:
https://sourceware.org/legacy-ml/libc-announce/2020/msg00001.html
Latest version of glibc is 2.41, released 2025-01-30. That puts 2.31 at least 10 releases behind. That version is quite outdated. There are numerous security and bug fixes in 2.31 alone, with each newer release also fixing some as well.
Not even Linux users are safe. What was that promise Valve made some years ago? That they'd keep Steam running regardless of the OS version? Man have they U-turned on that shit.
Wow are the salt levels high, are you guys mining right now? Take a chill pill, christ. No wonder nobody takes linux gamers seriously.
Wow. This might be the most down voted comment I've ever seen on lemmy.
It is a sight to behold
They've never promised that, because that would be an absurd promise to make. This is no different from Valve dropping support for older versions of Windows, which they have also done.
You: 2 day old account
\
Also you: comes into linux gaming community and starts insulting everyone
You're definitely the pinnacle of chill mate :)
The funniest part is their claim that people were being salty and should chill, at a time when there were almost no comments, and none were salty. Bot?
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.
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.
I don't think buddy knows the difference between a Linux version and a Linux distro.
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.
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.
Just get an OS that doesn't have versions. Ezpz fix.
TempleOS?
No?
