[bluesky2006]

I assume the improvements will be largely to do with the fact that they will strip away anything non-essential to the platform. You could probably therefore apply them to other distros but perhaps not to the same benefit if you're running, eg, a bloated Ubuntu install.

[poplap]

Very cool. I hope they intergrate WINE support so we can play old/non-linux steam games in an easy fashion. Plus this would allow them to gain traction with their OS - as much as I hate to say it steam Linux is very lacking compared to windows and there isn't much incentive to switch when I've got a great xbmc/steam setup already.

I think half life 3 (or another popular valve franchise)could be a Linux exclusive - that would get people using it.

EDIT: The line about 'thousands of games' in the press release gives hope that something like wine will be included.

I really doubt that they will have wine (Even though that would be amazing) the problem is that they would have to support it. Now look at it from a non-techie user, When the game fails under wine they won't understand why they will just say how bad steamOS/box/what ever is. Also doubt HL3 would be linux only, to low of market shares (they are still a company no matter how much they hate windows 8) not to mention it would only be on steamOS/box, many people won't want to install linux and dual-boot.

[jwcalla]

Y'know, I've always found it somewhat disheartening that the Steam guys have never contacted us about XBMC. One of the reasons I put XBMC on steam greenlight was to demonstrate how popular a feature it would be for the Valve crowd. To this day, I can't figure out if their lack of interest was because they're considering a competitor or because they just completely don't care about the media side of home media centers.

Meh. If this Steam distro ends up fairly popular and we end up supporting it, that'd be cool. But for now I still feel a tiny bit bitter.

It seems like they're looking to roll some of their own media functions so that they can partner with Spotify, Amazon, Hulu, etc. and all that stuff. Maybe so they can get a cut of the content distribution sales.

But one thing I noticed in the various SteamOS discussions out there on the interwebz is just how many people brought up integration with XBMC. So it seems like there is a lot of interest. Were you guys thinking of a situation where you would simply launch XBMC from Steam and vice-versa or were you considering a more involved integration?

As soon as this SteamOS is released I'm going to see what the options are for integration... but if you folks are looking for any developers to help with this kind of stuff, please do hit me up!

[teeedubb]

Very cool. I hope they intergrate WINE support so we can play old/non-linux steam games in an easy fashion. Plus this would allow them to gain traction with their OS - as much as I hate to say it steam Linux is very lacking compared to windows and there isn't much incentive to switch when I've got a great xbmc/steam setup already.

I think half life 3 (or another popular valve franchise)could be a Linux exclusive - that would get people using it.

EDIT: The line about 'thousands of games' in the press release gives hope that something like wine will be included.

I really doubt that they will have wine (Even though that would be amazing) the problem is that they would have to support it. Now look at it from a non-techie user, When the game fails under wine they won't understand why they will just say how bad steamOS/box/what ever is.

Its streaming from a windows/mac install, like onlive and gaika - I guess thats a good compromise of compatibility and stability.

Also doubt HL3 would be linux only, to low of market shares (they are still a company no matter how much they hate windows 8) not to mention it would only be on steamOS/box, many people won't want to install linux and dual-boot.

Yeah but it would sell a absolute shit load of steam boxes, raise awareness about gaming on linux/steamos and a chance to show other publishers that it can be done. Maybe not a complete exclusive but a timed exclusive, or only advertise it on their steamos, kinda like what is happening now with gta v and ps3.

If valve can get better performance out of their os than windows and make it easy via their installer there would be great incentive to dual boot.

[poplap]

Very cool. I hope they intergrate WINE support so we can play old/non-linux steam games in an easy fashion. Plus this would allow them to gain traction with their OS - as much as I hate to say it steam Linux is very lacking compared to windows and there isn't much incentive to switch when I've got a great xbmc/steam setup already.

I think half life 3 (or another popular valve franchise)could be a Linux exclusive - that would get people using it.

EDIT: The line about 'thousands of games' in the press release gives hope that something like wine will be included.

I really doubt that they will have wine (Even though that would be amazing) the problem is that they would have to support it. Now look at it from a non-techie user, When the game fails under wine they won't understand why they will just say how bad steamOS/box/what ever is.

Its streaming from a windows/mac install, like onlive and gaika - I guess thats a good compromise of compatibility and stability.

Ya but only if they have a computer that can play the game as well. Although I love this feature, it would be mostly for those with a gaming systems already.

I could also see them doing a time delayed release of HL3.

[TeKo]

I hope AMD sees this and finally puts some work into their drivers. Go go HD audio paththrough

[teeedubb]

I hope AMD sees this and finally puts some work into their drivers. Go go HD audio paththrough

Its already happening - AMD has released audio documentation to oss devs. Nvidia is getting on the open source bandwagon too, promising to provide documentation to the nouveau devs.

[poplap]

And thus the revolution begins...

[Budwyzer]

And thus the revolution begins...

let's not talk about Revolution please. It disgusts me that it is back when Terra Nova, or better yet Stargate Universe, both got cancelled.

[Hedda]

Y'know, I've always found it somewhat disheartening that the Steam guys have never contacted us about XBMC. One of the reasons I put XBMC on steam greenlight was to demonstrate how popular a feature it would be for the Valve crowd. To this day, I can't figure out if their lack of interest was because they're considering a competitor or because they just completely don't care about the media side of home media centers.

Meh. If this Steam distro ends up fairly popular and we end up supporting it, that'd be cool. But for now I still feel a tiny bit bitter.

I don't know about SteamOS in general, but the "Steam Machines" that Valve just also announced seem to be just as much about media as games

Checkoout their newly opened SteamMachines page for their SteamOS Linux-powered consoles designed for the living-room.

http://store.steampowered.com/livingroom/SteamMachines/

Noted the comment that it will not just be one box but eventually an open platform for other manufacturers to use "We'll tell you more about it soon. Remember, there will ultimately be several boxes to choose from, with an array of specifications, price, and performance."

Hope that Team-XBMC developers will at least try to get in on the beta to get a free SteamBox to a developer

as it would really be great to get XBMC on these

It seems like they're looking to roll some of their own media functions so that they can partner with Spotify, Amazon, Hulu, etc. and all that stuff. Maybe so they can get a cut of the content distribution sales.

But one thing I noticed in the various SteamOS discussions out there on the interwebz is just how many people brought up integration with XBMC. So it seems like there is a lot of interest. Were you guys thinking of a situation where you would simply launch XBMC from Steam and vice-versa or were you considering a more involved integration?

As soon as this SteamOS is released I'm going to see what the options are for integration... but if you folks are looking for any developers to help with this kind of stuff, please do hit me up!

Let's hope that Valve will allow an official native XBMC release from Tean-XBMC for SteamOS and that it will run directly on these SteamMachines

I don't want to have a workaround where we have to run XBMC on a other PC and then only stream the display to these

Even worse would be if Valve refuse XBMC on their SteamOS store and instead create their own competing media software and ship with it

[Chime]

Will I be able to build my own box to run SteamOS?
Yes.
Can I hack this box? Run another OS? Change the hardware? Install my own software? Use it to build a robot?
Sure.
Can I download the OS to try it out?
You will be able to download it (including the source code, if you're into that) but not yet.

Seems like XBMC on SteamOS shouldn't have too many hurdles to overcome.

[jwcalla]

Seems like XBMC on SteamOS shouldn't have too many hurdles to overcome.

I agree and some of it is going to depend on the level of integration people would like to see. (It would be nice to have a discussion of ideas on this.)

The only other thing is the outside possibility that the low-end Steam Machine is just a streaming-only device, in which case it very well could be a Tegra box (like Shield). If that were to happen, XBMC has already gotten a ton of ARM love -- though I think it's been mostly Android-oriented -- so getting it running on such a device could be somewhat easy. I guess it would need Tegra-based OMX decoders. I'm just thinking aloud here. There's probably only a small chance that there would be a Tegra-based SteamBox.

[Rob Loach]

Y'know, I've always found it somewhat disheartening that the Steam guys have never contacted us about XBMC. One of the reasons I put XBMC on steam greenlight was to demonstrate how popular a feature it would be for the Valve crowd. To this day, I can't figure out if their lack of interest was because they're considering a competitor or because they just completely don't care about the media side of home media centers.

Meh. If this Steam distro ends up fairly popular and we end up supporting it, that'd be cool. But for now I still feel a tiny bit bitter.

From looking at your XBMC on Greenlight page, it's clear the interest is there. Whether or not Valve gets involved, I think we should push this forwards anyway. Although I don't have much experience packaging for Steam specifically, I am willing to:

1. Set up a dedicated XBMC Steam account as they recommend (optional, but Nate, you might be a better person to do this)
   
2. Pay the $100 for the Steam Greenlight Submission Fee
   
3. Open source the packaging solution we come up with for sending XBMC up to Steam
   
4. Helping maintain it and keeping XBMC on Steam alive with the stable releases going forwards
   

Again, whether or not Steam gets involved is completely irrelevant. The great thing about Greenlight is that it's up to the Greenlight and XBMC communities to push XBMC forwards on Steam. Let's do this. We have the power. It's in our hands.

[natethomas]

Steps 1 and 2 aren't really a big deal. Step 4, for the most part, isn't either, particularly if we can do beta updates on steam. People could enable that and get our alphas. Obviously, it's not linguistically correct to call our alphas betas, but I assume users will know what's up.

The big problem is packaging for steam. If you visit here, you'll see that the packaging process is an interesting one, to say the least: https://partner.steamgames.com/

I, frankly, have no idea how to handle any of that. And none of the Windows devs, to my knowledge, have shown much interest in figuring it out. I haven't talked to any linux devs in anticipation of SteamOS or regarding Steam on Linux. Ditto OSX. I'm not saying that figuring out how all that works and making XBMC Steam ready would guarantee an invite to the Team, but people would certainly at least be interested.

[tjcinnamon]

Y'know, I've always found it somewhat disheartening that the Steam guys have never contacted us about XBMC. One of the reasons I put XBMC on steam greenlight was to demonstrate how popular a feature it would be for the Valve crowd. To this day, I can't figure out if their lack of interest was because they're considering a competitor or because they just completely don't care about the media side of home media centers.

Meh. If this Steam distro ends up fairly popular and we end up supporting it, that'd be cool. But for now I still feel a tiny bit bitter.

From looking at your XBMC on Greenlight page, it's clear the interest is there. Whether or not Valve gets involved, I think we should push this forwards anyway. Although I don't have much experience packaging for Steam specifically, I am willing to:

1. Set up a dedicated XBMC Steam account as they recommend (optional, but Nate, you might be a better person to do this)
   
2. Pay the $100 for the Steam Greenlight Submission Fee
   
3. Open source the packaging solution we come up with for sending XBMC up to Steam
   
4. Helping maintain it and keeping XBMC on Steam alive with the stable releases going forwards
   

Again, whether or not Steam gets involved is completely irrelevant. The great thing about Greenlight is that it's up to the Greenlight and XBMC communities to push XBMC forwards on Steam. Let's do this. We have the power. It's in our hands.

How can I vote for greenlighting a project on Steam?