KSP and Linux

[carlorizzante]

I had a similar experience. KSP on Mac crashes like every 2 minutes (literally), and it doesn't run at 64 bits (which is crap). So I finally installed Linux (just for KSP, and some testing).

Being on Mac, I opted for a dual boot installation. And I am quite happy with it. Frankly OS X is faster (it literally boots in seconds), way (way!) easier to use, and as much as stable as Linux. In Linux I just can't figure it out how to do basic stuffs like "show me the damn desktop!" - it's not that user friendly as I was expecting. It clearly needs some love by some good UX designer, but that's gonna happen sooner than later.

Linux is something I would like to see vastly adopted in schools and public institutions. And I'm happy it's happening faster and faster.

Anyway, KSP on Linux is stable as a solid rock. And it gave me an excuse to finally play around with Linux. So it's good on goodness.

I would recommend Ubuntu to a newbie, since the installation process for Linux, if you've never done it before, can be pretty tedious and confusing. This is an aspect that has to be improved. Looking forward to see more Linux users on desktop computers.

Good luck with your new Linux PC and have fun with KSP

[Tankman101]

...have fun experiencing that *you* can control your computer.

I too like jumping through arbitrary hoops just to play a game I like.

[Laie]

Any linux beginner should start with ubuntu.

As much as I hate that statement... if I'm pressed to offer a suggestion, it's almost always Ubuntu.

A magnetized needle and a steady hand.

[jarmund]

ed, man! man ed!

ee is the only way to go.

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I've been using various flavors of linux and other unix-like OSes as a server OS for about a decade, and I've mostly used centos on the desktop side. But a few months ago I decided to give Linux Mint a try, and here are my experiences and impressions:

- Most things work out of the box. Install steam, and you get KSP working out of the box

- The default open source nvidia-drivers didn't work too well, but switching to the proprietary one was a few mouseclicks away, and after that, it worked like a charm.

- I was always a fan of gnome before version 2.0, after which I consider it too bloated, so this time around I gave XFCE a go, and I quite like it (Always hated KDE)

- While I prefer to do things via console, the GUI-side is very well built, so I'm sure new users to linux in general will have no problem adapting

- I've only used Ubuntu briefly a few years ago, and I must admit I didn't like it at the time. Maybe I would today, but I'm sticking to Mint unless I feel like going back to Arch at one point. I'm sure for the vast majority of newcomers to linux who want to play KSP, both mint and ubuntu will do fine

That being said, the major hurdles have already been mentioned:

- Program compatibility. You're likely to find equivalents of most of the programs you rely on today.

- Drivers. This depends on your hardware, but in most cases you'll be fine, as vendors supporting linux has gotten a lot more lately.

I suggest that people who are curious about it try boot from a live CD of some sort and poke around. The Linux Mint install CD can be used as a live OS, and allows for a partition of persistent storage. Give it a try if you want, or go all or nothing and do a complete install from scratch.

[m4v]

I too like jumping through arbitrary hoops just to play a game I like.

Yeah, but to be honest the reason you might have to go through that is because the minimal support and QA the developers give to linux and that's when you have to jump some hoops to get things to work. In KSP I have to set the environment localization to English because even after 1.0 Squad didn't bother to fix their game crapping out in a localized environment (0.90's changelog says is fixed but the fix only works the first time you run the game) and in War Thunder I have to set the graphics to the absolute minimun because it runs into serious graphical glitches in AMD cards. In contrast I don't remember to ever had any issues with Valve's games, Portal and Team Fortress always played without a hitch, which is to be expected given Valve focus in Linux.

[Green Baron]

I too like jumping through arbitrary hoops just to play a game I like.

Oh, i took it that the op had fun experiencing a new os. There is no reason installing linux just to play the game you like, that's overkill amd people are far better off with windows.

And then, not everyone uses steam (i don't) and needs that little starting script, especially if not in the english speaking world (like me f.e.). For that they need an editor and at least know how to tell an executable file from a directory. There have been questions here before for how to recognise an executable file, hence the hint to the man pages.

When installing drivers on debian

....(cable network usually works out of the box, but wlan and graphics frequently don't

........(because the drivers are not open source

............(or the open source ones are second choice)

..........and not installed by the debian installer)

......so you have to find your own way)

your better off with the console, because that's independent of the graphical environment., Thus, if tired of cinnamon, sudo apt-get install gnome3 ...

Nano.

:-)

k

Did that sound arrogant ? I meant it more on the fun side ...

[steve_v]

In Linux I just can't figure it out how to do basic stuffs like "show me the damn desktop!" - it's not that user friendly as I was expecting. It clearly needs some love by some good UX designer, but that's gonna happen sooner than later.

I take it you're referring to the default Ubuntu/gnome/unity abortion of a UI... in which case I agree.

If you don't like the UI, just install another. With Windows or OS X you essentially get one choice, with GNU you can simply replace your desktop GUI if the default doesn't suit.

While no one option is as polished as the OS X UI, they're pretty nice these days, and you can even mix & match components individually to find something you like.

I too like jumping through arbitrary hoops just to play a game I like.

If you're that lazy, so be it. For me it was : Download KSP, unpack archive, ./KSP.x86_64. No idea where you found those hoops.

Do I complain about jumping through hoops when I must run a game in Windows? Installing an OS is not much more trouble than any other software.

[Tankman101]

Yeah, but to be honest the reason you might have to go through that is because the minimal support and QA the developers give to linux and that's when you have to jump some hoops to get things to work. In KSP I have to set the environment localization to English because even after 1.0 Squad didn't bother to fix their game crapping out in a localized environment (0.90's changelog says is fixed but the fix only works the first time you run the game) and in War Thunder I have to set the graphics to the absolute minimun because it runs into serious graphical glitches in AMD cards. In contrast I don't remember to ever had any issues with Valve's games, Portal and Team Fortress always played without a hitch, which is to be expected given Valve focus in Linux.

The lack of support to linux and the fact that things don't work out of the box is the main reason why I never want to touch it again. I used Mint for awhile, and while it was streamlined, fast, and user-friendly, when it didn't work it didn't work at all.

Closest analogy would be "When it works it's perfect, when it doesn't the world might as well be end of the world."

Did that sound arrogant ? I meant it more on the fun side ...

To be fair I was just giving a bit of a poke as well. It's my opinion, but people are free to do what they want

If you're that lazy, so be it. For me it was : Download KSP, unpack archive, ./KSP.x86_64. No idea where you found those hoops.

Do I complain about jumping through hoops when I must run a game in Windows? Installing an OS is not much more trouble than any other software.

For me it was DL KSP, get 2 FPS, look up problem, see tons of command line prompts and proceed to go back to my windows machine. Not to mention getting the OS set up (Drivers, accounts) was possibly the post painful experience ever.

Edited June 12, 2015 by Tankman101
WORDS ARE HARD

[carlorizzante]

I take it you're referring to the default Ubuntu/gnome/unity abortion of a UI... in which case I agree.

If you don't like the UI, just install another. With Windows or OS X you essentially get one choice, with GNU you can simply replace your desktop GUI if the default doesn't suit.

While no one option is as polished as the OS X UI, they're pretty nice these days, and you can even mix & match components individually to find something you like.

Thanks for the suggestion. I'm totally new on Linux so any bit of advise is very welcome.

[Fizwalker]

Thanks for the help and advice guys! I went ahead and moved over to Mint and for the most part I enjoy it more than Debian. That said, I've spent most of the yesterday trying to install the current nVidia drivers for my card (version 346). I've run into the *Cues sinister music* NOUVEAU driver. *end sinister music * As I cannot install the proprietary drivers with Nouveau installed, and every tutorial or guide I have found.... Has directions to kill it... But it keeps popping up and so I've concluded Nouveau must be loaded very early in the boot process. This thing makes me feel like I'm playing Whack-A-Mole remotely on Pluto, with a blind fold.... and after someone's spun me around a few dozen times (or maybe while completely sloshed ).

I figure that 90% of this problem is: I don't have a bloody clue what I am doing and that after I find something that works, I'm going to feel ridiculously stupid afterwards. (Thank god for the internet though.... If I had this much trouble back when I started playing games on ms-dos 3.3 and no ideas to help me out.... I wouldn't be here today!)

There was a comment awhile back regarding my choice to switch to Linux. I've been leaning towards Linux for awhile now, but most everything I run on my machine depended on Windows. To be fair, Windows 7 is decent enough as things go, but I don't really like where Windows is heading to, and I want to see what Linux offers. KSP is just the final prod to get me to switch.

Oh yeah, I resurrected an old laptop and installed Debian onto that. I figure that once I get my desktop to run the way I want, I can mess around with other distros or... Um... systems before putting it on the desktop. (Anyone find the term 'desktop' kind of weird considering towers aren't usually on top of a desk these days.....?)

I could use some help in what to try next. This is the info from inxi -SGx:

System: Host: phome.net Kernel: 3.11-2-amd64 x86_64 (64 bit, gcc: 4.8.1)

Desktop: Cinnamon 2.0.14 Distro: LinuxMint 1 debian

Graphics: Card: NVIDIA GF114 [GeForce GTX 560 Ti] bus-ID: 01:00.0

X.Org: 1.14.3 drivers: nouveau (unloaded: fbdev,vesa) Resolution: [email protected]

GLX Renderer: Gallium 0.4 on NVCE GLX Version: 3.0 Mesa 9.2.2 Direct Rendering: Yes

How the hades do I get rid of nouveau....? I think I understand, or at least I can follow instructions, well enough to get the drivers installed after that...

Edited June 11, 2015 by Fizwalker
Clarity

[Green Baron]

And the instructions in the nvidia readme don't help ? :-)

Okay okay, Plan B:

Install the nvidia driver from the repositories (nvidia binaries 331, nvidia settings), that's easier and it does everything for you, you can even install it from the graphical frontend (i think).

Got it working ?

k

or else the hard way: http://de.download.nvidia.com/XFree86/Linux-x86_64/346.72/README/installdriver.html

Chapter "Before you Begin", "Interactions with the Nouveau Driver"

Edited June 11, 2015 by kemde

[sal_vager]

Hmm that's odd as I have nouveau and the proprietary driver installed together, oh and on Ubuntu 15.04 the 346 driver is in the repo, so installing is easy

Mint should have it too.

[Fizwalker]

Oh for the love of.....! *face-meet-palm* Well, I learned a little more than I did before! lol Although, the version it states is up to date is version 319 of the nVidia drivers. 346 doesn't seem to be in the repository for Mint. Now I have to set up x.conf and reboot the system.

I guess I was trying it the hard way through the terminal. >.>

Anyway, thank you for the help and the pointer! (Goes to show, given a big enough clue stick..... )

Edited June 11, 2015 by Fizwalker

[carlorizzante]

By the way, are you guys able to use all the shortcuts on Linux?

I am unable to copy parts in the VAB, and I cannot ALT+click in order to transfer fuel (I could on OS X). I suspect the issues are related with the fact that I run Linux on a MacBook Pro. Nevertheless, if you have a solution that would be great

Edit: Solved. I have to use the right shift key + the left mouse btn. In both cases.

Edited June 12, 2015 by carlorizzante

[Fizwalker]

Strangely enough, apparently I didn't have an Xorg.conf file... So... Having fun creating one!

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By the way, are you guys able to use all the shortcuts on Linux?

I am unable to copy parts in the VAB, and I cannot ALT+click in order to transfer fuel (I could on OS X). I suspect the issues are related with the fact that I run Linux on a MacBook Pro. Nevertheless, if you have a solution that would be great

Don't know yet! I am creating an Xorg.conf file, but when I can play I'll try it out and pass on what I've learned!

Edit: And apparently successfully!

Edited June 12, 2015 by Fizwalker

[Bolche]

Use Right Shift instead of Alt

[steve_v]

You should be able to safely delete xorg.conf and run 'nvidia-xconfig' to generate a new, sane, default one that explicitly loads the proprietary driver.

Does mint not do the easy metapackage "nvidia-driver" that pulls in the latest binary? -> 'apt-get install nvidia-driver', reboot

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For me it was DL KSP, get 2 FPS, look up problem, see tons of command line prompts and proceed to go back to my windows machine. Not to mention getting the OS set up (Drivers, accounts) was possibly the post painful experience ever.

So you're just CLI-phobic then? No OS has full OpenGL acceleration on modern cards without installing drivers. You installed drivers on Windows, did you not? How many FPS do you get without them?

The process is just different, that's all - try to do it the Windows way and you will fail.

Linux is: Kernel + GNU toolchain + Xorg + Deshtop environment + apps. You don't rely solely on the desktop because that bit un-bolts. Loosing the GUI or graphics drivers is not "the world ending" at all, the rest of the system is probably just fine. Some Linux boxes have no GUI at all installed you know.

Edited June 12, 2015 by steve_v

[m4v]

eh, isn't the xorg.conf file a relic of the times you had to tweak everything by hand to get your resolution right? I have been going without that file for years now.

[Fizwalker]

You should be able to safely delete xorg.conf and run 'nvidia-xconfig' to generate a new, sane, default one that explicitly loads the proprietary driver.

Does mint not do the easy metapackage "nvidia-driver" that pulls in the latest binary? -> 'apt-get install nvidia-driver', reboot

*Snip*

Strangely enough, and it's possible it got deleted when I used the repo, but I didn't have xorg.conf so I had another opportunity to learn something about Linux. I'll try what you posted above and see if that works

[steve_v]

eh, isn't the xorg.conf file a relic...

Sort of, it's not deprecated as such, just unnecessary for most drivers. If you have more than one driver installed for the same card (and your package manager doesn't automagically set it up), or need SLI/custom modes/overclocking/your monitor lies about its caps etc. it still goes in there.

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FWIW, there is also SMXI/SGFXI, useful if you want the upstream or beta drivers (my nvidia drivers were installed thus), but you have to remember to re-run it after kernel updates.

Oh, and, disclaimer: If anyone ever tells you to run a command, you should probably check the manual for said command (in this case 'man nvidia-xconfig') to see what it actually does.

Edited June 12, 2015 by steve_v

[Tankman101]

So you're just CLI-phobic then?

If I can't see something, I will forget it within a day. That means CLI prompts are an immediate no-go for me. I NEED the graphical interface or I can't navigate anything.

No OS has full OpenGL acceleration on modern cards without installing drivers. You installed drivers on Windows, did you not? How many FPS do you get without them?

False equivalency, with windows I just go to the manufacturers website and download the drivers. With Mint I had to type in an obscene amount of text to get it to download. And even then the game ran like utter garbage.

Linux is: Kernel + GNU toolchain + Xorg + Deshtop environment + apps.

I'm aware of the structure of Linux.

Loosing the GUI or graphics drivers is not "the world ending" at all, the rest of the system is probably just fine. Some Linux boxes have no GUI at all installed you know.

See 1.

Also "Some people don't have a GUI" is possibly the worst argument for the lack of a GUI ever.

[steve_v]

Like I said, the process is different. Starting with stay away from the manufacturers website. Add 'contrib non-free' to a config file and run 'apt-get update; apt-get install nvidia-driver' isn't really "an obscene amount of text" either, IMO.

'Download sgfxi and run the script' is even easier.

Having the option of other GUIs, or no GUI at all is an excellent reason to do core system management tasks from the CLI - because it's always available.

But whatever, suit yourself.

Edited June 12, 2015 by steve_v

[sal_vager]

This may sound contradictory now, but you don't really need an xorg.cfg these days at least with Debian based distros, and you can do a lot of this stuff using Synaptic which is already installed in Mint.

Synaptic is a graphical package manager, it can uninstall the driver from the Nvidia site, install the one from the repo that has been tweaked to work on your system, and set it up for you.

This is a little old but Synaptic hasn't changed much, you'll most likely find the 346 driver in the Universe or Multiverse repo, which is easily enabled in Synaptic.

[Fizwalker]

Maybe it's just with Cinnamon or the 319 drivers then.... For whatever reason, Cinnamon crashed without that conf file. I'm also wondering if there's something that didn't get installed with this iteration... (I messed something up with the grub boot and it sent the system into a recovery terminal prompt, I didn't know what to try to fix it so I tried to reformat and reinstall Mint. Getting that cleared took about 3 tries lol)

Again, thank you for the help and pointers!

EDIT: Just a strange thought. Can KSP on Linux be run from the command line?

EDIT2: I have the 346 drivers from nVidia's website.... is there a reason to not use these?

Edited June 12, 2015 by Fizwalker

[Fizwalker]

This may sound contradictory now, but you don't really need an xorg.cfg these days at least with Debian based distros, and you can do a lot of this stuff using Synaptic which is already installed in Mint.

Synaptic is a graphical package manager, it can uninstall the driver from the Nvidia site, install the one from the repo that has been tweaked to work on your system, and set it up for you.

This is a little old but Synaptic hasn't changed much, you'll most likely find the 346 driver in the Universe or Multiverse repo, which is easily enabled in Synaptic.

I am a complete newbie in Linux Sal (although flailing about randomly has taught me a little about syntax with sudo....) how do I enable these repositories? ie: what are the web locations of these repositories!

Edited June 12, 2015 by Fizwalker
Clarification