Ceci est une ancienne révision du document !
Welcome back to another edition of Questions and Answers! In this section, we will endeavour to answer your Ubuntu questions. Be sure to add details of the version of your operating system and your hardware. I will try to remove any personally identifiable strings from questions, but it is best not to include things like serial numbers, UUIDs, or IP addresses. If your question does not appear immediately, it is just because there are many waiting, and I do them first-come-first-served.
So I’m busy wrapping some coal in a box for the kids this Christmas, it’s not that they really deserve it, but they have not been well behaved this year, plus we did not get that bonus 13th cheque we worked so hard for; rather a pink slip and told to hit the road. What can I say, maybe they will be better behaved next year? It may be back to porridge for breakfast, lunch and supper, but it is better than nothing and a barbie doll? The problem is that I had to give up our internet connection as well, as it is not affordable if you do not have an income, so the help may be a bit slower and less, overall, until I get employment again. It is not intentional, but an outcome of circumstance. If you reached out to me via email or Telegram, know I will get to you, but only once I have bummed the internet from somewhere. I don’t really want to hack my neighbours (it’s rude). In the meantime, I will go over the weird questions that I have skipped in the past, due to communications failure, and see if I can make heads or tails out of them.
Q: Hey. I upgraded to Ubuntu 24.04 via clean install. I followed this – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=icdzgpq3j1E. The short version is that it does not work. My error is – Package steam is not available, but is referred to by another package.
This may mean that the package is missing, has been obsoleted, or is available only from another source. However the following packages replace it: steam-installer steam-devices E: Package 'steam' has no installation candidate
What has changed since 20.04?
A: Hi there, if you don’t mind Snap packages, install it from your App Center. Otherwise, read on.
Q: I have recently installed Ubuntu 24.04.1 when my machine kept asking me to update. All was good until I decided to do a fresh install, as Virtualbox stopped working. Again all was good, and I installed steam to play some games. I use R2modman to mod Lethal Company. When I run it, it tells me that it can’t find Steam? I found this, but it does not help at all. https://github.com/ebkr/r2modmanPlus/issues/1446
A: Steam in a container, is walled off from the rest of the system, be it Snap or Flatpak or Appimage. I would suggest that you install the debian package version to skip all the issues.
Q: I was all excited to upgrade to Ubuntu 24.04, as 22.04 was buttery smooth on my last install. Instead of a full install, I chose the minimal one with just a browser. My idea was to go lean. I then installed just Libreoffice writer from the app center. Thing is that it looks worse than Abiword. You know, like windows 3.1 in high res. <removed> How do I fix this?
A: So this was a bit of a mission. Don’t install the Writer from the App Centre, it lacks things like gnome-integration. You will want to install the .deb-files downloaded from Libreoffice website. You need to start with the -ure deb, then the -core, then the fonts, then the pictures, then the language, then the writer base, then gnome integration, then finally the writer, then the debian-menus. I suggest you use gdebi to install, it will show you what you are missing (if I missed anything in this list).
Q: My guy, I installed steam on Ubuntu, the normal snap version. When I install games, it says by default it installs to /usr/… !BUT! I can’t find the games there. I need to add textures to a game, but the game does not exist, yet it plays?
A: Mmm… from what you say, it is a Snap package that you have installed, all the data for snap packages are under ~/snap iirc. My suggestion is to scratch around in that folder for a “common” folder to find your games.
Q: I have been gaming on LXLE on my old computer. This year I got a new computer and decided to go from 18.04 LXLE to Ubuntu Gnome 24.04. I tried to install steam via the terminal and after a few tutorials, it installed, but I messed up and installed again, but now I don’t see it. I can’t remember what PPA I used that may have had steam and I don’t really want to add too many PPA’s. Please give me the proper way to install steam?
A: Steam is installed via the Snap store. However, if you plan on using mod managers like the user above, you would need to do it another way. I am still on Linux Lite 6, so I have no experience with 24.04. I have installed it in a VM to check for you. My suggestion is this:
Install gdebi: sudo apt install gdebi
Go to: https://store.steampowered.com/about/ - and click the install steam button.
Open the .deb-file that just downloaded with gdebi and install.
Run Steam and let it update all the packages.
Sign in, when it asks. Install one (1) game and let it finish. (DON’T PLAY IT).
Exit and reboot.
Profit?
Q: I have installed Steam and it wants me to install 386 drivers. <removed> So that happened. What now? I am following the instructions to the letter here, but I still feel stupid. Do I need to install all the “suggested” packages? It’s quite the list: <removed> <removed>
A: You need only the main version number “550”, not the whole thing. For example: sudo apt install libnvidia-gl-535:i386 - see my above way of installing Steam, I feel the Snap or Flatpak you are using is not mature enough. The only issue is: once you install the Snap or Flatpak, it installs a few things that interfere with other installs of Steam, so you would have to reinstall the OS and start clean.
Q: My laptop is getting on in years and I was wondering if I could go from Ubuntu to Debian, to game? I was thinking of moving to MX Linux, but I see it is not lightweight, but medium weight. Vanilla Debian is too much work. Please give me some suggestions?
A: “Lightweight” and “gaming” are moving further apart as people use huge engines like Unity or Unreal. Go ahead and try MX Linux (I think they even have a fluxbox edition) if that is too heavy, maybe look at PikaOS? (I think they have a hyperland edition). I have used Linux Lite for my aging laptop and games work fine (Steam and GOG), as far as I am concerned. It all depends on how old the laptop is. Bhodi Linux may also be a valid choice if you are fond of all the Ubuntu apps.
Q: I want to move away from Windows 11, it just keeps installing I don’t want. I have been dual-booting for a while now. The reason I can’t drop Windows is that Ubuntu can’t “just work”. I run steam that is up-to-date and get this “Error: Steam now requires user namespaces to be enabled.” Like what does that even mean? Is this something new to Ubuntu 24.04? I didn’t have issues with 20.04LTS before that.
A: It probably means you are running Steam via some launcher? Did you install LXD? I found this on the interwebs: https://discuss.linuxcontainers.org/t/steam-in-incus-steam-now-requires-user-namespaces-to-be-enabled/21654. Have you tried any of the following, maybe you could find something simpler? https://www.zdnet.com/article/5-best-linux-distributions-for-gamers-in-2024/. From my discussions with friends who game a lot on Linux, it seems you may have multiple versions (Snap/Flatpak/AppImage/Debian Package) installed. Please see my reply to Pinky and the rain above ^^^
Q: I am having issues starting Multipass. It seems that if I disable my firewalls, UFW and OpenSnitch, it works. I’m not 100% why this is.
A: I have found something on Google that suggests there was a bug in earlier versions, can you update to the latest everything and see what happens? See: https://github.com/canonical/multipass/issues/2721
Q: I have been having odd issues with Ubuntu Gnome 24.10 and Steam. Not major bugs, but pain-in-the-***-type bugs. I recently switched to Plasma 6 and a lot of the problems just went poof! Could this be the reason that Voyager Linux did not release a gaming edition this year? Where would I see the least amount of issues? <removed> <removed>
A: Probably 24.04 LTS? Maybe XFCE? Maybe non-Wayland? Maybe a different proprietary/ Open source driver version? I can’t say. You would need to check yourself as your hardware varies a lot from mine. So there are a couple of suggestions in this QnA you could try.
Q: Something is off in Ubuntu 24.04. My cousin and I play games together, he is on Ubuntu 22.04. When our game zooms in, then I get a top-left to bottom-right tear across my screen, and he does not. I have tried with Vsync on and off and it makes no difference. I have a newer CPU and GFX than him. My Nvidia driver is the latest and my Kernel is the latest. The only other difference is that I use Gnome and he uses XFCE.
A: In XFCE you can usually set your composting and I wonder if that is not the difference. That said, what happens when you log out and choose “Ubuntu”, if you were on Wayland or vice-versa? (It sounds more like a Wayland quirk than anything else.) You could roll back to a previous kernel if it worked before an update, or even a previous graphics driver version.
EDIT: The above issue disappeared after Choosing “Ubuntu” as per our Telegram discussion.
Q: I have a question regarding Steam like Proton and whatnot. If I run my game in 1280×720 full-screen on my 4K display, and I change it to 1920×1080 or higher, there is no difference to be seen. It is as if the screen is in 4K no matter what I choose when I go full-screen. My reasoning behind this is that my graphics card in my laptop will run cooler and I will get more performance if I don’t draw 4K worth of pixels on the screen. I am using Ubuntu 24.04 in my i9-12900HK and Nvidia 3050Ti.
A: Sorry my friend, that has nothing to do with Ubuntu or Steam or Proton. It is most likely the game engine or default settings in said engine. You would need to test this on another game that does not use the same engine. Let’s say Unity and Unreal. Then you need to check it against another game on the same engine, to be sure.
Q:Reddit is no help. “https://www.reddit.com/r/Ubuntu/comments/1f7id8k/how_do_i_enable_user_namespaces_in_steam/”. I literally play 2 games on Steam, and both are giving me this; Steam now requires user namespaces to be enabled.
This requirement is the same as for Flatpak, which has more detailed information available: https://github.com/flatpak/flatpak/wiki/User-namespace-requirements
A: You can try changing the bubblewrap permissions. Code:
sudo chmod u+s /usr/bin/bwrap
Otherwise check any of the above solutions.