Linux Support :D

Me.

--Eric

 

Let me ask you again....
So you are ACTUALLY willing to pay $1500 for the Unity PRO license, AND $1500 for the Unity Linux license?
(For a grand total of $3000)

If you do, well, UT you got ONE, ONE customer. Let's see exactly how many is worth UT time to do this.

 

I wouldn't have a problem if Linux publishing was part of the standard Pro license. That's what Windows publishing used to be, back when Unity was Mac-only. It's a computer OS, not a completely separate platform like iOS, so it doesn't make any logical sense to have it be a separate license. It would be inconsistent.

They're already doing it. http://forum.unity3d.com/threads/5891-Linux-Web-Player?p=519300&viewfull=1#post519300

--Eric

 

Make that two.

 

Like this 350 post thread? Or maybe the 200 post "Linux webplayer" thread in the gossip forum?

 

And what happens at the end of it? 90% are demos compiled to linux that nobody tries out, and the other 10% reach 10% of the market. Hate to sound like an old moany git but I would be enormously more inspired to see strong progression on the mobile front.

 

So Unity3D should invest what tens of thousands of dollars annually (?) into creating and maintaining unity3D for linux so that maybe 1 or 2 unity games might make it into the humble bundle cut a year...

Think about what your saying...

And? That isn't what I said.

because the stats are quite clear:

Gish, World of Goo, Grappling Hook, DROD, and Penumbra. Surprisingly, the average sales distribution was 72% Windows, 22% Mac and 6% Linux!

6% Compare that to the markets unity has opened up... it's nothing.

Yep.

EDIT: Don't confuse a long discussion with people. 350 Posts - I'm sure a fair few of them have been mine

 

That's just one reason, of course. And they are implementing Linux publishing; you seem to be in denial.

I have; you clearly haven't. There's obviously some irrational bias at play here.

You'd actually turn down 6% extra sales for hardly any effort on your part? How bizarre. Any normal business would jump at that opportunity.

--Eric

 

Remembering of course, that linux support IS coming.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Devils_advocate

Whoa, where did 6% come from?

Remembering Linux has a very small supply (by the argument of pro-linux-ers). So if we increased supply by say 10 times (from what I've seen so far a conservative estimate) you're talking about 0.6%. Then you'd potentially have to take into account all the additional testing etc. that needs to be done... possibly unity license fee...

 

*Sigh*...if you're just going to troll, I'm not going to bother arguing anymore.

--Eric

 

We are not trying to troll you. We are just saying that UT should concentrate on the mobile platforms that paying customers who gave UT lots of money (Unity PRO + iOS PRO + Android PRO = $4500) should get the priority over platforms that won't even turn a profit for UT. Right now UT is already got its hands full trying to handle PC/OSX/PS3/X360/iOS/Wii/Android/Web/Flash...etc etc. To support Linux would mean UT has to divert its attention to support a very minority platform at the cost of major platform (and REAL paying customers).

 

Another person in denial. Read this: http://forum.unity3d.com/threads/5891-Linux-Web-Player?p=519300&viewfull=1#post519300

--Eric

 

Taumel is behind you Eric, look!

Seriously, It's good news that linux is on the way. There's only one reservation I have - will this sap resources from markets I feel need more work done to them? for example DX11 unity should fall back to DX9 unity. I shouldn't need two executables for this (when DX11 is done) And mobile should keep leapfrogging the competition. I'm a very competitive creature and if unity's mobile quality falls behind the competition there would be tears.

Also imho linux support should be pro only. I doubt it will be but pro doesn't currently have enough unique features to justify it's expense for a lot of users. Personally, I think the free version is probably worth 1500. But I'm just saying what I think I've managed to observe.

 

Don't worry about the resources available for diverse parts of Unity... i think UT will manage this quite well.

But you should think a bit broader, imho. E.g. Android is just introduced (a few releases back), and in your logic, this would have messed up other development aswell (which wasn't the case in practise).

Linux is a very big oppertunity, on all kinds of sides (business wise). Now it might be small, but that's because most developers (games etc.) and publishers alike, are afraid of it (because of myths, "chicken egg" syndrome and whatnot). Many Linux users cannot fully convert to their OS of choice, because of the lack of modern games ported to their OS. If their is more availablitiy in this area, the growth will increase by huge steps. Also the market can fully expend that way (income wise), because Linux users are not freeriders/leechers by definition.Linux users are just as others willing to pay for products (e.g. commercial stuff).
So, developers making their titltes available for Linux, might see a high pickup (and thus sales), over time in a new audience.

And where only for now talking about an export function, which isn't so terribly difficult at all (OSX vs Linux not a very big difference under the hood, both have alot in common). Just two things, native export, and webplayer for linux.
The editor is not required for now.. since that is way more difficult to achieve (and requires many more hours of research/debugging/testing/building etc)

I Don't think Linux export option should be PRO only, because OSX and Windows both are also supported in both versions. Iphone and such, are embedded OS's for specific hardware and require a different approach compared to a Desktop OS.

 

Which is an excellent argument for NOT supporting Linux. It says you're simply creating work for the hell of it - not 'creating new markets'.

 

Wrong, i said, that reaching new unused markets increases sales, adaption, use. Companies should look out for extensions of their current markets, by moving to unused markets.

E.g. Apple, was just a desktop computer company (incl. OS). and then they added an unused market to it (mobile computing: tablet, iphone)
It increased their sales, and shares by tenfold..

Same can be said here, new OS support is new territory to do business in = more sales, more adaption more use.

 

Agreed!

 

The key difference is that apple stole customers from OTHER markets. Unity3D stealing customers from Mac or Windows does not magically increase it's user-base.

 

Linux is a different market than Window, and the same can be said about OSX.
The only things they have in common, is that they are mostly used on desktop alike devices. (from this discussion anyway). Linux has not being touched yet, and a huge commercial potential (market) is not used.

And how would UT steal from it's own userbase? they don't! They are EXPANDING the userbase, by allowing new users to use their software, on the new userbase choice of OS.

So their is no stealing, robbery or whatever going on.. it's about expanding (i told it before, appearantly not clearly enough).

 

There are no accurate numbers for installs on Linux because it's free. To say it's not a major platform is conjecture at best.

However, I recently joined the casino gaming industry (coming from video games), and I stumbled into a multi-billion dollar industry that's HUNGRY for video game technology and the vast majority of their gaming machines run Linux. IGT alone runs Windows because they can afford to take the cost-hit. That's a big, established (i.e. not independent), deep-pocketed industry. Unity would be foolish to ignore it.

 

"Many Linux users cannot fully convert to their OS of choice"

Your words - not mine.

 

so? As explained before, this means, they now are using windows solely for gaming purposes.. but they want to use Linux 100% if they could still game on it.
So, these users, are now buying games, which cannot be ran on Linux, but on Windows.. that number stays the same (linux or Windows) (not stealing users away)

However, there are also quite a huge bunch of Linux users, who only play old games or flash games, because they are not willing to support a company not acknowlegding their OS as target. (i know a few that have such principles)
If you look at the humble indie bundle, most of them are Linux supported games, you see those users want to purchage, just because they support Linux.

Btw, what is it to you, if they DO or DO NOT support Linux eventually. (and others here, being kind of negative about this Linux thing)
It's up to UT to choose, not us. Apparently they are reasearching it already.
I can only work out OK, for everyone, if Linux would be supported aswel. So what's the problem?

 

LOL, you are naive to believe UT's support for Linux will "turn things around" ("chicken and egg" question) for the Linux. Seriously, LMAO.

There is a reason people don't adopt Linux. Linux has been on the mainstream market for almost 2 decades now, and the adoption rate is still below 2% at best, AND IT IS A FREAKING FREE AND YET PEOPLE STILL DON'T WANT TO ADOPT IT! Think about it, just under what kind of circumstances would something being offer FREE and people would still refuse it? (Let's say free sex?? )

The point is, Linux is an UGLY OS that's hard to use, its so ugly and hard to use that people would refuse to put it on their system EVEN WHEN IT IS FREE. Oh just in case you might misunderstood me, when I say "ugly" I don't just mean the UI, I meant marketability - it has ZERO SEX APPEAL to mainstream consumer.

So even if Unity is to give unwavering support for Linux - ITS NOT GOING TO TURN THINGS AROUND.
Why you ask? Let's make a even bigger assumption, let's say EA or Activision is to publish their blockbuster title to Linux EXCLUSIVELY (oh, let's say "CALL OF DUTY: MODERN WARFARE 3"?), I will bet this $100 in my pocket right now EVEN THAT'S NOT GOING TO CHANGE A THING. Kids are just going to go "What? On Linux? I will pass". The very few who would actually try to install Linux just to play COD:MW3, will get hugely frustrated by it, gave up, and swear never to use Linux.
And there you have it. Linux, a dead end market. Even John Carmack tried, porting ID's blockbuster titles and it didn't turn things around for Linux.


Believe me, if Linux ain't taking off back in 90s, it sure ain't going to take off now and forever.

 

This quote is indeed a big LMAO worthy, at least i experienced it during reading your comment.
I know you dislike Linux (as in distro) and it's flavors, well good for you.
Luckely, the world is not dependent on your one sided, non innovative visions.

 

If they move from WINDOWS to LINUX unity is simply: "creating work for the hell of it - not 'creating new markets'."

If they don't move markets, then Linux has a insignificant take-up.

Android has market, Mac has market - both are non MS OS's - so where is the linux market?

 

I'll just say that the humble indie bundle had the requirement that all games are crossplatform (including linux). Also a lot of linux users bought the bundle, so there is a market there. In short I'm happy unity is going to support linux.

Edit: just realised that my point has already been discussed to death. Kind of embarassing In my defense with all these walls of text in this thread it's easy to get acute episodes of tl;dr

 

Oh yeh? Is that all you can come up with as an argument?

The truth is, I actually LIKE the idea of Linux platform (for it to be free and open source), the problem is its poor implementation, marketing, and almost non-existent market share. Its really just too bad its a dying platform.

Oh and the world is indeed NOT dependent on my opinion. The world at large has already made up their mind long ago. They don't want Linux. The less than 2% market share is the proof.

 

(modern warfare 2 was very playable on linux through Wine btw, I know some people that used to play it that way)

Also linux has its rightful place in computing. It's just that gaming is not one of its strong points currently. Also... dieing? Is its market share declining? It has been slowly but surely rising for years.

 

"They probably all use linux". Heh, so at least you agree that linux has cornered the succesful and charitable people demographic.

 

Oh, I don't doubt that Linux has its rightful place in computing, but as a viable marketable platform for commercial desktop titles it is not.

The argument that Linux market share is "growing" is a moot one when its market share is less than 2% (so it gains 0.00001% every year). Like I have said before, it has been 20 years and its market share is still 2%, and that's with major corporations (Dell, HP, IBM, Lenovo, Asus, Acer ...etc) and governments (Brazil, China, India, Thailand and some provincial governments in EU...etc) backing it too. If all these grandiose efforts by major corporations and governments have so far seem to fail to make Linux a dominant platform of choice, what makes you think Unity or gaming in general will turn this around?

 

From another thread demanding UT to drop Unity Pro down to $99 ......

Seems to be a running thing with the Linux users - they are just cheap and prefer not to pay for anything right?

So what can you expect getting out of Linux market anyway if majority are like you who simply just don't want to pay a fair price for the software? Oh and don't bring that argument about the Humble Indie Bundle - a few rich Linux diehards don't make majority of Linux user base (as insignificant as it is ... at less than 2% currently) a viable option because majority of them simply don't want to pay for anything.

 

Well who doesn't? If I offered you a crate of gold and jewels, would you prefer to pay for it or would you rather I gave it to you for free? On Windows, piracy is a huge problem because Windows users are just cheap and prefer to not pay for anything, right?

 

I blame poor policing, corrupt cultural values and ineffective legal system

But yeah, I give you points for trying.

 

Why is it me who seems to find Linux exporter news? I don't even have a Linux box
This is from the latest blog video demoing flash export

 

Wow, that is great, I guess they are getting somewhat close.

 

Yummy. Can't hurt sales now its decided on.

 

Since Android runs on Linux, the obvious solution to the support problem is to run Android as a guest operating system on Linux. I've run Windows as a guest operating system on Linux as a settop box developer and it shouldn't be that hard to do. For that matter, just run Windows as a guest and it should work fine as long as your machine has lots of CPU and memory.

 

That's not obvious, it's incorrect; Android isn't something that "runs on Linux". You wouldn't run Android on a PC anymore than you would iOS. (There is an effort underway to port Android to x86, but that doesn't help with software that you don't have the source code for, and that's ignoring control issues.)

That's not really an acceptable solution, it's a desperate work-around. Anyway it's irrelevant.

--Eric

 

Does it mean that the Unity editor will be work on Linux too?

 

no it does not mean the editor runs on Linux too.
It just means, there is a high chance that a linux build option will be present in a soon to be released version of UT.
Nothing is for sure, untill it's there.

 

LOL.

I love how you completely ignore the giant 'FLASH EXPORT' and focus on the tiny 'linux'.

Here's a hint:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adobe_Flash_Player#Supported_platforms

Forest. Trees.

 

Flash exporting is nice, but this is a discussion about Linux deployment. Why would he make a big deal about the Flash exporter in this thread? He didn't ignore it, it's just not contextually appropriate.

You Linux bashers'll have to just get over this eventually. I can't wait until this is a non-issue anymore.

 

He is pointing out the fact that it isn't necessarily a Linux exporter, but a flash exporter that supports Linux. As in, Flash is the reason it works, not an actual export option for Linux.

 

No, that's not the case. Look again at the screenshot. The Flash exporter is a separate publishing option, which is selected (it's at the bottom of the list below Wii, you can just see the first few pixels). Linux exporting is together with PC and Mac exporting.

Indeed. Next time, think before you LOL.

--Eric

 

Right you are, my power of observation is hilarious!

 

Hey guys, when will the pleasure of trying Unity3D under Linux platform?
one years ago I use and I'm really looking forward to this implementation,
Thank you.

 

When it's done.

--Eric

 

Flash by default (should) support LINUX.

If your goal is to get LINUX support... you're missing the giant red flashing sign and looking for it under a rock.

I find it ironic, that's all.

It's well established unity are developing 3 entirely separate platforms that should support Linux - that was never my issue (and I can't wait for them to get one done!)

Given you ignored vital content of my last post... will this post enlighten you?

 

As a prospective Unity customer, I find that answer inappropriate. I understand development takes time, and bugs don't magically go away; I'm in the software biz myself.

However, I can find no mention of decisive progress from this:
http://blogs.unity3d.com/2011/03/24/ninjacamp-iii-foxes-and-penguins-unite/
which was something a small team of your developers did as a side project in four days. That was two quarters ago.

 

Then I suggest you don't purchase unity3D for it's Linux/Flash abilities

If you really want an answer, email 'em.