LINUX MINT TALES VOL.2

[neonoverdrive]

i'm back! mainly because i find documenting this process fun, and i dunno. maybe someone else will see my process and go "oh, i should do that".

so, last we left off i talked about wanting to give theming my setup a try. or, as ive come to learn it's also referred to, ricing.

i was running through a couple ideas, honestly. was i more into a flat, colorful look? or a skeumorphic nostalgia trip?

i mainly perused through sites like gnome-look and cinnamon spices, turns out theres a *LOT* you can customize on linux, at least specifically mint. i could change the cursor, the icon theme, the windows, the taskbar/panel. all *natively*.

thats WILD to me coming from windows, as id have to find external programs for this. but its out of the box!! it's incredible!!

i went through a lot of options, some of which i'll link here for your eyeballs viewing pleasure:

https://www.gnome-look.org/p/1305251


https://www.pling.com/p/2126365/


https://www.pling.com/p/1493643/


https://www.pling.com/p/2162540


but, i ended up using this combo here:



hm. yknow. i wonder if i like evanesence. hehe

you can see what options i did in the terminal there, but for ease of viewing...



real nice, aint they? i found out a lot of cinnamon/gnome themes are css based- so.. yknow. i got to have a little fun with customizing it a teeeensy bit more to my tastes.

but im happy! i may play with some desklets, but so far im quite cheesed with how its come out.

on the other end of things: THE TALE OF... um. trying to play STEAM GAMES


now. i dont know if you know this about me, but i play a lot of final fantasy XIV.



(maybe an understatement.)

but i usually play with xivlauncher on windows, lucky me that its based on linux! it was easy enough to setup- and i had confidence in getting other non-linux games running.


wwwwwwwwwweeeeeeeelll.

i was struggling really bad at first. i couldnt even get *nubbys number factory* to open without using bottles. i was so confused. (though, in hindsightr that shouldve been a sign) i'm no quitter though, i love a good puzzle. its why these roadbumps are more engaging and fun for me, i love to think through it.

i googled around, and i came to a few conclusions. "try using the flatpak version" (flatpaks, for those unaware, are essentially sandboxed versions of programs, mainly out of security. theyre easily configurable to have access outside of its sandboxed folders, but theyre generally pretty locked down.) and i thought, ok. sure. i do that, and my tester is nubby because nubby installs in record time. perfect. bingo. it works.

i fiddle with the permissions, i let the flatpak steam view my other externals. great. i try to play a game already installed on said external, i believe i tried to run monster hunter wilds. to run windows games on linux, steam uses these proton compatibility layers to help run on linux. great! and you can switch between a good amount of versions to see what works, (and protonDB exists as a tool to see how others have gotten games working, or how borked a game is or isnt on linux/steamOS (GOD I LOVE THE LINUX COMMUNITY!! SO MUCH DOCUMENTATION!!!))

so.. i try monster hunter wilds. it "opens" but immediately closes. ok. odd. nubby did it earlier as well. it'd open but immediately close. i couldnt fathom why. i tried other, smaller games. vampire survivors- installed it. and it worked, clearly no issue, right?

well... lets recap. im trying to install games on my external drive that i use Specifically for games. on other drives, like my root one. or even a sandboxed one, it worked fine. i realized i didnt even install vampire survivors on the right drive.

okay to save the suspense, it was the drive. more specifically, my external SSD was formatted as an exFAT, which specifically does NOT work with steam and proton. in essence, its because proton requires drives that support symbolic links, which.. exFAT does not. oops!!

sooo turned out to be an easier fix, i ended up moving important files from that drive, formatting it to ext4, putting the files back and installing a new dummy game, REPO, on that specific drive.

meanwhile through all of this im going through trusty flatseal to manage my permissions for steam, testing.. oh what the fuck now steam only sees like 7 gbs of my drive. i was wracking my brain until i realized "oh wait, im still on the flatpak. the version of steam i swapped to for troubleshooting specifically"

so i swapped back. installed repo again....................

AND IT WORKED! NEON NUMERO UNO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
 
RAN LIKE A DREAM, LETS GO! 

it was literally just the fact my external was an exFAT, which.. looking back at the times it DID work, i should've realized sooner it was a drive related issue, than anything else. oh well! you live and you learn!

see you next time, space cowboy