Sadly my professional bet (FWIW I did discuss with people at Valve about the immersive browser back in 2016… back when WebXR was still WebVR) is that they at “best” will rely on a Steam desktop, not go more upstream.

one of the “winkeyless” enthusiast mechanical keyboards…

That’s me, in fact you can see my keymap at https://github.com/Utopiah/zmk-config-zen-2/blob/main/config/corneish_zen.keymap#L27 for my Corne-ish Zen 3x6

I’m not. To me Steam is already successful with VR and on Linux. I have an Index since day 1. One of my favorite game, VR or not, is Half-life: Alyx. I also anecdotally already have a Steam Deck since day 1.

No rather to me, as I said before it’s

the big questions for VR on Linux more broadly is what changes upstream on KDE in terms of immersive UX? Is KDE Plasma becoming a VR graphical shell? Does it have 3D widgets? Does it impact freedesktop in any way?

namely more precisely how will Valve work impact VR on Linux upstream of Steam itself.

Yes precisely that part.

My bad then, as I mentioned before unfortunately I have no such keyboard available anymore.

I’m not sure if we’re having the same conversation, they addressed 5 items but now my actually questions on the more structural aspect.

Agreed but I’m not really talking about Steam here.

Shocking to read in a Linux thread. The entire point of free software and open source is that the need of 1, not even a market but a need, without any budget, might still be relevant and important.

Linux itself is the result of that.

I genuinely don’t get your point. Popularity is not a criteria that is relevant for my needs. Your preferences are not relevant to my needs. We are different people and that’s OK.

That’s about popularity though. Of course it will change development, and hopefully for the better because consumers and developers alike will be able to trust that the platform will keep on being usable. Still, it’s not about being genuinely new technically speaking. Same for e.g. https://simulavr.com/ which now looks like… well let’s just said egoistically speaking I did track the project for years, glad I didn’t order a DevKit, sadly.

• criteria please, hand tracking does work even though it might not be something you like for your own usages
• there are even actual games like Laser Dance developed specifically for it
• it’s 2026 hardware?
• https://immersive-web.github.io/ feel free to ask question
• Valve did announce they are not developing VR content for it e.g. https://www.uploadvr.com/valve-isnt-currently-working-on-a-new-vr-game/

I never tried with it specifically (done with with numerous other HMDs though) but it’s just streaming and they have a Alvr repo https://github.com/Lynx-MR/ALXR so I imagine so yes.

I don’t have a physical keyboard with a Windows key to verify (gave that to a friend who need an ergonomic keyboard few weeks ago) but AFAICT xev or KDE Plasma again return meta when pressed on that key.

Also ZMK https://zmk.dev/docs/keymaps/list-of-keycodes list GUI as Meta GUI (Windows / Command / Meta) and QMK LGUI(kc) G(kc), LCMD(kc), LWIN(kc) https://docs.qmk.fm/feature_advanced_keycodes

My interpretation of “Meta key, its functionality may be invoked by other keys such as the Windows key or Macintosh’s Option key” is that the Windows key is the meta key, isn’t it what it says?

Sure, my point is mainly to distinguish what is genuinely novel versus what already exist but people might not be aware of.

Not according to Wikipedia (linked to initially already) nor KDE Plasma which I’m using :

I’m planning my exit.

How can I help?

A friend of my is a researcher working on large scale compute (>200 GPUs) perfectly aware of ROCm and sadly he said last month “not yet”.

So I’m sure it’s not infeasible but if it’s a real use case for you (not just testing a model here and there but running frequently) you might have to consider alternatives unfortunately, or be patient.

I don’t have one. If I did, I want change the keycap.

Now… it’s called a meta key https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meta_key … and I use it exactly as one would on Windows, e.g. Meta-e starts the file explorer … but I added my shortcuts too e.g. :

• meta+k for konsole
• meta+f for FIP (online French radio, music only, no ads)
• meta+F to stop FIP
• meta+a to play the series I’m currently watching
• meta+A to stop mpv (playing the current series)
• meta+o to turn on my office lights
• meta+l to turn off those lights
• meta+ESC to turn off lights and suspend computer
• meta+s for Spectacle to take a screenshot

and I have quite a others I can’t recall right now.

No worries, it’s quite niche even for XR professionals some are surprised to learn it even exists. So I’d put that on lack of communication from Lynx.

Also FWIW for Meta/Facebook one can use a headset without any account now via PrivateQuest so if bought 2nd hand, not 1 cent goes to the zucc.

Yes but …

• no hand tracking
• no color passthrough
• no hardware upgrade
• no WebXR
• no new VR proper content

Still, it’s good obviously, not having to rely on BigTech. This was also possible before though as I pointed out in https://lemmy.ml/post/38899489/22202786 with e.g. Lynx XR1, as a rooted Android standalone HMD with no account required.

Anyway IMHO the big questions for VR on Linux more broadly is what changes upstream on KDE in terms of immersive UX? Is KDE Plasma becoming a VR graphical shell? Does it have 3D widgets? Does it impact freedesktop in any way?

Edit : I have a SteamDeck since its out, Lynx XR1, etc so I absolutely want Linux VR and FLOSS XR to succeed. In fact I even gave a talk at FOSSXR years ago about that, fact did it twice. Still it doesn’t mean I can’t be disappointed by those points. I like Valve, I want to give them money, that doesn’t mean I can’t be objective. You might have different requirements, that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t compare to alternatives which have existed for years.