Create and store compatdata in home folder, or suffix with UserID.

[da2ce7]

Feature Request

I confirm:

• [ X] that I haven't found another request for this feature.
• [ X] that I have checked whether there are updates for my system available that
  contain this feature already.

Description

I share often share my gaming computer with other people, and we store our games in a common folder.
However, the compatdata folder gets locked to a user, and then creates locking troubles.

1. Stored locally in the /home/ folder. (Ideal)
2. Suffixed with the Unix UserID.

Either way, this folder should be made user-dependant.

[da2ce7]

On my system I have a /srv/SteamLibrary/ that is shared between the users.

For each user I must use a simple command in the login script:
ln --symbolic --relative --no-target-directory --backup --force /srv/SteamLibrary/steamapps/compatdata_username/ /srv/SteamLibrary/steamapps/compatdata

However, this workaround shouldn't be needed.

[kisak-valve]

Duplicate of ValveSoftware/Proton#2725. Since there's a specific and actionable request here, I'm not going to summary close this as a duplicate.

[aeikum]

This is arguably a Steam Client issue. Proton doesn't decide where the game data goes, the Steam Client tells us where to put it in the STEAM_COMPAT_DATA_PATH variable. I'm not sure what the policy is on sharing libraries between users on Linux with the Steam for Linux client.

[kisak-valve]

Related: #6958.

[chewi]

I would also like this. Some other folders are already created per-Steam-user rather than per-system-user and I think the former would make more sense here. There may be permission issues but if you're sharing your library folder then you've probably already dealt with them. I used ACLs but I suspect most pick a filesystem like NTFS instead.

[lectrode]

With the steam deck on the way, doesn't this make even more sense to implement? I imagine there will be multiple households that share 1 or 2 steam decks amongst multiple family members.

With storage limited like it is, it only makes sense to separate the game data from the save data so that players don't have to re-download the game to keep their game saves separate.

[geoffryan]

+1. We have a shared linux computer using family sharing, completely unreasonable that we can't actually share proton games locally.