This is a folder showing my games installed via proton. There has to be a better naming convention than this, surely? Why did Valve make it a random string of numbers instead of something like taking the game/application title with a number on the end like “NameOfGame_01”? If a folder is already detected with the same name when installing something then it can just be “NameOfGame_02”

I understand the reason for having a unique named folder to avoid any conflicts but damn, random numbered folders makes it so much harder to find the install paths for non steam games. Valves method seems simple but annoying for the end user IMO.

https://preview.redd.it/g4m4c6jqvo2c1.png?width=1449&format=png&auto=webp&s=aea9795ccac5152f69862d943b6779ae30ac4241

  • forbiddenlake@alien.topBEnglish
    2·
    10 months ago

    Naming things is hard, and text on computers is fraught with peril. Numbers are safe.

    What if you have a game named Русская локализация? Would that help you? Or \ or COM1, would that even work on Windows (nope)? Or two games named Farming Simulator? How do you disambiguate?

    The number is the store ID, which is not unique to Proton and has been used by Steam forever.

    • sad-goldfish@alien.topBEnglish
      1·
      10 months ago

      While I get what you’re saying, steamapps/common already has a similar directory structure (a folder for each game) with names like Robocop Rogue City, Red Dead Redemption 2 and Proton BattlEye Runtime so it seems like they probably already have unique names.