Some users expected to see SteamOS in action

Mar 6, 2015 07:47 GMT  ·  By

The Khronos Group demoed their new Vulkan API, which is supposed to replace the current OpenGL generation, at GDC 2015 in San Francisco and they used an Ubuntu-powered system to do it.

Valve arranged for The Khronos Group to make their presentation at GDC 2015 and it looks like they are definitely on the right track. From what they have revealed so far, the new Vulkan API is doing wonders in the Source engine from Valve, but that was to be expected. And this is where the quirk is. Developers will have to provide support for Vulkan in their engines.

Some very observant users on Reddit noticed that the system used by The Khronos Group for their demos is actually an Ubuntu one. We expected to see SteamOS in action, but it's not a really friendly desktop system and the Vulkan developers needed that. So, they chose Ubuntu and from the looks of it it's an older one, possibly Ubuntu 12.04 LTS.

In any case, if you want to get some technical details, you can check out the video that they just posted on YouTube that details some of their work. Vulkan is still in its early stages, but at the rate things are moving in the Linux world, I wouldn't be surprised if it were implemented in a ton of engines and games by this time next year.

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