Posts by Luke Short

Technical Writer for Chrome Unboxed, bringing over 8 years of experience with cloud computing and software development. By day, I showcase the value of cloud products to potential stakeholders and how they help to solve their needs. By night, I'm a passionate Linux gamer, tinkerer, and blogger. I'm a strong believer in a fully open source future and I love developing projects on Linux with a Chromebook. All views and opinions are Luke’s own and do not reflect that of his full-time employer, VMware.

Why ‘Borealis’ (Steam gaming for Chromebooks) may still arrive in 2021

October 20, 2021 By Luke Short View Comments

Borealis, the official Steam gaming support in Chromebooks, has been in development for at least a year now (and likely much longer). Let’s go over some new revelations we've found and then take a look back at what we know so far. There are many signs that point to a release of Borealis in the … [Read more...] about Why ‘Borealis’ (Steam gaming for Chromebooks) may still arrive in 2021

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Online games with Anti-Cheat will soon be playable on Chromebooks

October 7, 2021 By Luke Short View Comments

Ever since Valve announced their Steam Deck, it has been nothing but great news for Linux gamers and, by extension, soon-to-be Chromebook gamers. One of their original goals was to make anti-cheat software compatible with Wine and Proton (the programs that make Windows games work on Linux). This … [Read more...] about Online games with Anti-Cheat will soon be playable on Chromebooks

CrossOver 21 is now available: how to use it to run Windows apps on your Chromebook

September 28, 2021 By Luke Short View Comments

It’s been a while since we’ve touched on CrossOver. It’s a commercial product from CodeWeavers, the developers behind Wine and Proton, which allows Windows applications and games to run natively on Linux and macOS. Thankfully the janky old days of CrossOver running on Chromebooks through limited … [Read more...] about CrossOver 21 is now available: how to use it to run Windows apps on your Chromebook

Exclusive: how to enable Vulkan in Crostini on your Chromebook right now

September 10, 2021 By Luke Short View Comments

The time has come: welcome to our exclusive guide on how you can use Vulkan in Crostini! This unlocks the full gaming power of Chromebooks by allowing more modern games to work. More importantly, it also allows Steam’s Proton compatibility layer to work at its full potential, which means the … [Read more...] about Exclusive: how to enable Vulkan in Crostini on your Chromebook right now

Running benchmarks with Vulkan in Crostini (Linux for Chrome OS) yields surprising results

August 26, 2021 By Luke Short View Comments

We recently cracked the case of how to get Vulkan graphics acceleration working in Crostini. I've got a full guide on how to do this yourself coming up as my next article so stay tuned for that if you'd like to be able to tinker with this a bit yourself! With the power of Vulkan, we wanted to see … [Read more...] about Running benchmarks with Vulkan in Crostini (Linux for Chrome OS) yields surprising results

Eureka! Playing Vulkan Games in Crostini

August 6, 2021 By Luke Short View Comments

Today is a day I’ve been waiting for for a long time: Vulkan support in Crostini is a reality. Technically, it's been available in the default "termina" virtual machine since Chrome OS 93. The catch was that the Debian container inside the virtual machine needs an updated and experimental graphics … [Read more...] about Eureka! Playing Vulkan Games in Crostini

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What happens when a Chrome OS device is no longer supported?

August 3, 2021 By Luke Short View Comments

Have you ever wondered what happens when your Chrome OS device reaches the end of its support? Me too. Fortunately (or unfortunately?), my Chromebook Pixel 2 was promised updates until a few months ago. This article will be the first in a series where I talk about breathing new life into your Chrome … [Read more...] about What happens when a Chrome OS device is no longer supported?