Completely new to Linux, cannot install (Ubuntu 24.04, protontricks 1.10.5)

[cobbles-and-tatter]

Not sure if this is a bug or my own inexperience with Linux.

So, I've tried two methods for installing protontricks. The first was through the App Center, which seemed successful at first, until I actually tried using the program, at which point it gave me this error:

SyntaxError: Invalid file magic number

ERROR: Protontricks did not find a valid prefix directory. Stdout was:\n

The other method was by downloading one of the community packages. I got as far as downloading and decompressing it, but at that point I have no idea what I'm supposed to do next. I think I tried using the ./install.sh command but it didn't work.

EDIT: Also, my attempts to install the Flatpak version have also been unsuccessful. I'm getting hung up on installing Flatpak and Flathub, I think. My head is spinning at this point; I really have no idea what I'm doing.

[Matoking]

Ubuntu ships an outdated version of Protontricks. The newest version which is also required for Protontricks to functional with the newest stable Steam is 1.12.0; any older and it will get stuck on the error you're seeing.

Installing the Flatpak is probably the easiest option. Have you tried following these instructions on getting Flatpak installed first?

https://flathub.org/setup/Ubuntu

After you've got Flatpak set up, just follow the instructions on the main page.

Hope this helps!

[cobbles-and-tatter]

I think I tried that, and I am pretty sure I have Flatpak working. However how it relates to protontricks is where I got hung up- nothing you said in your guide under the Flatpak section made any sense to me (again, complete novice, I don't think this is a fault of your guide). And searching the Flatpak software app for Protontricks and installing it from there gives me the same problems I would've had downloading it from the App Center.

Am I supposed to be installing Protontricks or using Protontricks from the command line, somehow? I wouldn't know how to do that. I tried copy/pasting the commands you listed out and my Terminal just didn't seem to react to them at all, not even an error message. I did restart it afterwards like you said, but, well, then I was just looking at a blank terminal without knowing where to go from there 😅

[Matoking]

Protontricks can be used both using the graphical application and from the command-line.

Most of the time, you're probably trying to run a command like this you might've found on Reddit or ProtonDB (this as an example, not something you'd actually need to run for this game):

protontricks 220 vcrun2017

It installs vcrun2017 using Winetricks for a game with the app ID 220 (i.e. Half-Life 2).

You can do basically the same thing by opening the Protontricks GUI (you should find an application named "Protontricks" under your Start menu, or whatever you wanna call it under Linux ;) ), selecting the game Half-Life 2 and then looking for the vcrun2017 option in one of the menus (it's usually "Select the default wine prefix" -> "Install a Windows DLL or component") and selecting it.

Because Winetricks has a ton of different things it can configure and install, it's often easier to copy-paste a command so you have to do less clicking. It also makes it easier to share instructions on sites like ProtonDB.

The Flatpak installation method has the one complication that you have to set up an alias if you want to copy-paste commands and have them run as is. Just remember that when running the command-line Protontricks using Flatpak, you need to replace the protontricks in the command with flatpak run com.github.Matoking.protontricks. Setting an alias takes care of this automatically, though you can always write the command out yourself like this:

flatpak run com.github.Matoking.protontricks 220 vcrun2017

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I hope this helps!