Having several computers connected to one steam library

[Naso4265]

Currently, I have the steam library for my laptop on a samba server, so that I don't fill up its small hard drive. I was wondering about having my other computers connected to that library, and the potential issues that could arise. I think it would be nice to be able to use another computer to download games, so that it doesn't interfere with whatever I am working on with my laptop.

[Kesac]

It would be very tricky, and you would likely experience horrible load times if you got it to work.

The main restriction is you could only have one steam client online at a time, but if multiple computers are connected to the same library, you could run into other unexpected errors, such as file sharing issues. (This is assuming you do something like family sharing)

[Naso4265]

Originally posted by Kesac:

It would be very tricky, and you would likely experience horrible load times if you got it to work.

The main restriction is you could only have one steam client online at a time, but if multiple computers are connected to the same library, you could run into other unexpected errors, such as file sharing issues. (This is assuming you do something like family sharing)

Well, so far, the load times have been okay, and connecting several computers to one library is quite easy. You just rename your steam library folder, make a new one with the computer you want to add, and then move the files to the new library. I can see having several clients online being an issue, but that is the only major issue to me, since it worked nicely when I did a similar thing with a dual-booted computer, so that I could use the same library on both operating systems.

[Naso4265]

Well, after some testing, I concluded that having 2 computers on one steam library does not break everything, only some things. When downloading games from one computer, the other one requires a restart of steam to detect the new games, and installed games disappear and reappear at random. Then i decided to start up half life on both computers, keeping the beginning cutscene synced up on both PCs, just to see something break. After a brief loading screen, I somehow ended up in the train tracks.

[Harbinger]

I just did this successfully on my network, so I thought I'd post a breakdown of what I did here. I wanted to share the same library files on multiple computers over my network without having to duplicate any game files. I currently have 2 computers with working shared libraries. I'm going to call those computers main and other for this post.

Here are the steps I took:

1) On my linux server, I created /steam and then subfolders for my computers (/steam/main and /steam/other).
2) I created samba shares for the 2 subfolders. (I'm assuming you can find a suitable guide for setting up samba)
a) Here's the tricky part, I had to add the following configuration directives for samba:
Under global, add "allow insecure wide links = yes"
Under the other share, add "follow symlinks = yes" and "wide links = yes"
3) I mounted the samba shares for each library folder as network drives on each matching computer. For ease of reference, I gave each network drive the drive letter S:
4) I used steam to create a new library folder on S for each computer.
5) On the linux server, I deleted the /steam/other/SteamLibrary/steamapps directory and then symbolically linked it to the /steam/main/SteamLibrary/steamapps directory.
6) I installed a bunch of games on my main computer and they automatically showed up in the steam library on the other computer.

I hope this helps someone. Feel free to message me if you need some additional guidance with this.

[76561199418627359]

This thread was quite old before the recent post, so we're locking it to prevent confusion.