smtty

A minimal TTY “Steam Machine” launcher that runs Steam Big Picture inside Gamescope on a chosen monitor, with per-user saved settings and configurable internal resolution (including 4:3/16:10 stretch).

Install

Latest release: v14.0 release notes and installation

Arch Linux / AUR

paru -S smtty
# or
yay -S smtty

Manual user-local install

git clone https://github.com/dillacorn/smtty.git
cd smtty
chmod +x smtty-installer
./smtty-installer

The installer uses ~/.local/bin by default. Run smtty after installation. Steam and Gamescope must already be installed.

Uninstall

Arch Linux / AUR

paru -Rns smtty
# or
yay -Rns smtty

Manual user-local uninstall

From the cloned repository, run the installer again:

cd ~/smtty
./smtty-installer

Choose [2] Uninstall smtty.

To remove the user-local installation directly instead:

rm -f ~/.local/bin/smtty ~/.local/bin/smtty-update

Your profiles and settings remain in ~/.config/smtty. Remove them only when you intentionally want a complete reset:

rm -rf ~/.config/smtty

Discussions and testers wanted

I’m actively looking for testers, especially on hardware different from mine.
Use Discussions for hardware-specific quirks, tuning, and “is this a bug or my setup?” debugging.

Start here: Welcome to "smtty" Discussions

IMPORTANT:

• Steam cannot be running in any other session or smtty will fail.

• Make sure “Enable GPU accelerated rendering in web views” is enabled in Steam, or Steam notifications can cover the entire screen with a black image when running under gamescope.

Steam Big Picture overlay cursor quirk (stretched resolutions only)

• This issue only shows up when running a stretched/custom aspect session (4:3, 16:10, etc.), not native 1:1 inner=outer sessions.
• On my setup, the game only consistently re-grabs raw mouse input if the mouse is moving while I close the Steam Big Picture overlay.
• If I close the overlay with the mouse perfectly still, the game often fails to re-grab the cursor and the camera/aim can feel stuck or pinned to an edge.
• Current workaround: jiggle the mouse while opening and closing the Steam Big Picture overlay so the game can re-grab the cursor.

I made an issue on this ValveSoftware/gamescope#2042

Overlay limitations

• When running gamescope, clipboard integration with the desktop session is one-way: you can copy from the gamescope session to the desktop, but you cannot copy from the desktop into the gamescope session (no desktop → gamescope paste).
• For Steam messaging, use a browser on your normal desktop session and open:
  https://steamcommunity.com/chat
• For convenience, you can create a dedicated Steam Chat launcher. Example .desktop file (Firefox profile) in my awtarchy repo:
  firefox-steam-chat.desktop

Demonstration Video

Watch the demonstration video: (already outdated...lol)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r8dZZAY5GDE

Hyprland:

Learn about what I did in Hyprland before using smtty+gamescope -> Steam_Launch_Options_Wayland_Hyprland

License

This project is licensed under the MIT License.

Legal Notice

This project is a general-purpose open-source utility that runs locally on the user’s system. It does not provide a hosted service and does not collect user data. Users are responsible for complying with laws and regulations in their own jurisdiction when using this software.

☕ Donate

Built and maintained out of passion. Always FOSS. Donations appreciated.
Donate via PayPal