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Comment by maccard | Hacker News Reader

> Both services support adding non platform games through their shortcut/executable.

That only launches the game through the correct store. If the game doesn't implement cross play, you can't play together.

> They also support voice chat for groups and players not in game.

But you're trying to be in game with the person, and again if the game doesn't do in-game voice chat, you have to find alternatives. On a console you join a party and the software correctly handles the cases around "do I want to put you in a voice chat channel for your game" (because it has to to pass certification).

> File a bug report? Or you just came up with some hypothetical issues?

Really helpfully closed after 30 days of inactivity. https://github.com/docker/for-win/issues/42. (I didn't make this bug, but I found it, and just logged onto my xbox instead).

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PC games don’t need “cross play” FYI, you create a server and it is visible for anyone who purchased the game regardless of platform.

I haven’t used in game voice for more than a decade now. discord, teamspeak, steam chat, Xbox live all work well and are used by quite a lot of people.

Can’t comment on that single issue, but it does look like there was barely any information provided to repro the issue.

> PC games don’t need “cross play” FYI, you create a server and it is visible for anyone who purchased the game regardless of platform.

That is very much game specific. As an example, Deep Rock Galactic doesn't support playing between Steam and the MS store [0]

> I haven’t used in game voice for more than a decade now. discord, teamspeak, steam chat, Xbox live all work well and are used by quite a lot of people.

All of those options require you to coordinate your play outside of the game and the platform. If you are playing Sea of Thieves on Steam with friends using steam voice chat, and one person joins via the MS store, you need to figure out out how to get them into the correct place. If you're all on xbox, they just join your party.

> Can’t comment on that single issue, but it does look like there was barely any information provided to repro the issue.

So it's not just file a bug report, it's file a bug report and provide follow up information. As a programmer, that's fine, but what if my kids want to play minecraft with their friends?

[0] https://www.deeprockgalactic.com/crossplay-info

> So it's not just file a bug report, it's file a bug report and provide follow up information. As a programmer, that's fine, but what if my kids want to play minecraft with their friends?

I’d say your kids pc doesn’t need docker on it.

You can’t eat the cake and have it too. If you’re technically skilled to be using containers and virtualization, least you could do is file a helpful bug report.

So now my kids need a separate PC? I thought the point of this was that my PC could do everything?

"my" "personal" computer, Yes I'd expect your kids to have their own.

And docker misconfiguration causing issues in unrelated services is one another reason why I'd suggest they have their own.

So now the kids need a PC to game, and the parent needs a second PC to game, and I'm wondering how this is more reasonable than a single dedicated appliance that costs less than half of the two PC setup.

Docker blocking Xbox chat is not a platform issue but a docker issue and OP doesn’t even want to take time to file a proper bug report so yes kids would be better off using a pc or their own.

Same would go for any console, phone etc. You can’t just install stuff with known issues from 3rd parties, not file report with any diagnostics and then blame it on the platform. Would you blame iOS for a badly behaving app that makes it hard for the kids to use the iPad?

If I am understanding correctly, it is an Xbox issue because game systems do not like virtualization / emulation / containerization functionality because of its potential for enabling cheats. Many test proctoring systems are the same way-- the presence of a virtualization service, driver, or hypervisor will trigger a red flag.

So again, for the huge number of people whose life involves technology there are a lot of things that can throw a wrench into that PC for gaming, and in those cases a console makes a lot of sense. It's a little odd to me that this bothers you so much; surely it is expected that consoles have a good usecase given their popularity?

No the issue here is Docker creating an improperly configured network interface.

xbox apps on Windows do not care about virtualization, in fact they probably can't - because xbox os is essentially a subset of windows as host and guest.

If you are saying that a Windows application cannot tell if virtualization is in use, you are incorrect. It can both tell whether you are in a virtualized instance (e.g. if you have Hyper-V on) and if you are running a hypervisor. In the former case, a simple hardware inspection would suffice, and there are a dozen other methods to tell such as used by virt-what.

None of this is relevant. Maybe Docker's interface is "improperly configured" for the gaming use case. It remains a headache, and using a console is a viable solution that allows you to work with buggy instances of Docker without disrupting your gaming.

>I’d say your kids pc doesn’t need docker on it.

I have nephews who are tinkering with Java and python, and I assume will be hitting docker at some point.

You're being incredibly nitpicky over a reasonable example of why PC is not as plug-and-play as a console. On a console, the game will work. On a PC, there are a lot of factors that may prevent it from working.

The entire "use a PC" premise is that the PC can be useful for gaming as well as for non-gaming uses, and the counter-argument is that those non-gaming uses can easily cause problems for the gaming uses. Docker is not the only example, tools like fiddler or wireshark or ghidra could cause problems. But heaven forbid that a gamer on hackernews be a tech enthusiast, right?

> Docker is not the only example, tools like fiddler or wireshark or ghidra could cause problems. But heaven forbid that a gamer on hackernews be a tech enthusiast, right?

No, heaven forbid they want to tinker then complain but don't want to spend 5 minutes to file a bug report or follow the hacker way of actually figuring the issue out and proposing a fix.

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