protonscr

Steam client no longer launching after upgrade to Ubuntu 20.04

steamopen Steam clientDistro Family: Ubuntu
ValveSoftware/steam-for-linux#7467 · opened 2020-11-14 by DaNicolas · updated 2022-03-11 · 8 comments · github
DDaNicolas 2020-11-14 github

Your system information

  • Steam client version (build number or date): latest from official repository (?)
  • Distribution (e.g. Ubuntu): Ubuntu 20.04 64 bit.
  • Intel integrated GPU. No dedicated GPU.
  • Opted into Steam client beta?: [Yes/No] No
  • Have you checked for system updates?: [Yes/No] Yes

Please describe your issue in as much detail as possible:

Steam client worked fine before upgrade from Ubuntu 18.04 to Ubuntu 20.04. After upgrade to Ubuntu 20.04 (which also required me to reinstall xorg, since some graphical glitches occurred), steam client no longer boots. I tried reinstalling steam and removing all steam data from the /home/user folder, but to no avail.

Steps for reproducing this issue:

  1. Run steam, either from graphical interface or terminal.
  2. If running first time after reinstall, get pop-up "Pins potentially out of date ..." with progress bar for a few seconds, otherwise no graphical output. If running from terminal, get output:
Running Steam on ubuntu 20.04 64-bit
STEAM_RUNTIME is enabled automatically
Pins up-to-date!
Can't find 'steam-runtime-check-requirements', continuing anyway
/home/nicolas/.local/share/Steam/ubuntu12_32/steam
[2020-11-14 15:55:29] Startup - updater built Jul 28 2020 22:37:33
ILocalize::AddFile() failed to load file "public/steambootstrapper_english.txt".
Installing breakpad exception handler for appid(steam)/version(0)
free(): invalid pointer
crash_20201114155529_1.dmp[6610]: Uploading dump (out-of-process)
/tmp/dumps/crash_20201114155529_1.dmp
/home/nicolas/.local/share/Steam/steam.sh: regel 750:  6603 Afgebroken              (geheugendump gemaakt) $STEAM_DEBUGGER "$STEAMROOT/$STEAMEXEPATH" "$@"
  1. Steam crashes

If needed, I can upload dump files.

Kkisak-valve maintainer 2020-11-14 github

Hello @Hopkins-Levitzki, I suspect that Ubuntu replaced the Valve-provided Steam package with the distro-modified Steam package during the upgrade and they have different folder layouts. Both variants of the Steam packaging should work, but transitioning between the two is untested and can have unexpected results. You should be able to check which package is installed with something like apt policy steam:i386

The Valve-provided Steam package uses .../.local/share/Steam/... which is consistent with what I suspect. Ideally, you should be able to re-install the Valve-provided package from https://store.steampowered.com/about/ if it's been replaced by the distro-modified variant and uncomment the deb [arch=amd64,i386] http://repo.steampowered.com/steam/ precise steam line in /etc/apt/sources.list.d/steam.list to get future package updates.

Worse case scenario, you can move ~/.steam and ~/.local/share/Steam somewhere out of the way, then re-run Steam to get it to do a fresh bootstrap of the Steam client.

DDaNicolas 2020-11-14 github

Thanks for the answer, @kisak-valve. I'll see what I can do with this info. Here is the output of apt policy steam:i386:

steam:i386:
  Geïnstalleerd: (geen)
  Kandidaat:     1:1.0.0.66
  Versietabel:
     1:1.0.0.66 500
        500 https://repo.steampowered.com/steam stable/steam i386 Packages
     1:1.0.0.61-2ubuntu3 500
        500 http://be.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu focal/multiverse i386 Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status

Interestingly, it says Installed: (none).

Kkisak-valve maintainer 2020-11-14 github

Well that's curious, maybe also check apt policy steam-launcher?

In any case, since apt sees repo.steampowered.com, that makes my initial guess wrong.

DDaNicolas 2020-11-14 github

Indeed both steam (distro specific) and steam-launcher packages were installed, probably the result of trying different ways of installing Steam after the problem first occurred, unaware of the two coexisting versions. I now purged all packages related to steam (steam and steam-launcher) and removed the folders ~/.local/share/Steam and ~/.steam . I then installed steam again from the standard Ubuntu repository (apt install steam). The error output is different but similar:

[2020-11-14 16:43:44] Startup - updater built Apr  9 2019 22:48:20
ILocalize::AddFile() failed to load file "public/steambootstrapper_english.txt".
free(): invalid pointer
Aborted (core dumped)
cat: '/home/nicolas/.steam/debian-installation/ubuntu12_32/steam-runtime.tar.xz.part*': Bestand of map bestaat niet
tar: Dit ziet er niet uit als een tar-archief
xz: (stdin): Bestandtype niet herkend
tar: Child returned status 1
tar: Error is not recoverable: exiting now
find: ‘/home/nicolas/.steam/debian-installation/ubuntu12_32/steam-runtime’: Bestand of map bestaat niet

Additionally installing the package steam-installer did not change anything either.

3375gnu 2020-11-24 github

I have the same issue, but on Devuan unstable. Distro provided steam package version is 1.0.0.66-2. I have tested Valve provided one as well (steam-launcher 1:1.0.0.67) with the same outcome.

The root cause the following line:

free(): invalid pointer

I run it with valgrind to get something more interesting, but that's what I got:

==29329== Invalid free() / delete / delete[] / realloc()
==29329==    at 0x4836867: free (vg_replace_malloc.c:538)
==29329==    by 0x4A7F167: XFree (in /usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libX11.so.6.3.0)
==29329==    by 0x15D7B5: ??? (in /home/user/.steam/ubuntu12_32/steam)
==29329==    by 0x15E36D: ??? (in /home/user/.steam/ubuntu12_32/steam)
==29329==    by 0x140C87: ??? (in /home/user/.steam/ubuntu12_32/steam)
==29329==    by 0x1291FB: ??? (in /home/user/.steam/ubuntu12_32/steam)
==29329==    by 0x4CB7DF5: (below main) (libc-start.c:308)
==29329==  Address 0x402a000 is in the GOTPLT segment of /lib/i386-linux-gnu/ld-2.31.so
WWanBatkong745 2020-12-07 github

This also started happening to me since yesterday, I'm on Linux mint 20 and I keep getting this error despite previous commands

cat: '/home/user1/.steam/debian-installation/ubuntu12_32/steam-runtime.tar.xz.part*': No such file or directory
tar: This does not look like a tar archive
xz: (stdin): File format not recognised
tar: Child returned status 1
tar: Error is not recoverable: exiting now
find: ‘/home/user1/.steam/debian-installation/ubuntu12_32/steam-runtime’: No such file or directory

I've tried everything on https://askubuntu.com/questions/1038754/steam-wont-start-on-18-04
and I've also tried completely uninstalling and re-installing. This just started happening to me somebody please help :\

Thanks in advance.

Hheapframe 2021-08-18 github

This now is happening to me on ubuntu 21.04
Running Steam on ubuntu 21.04 64-bit
STEAM_RUNTIME is enabled automatically
Steam runtime environment up-to-date!
Steam client's requirements are satisfied
WARNING: Using default/fallback debugger launch
/home/usernameimnotshowing/.steam/debian-installation/ubuntu12_32/steam

Jjorgedferreira 2022-03-11 github

Also happening to me now. Yesterday it worked... at the end of the day i upgraded some packages (ubuntu 18.04) and today it did not even start. I purged, instaled, purged again, removed folders, tried oficial repo, ubuntu's repo, nothing. Latest error:

This sucks...

steam.sh[11810]: Running Steam on ubuntu 18.04 64-bit
steam.sh[11810]: STEAM_RUNTIME is enabled automatically
setup.sh[11944]: Steam runtime environment up-to-date!
steam.sh[11810]: Can't find 'steam-runtime-check-requirements', continuing anyway
[2022-03-11 13:25:19] Startup - updater built Nov 22 2021 22:06:59
ILocalize::AddFile() failed to load file "public/steambootstrapper_english.txt".
Installing breakpad exception handler for appid(steam)/version(0)
*** stack smashing detected ***: terminated
crash_20220311132519_2.dmp[12024]: Uploading dump (out-of-process)
/tmp/dumps/crash_20220311132519_2.dmp
crash_20220311132519_2.dmp[12024]: Finished uploading minidump (out-of-process): success = no
crash_20220311132519_2.dmp[12024]: error: libcurl.so: wrong ELF class: ELFCLASS64
crash_20220311132519_2.dmp[12024]: file ''/tmp/dumps/crash_20220311132519_2.dmp'', upload no: ''libcurl.so: wrong ELF class: ELFCLASS64''
/home/jorge/.local/share/Steam/steam.sh: line 794: 12013 Aborted (core dumped) "$STEAMROOT/$STEAMEXEPATH" "$@"

Nothing extracted yet.