One of the areas that should be improved upon in Elementary OS is its Software Center. Since the Software Center is the main player when it comes to installing applications, it should be given great attention to.
Specifically, there is a problem about Steam when you search about it in the Software Center. When you search Steam, you get two results but neither could be installed. The first one simply shows an error message while the other one redirects you to Ubuntu—something which is deemed next to useless.
Steam is free to be downloaded from the software repositories on your computer. In this tutorial, we are going to teach you how to install Steam in two ways:
- In Elementary OS, the tool used for installing software is called apt. To search the software in apt repositories, use the syntax: sudo apt-cache search
The program name can be either the name of the program or one of the program’s descriptions. Hence, you can put: sudo apt-cache search steam. You are then presented with various outputs matching the description you entered. Next, you can see Steam from the Valve software which is exactly the one you want to install.
- To install Steam, enter the command: sudo apt-get install steam and a list of dependencies will appear. A prompt will ask you to enter Y in order to continue installing the Steam software.
- When the installation process is already done, use the menu in Elementary to search for the Steam icon. When located, click on the icon and an update box will appear which will then commence to download an estimated 200MB of data.
- When the download has been completed, Steam is then installed and you can use the app already.