Advice please

[GTFO. TommyBoy]

Ok, I've googled this and I cant find an answer on it. I would like to run steam from my NAS on a mapped drive, this in itself is not an issue. What i cant find any info on is running 2 accounts simultaneously from said mapped drive ie. mine and willys running at the same time. I'd like to do this so that updates and new game downloads only need to be downloaded once to the steam folder rather than 2 accounts being updated etc etc. Anyone got experience of doing this?

[GTFO. KARR]

Would creating junctions from the two steam accounts to a 'central folder' work?

Eg:
192.168.0.1 C:\Steam\TommyBoy
192.168.0.2 C:\Steam\GayBoy\

both junctioned to a folder like H:\Steam\Combined

That way Steam would update the files from one pc and the other would see them. Only problem i can see are trying to use the same game at the same time or if they are in a "common" folder?

[r3loaded]

That would still cause problems with one copy of Steam locking the files. I personally wouldn't try this - far easier to just put local copies on each computer. You'll get faster load times and lower network bandwidth usage to boot.

You can still maintain a copy on the NAS of all the games as a "master copy". I do this with my server, where I occasionally log in to Steam on the server with both mine and my brother's accounts to keep the master copy up to date. Installing a game is then a trivial affair of copying its files over from the server to the computer (and its much faster).

[ELEA|Willyfxp]

Would creating junctions from the two steam accounts to a 'central folder' work?

Eg:
192.168.0.1 C:\Steam\TommyBoy
192.168.0.2 C:\Steam\GayBoy\

[GTFO. TommyBoy]

That would still cause problems with one copy of Steam locking the files. I personally wouldn't try this - far easier to just put local copies on each computer. You'll get faster load times and lower network bandwidth usage to boot.

You can still maintain a copy on the NAS of all the games as a "master copy". I do this with my server, where I occasionally log in to Steam on the server with both mine and my brother's accounts to keep the master copy up to date. Installing a game is then a trivial affair of copying its files over from the server to the computer (and its much faster).

so I download the files 4 time instead of 2? WIN!

[GTFO. kk20]

AFAIK it isnt possible. A few of us looked at this a long time ago (when valve released the cyber cafe logons) there wasnt a centralised option available. I was going to run "free" steam games for a club I run but ran into similar problems (I wasnt sure which PCs would be used so I needed a central copy available "to the network". The core files get locked.

[r3loaded]

so I download the files 4 time instead of 2? WIN!

Nope, you only download the game files from the Steam servers to the NAS once. When you want to play a game that's not on your computer, you just copy its files from the NAS instead of spending ages downloading from Steam's servers.

[GTFO. TommyBoy]

so I download the files 4 time instead of 2? WIN!

Nope, you only download the game files from the Steam servers to the NAS once. When you want to play a game that's not on your computer, you just copy its files from the NAS instead of spending ages downloading from Steam's servers.

I want to reduce the amount of arsing about that I am doing now, hence my reason for wanting my steam files in 1 central place, I don't need a backup because of redundancy. Having to log on twice with 2 different steam accounts to my NAS (which cant be done anyway, it's a dedicated NAS, not a NAS PC) and then on 2 separate PC's just to update the steam files is the exact opposite to what I want to achieve

[r3loaded]

If it's arsing about that you want to minimize, just keep the computers completely independent of each other and let them update to their own local drives. More bandwidth used, but you don't have to manage anything - just log in and it'll update automatically.

[GTFO. TommyBoy]

If it's arsing about that you want to minimize, just keep the computers completely independent of each other and let them update to their own local drives. More bandwidth used, but you don't have to manage anything - just log in and it'll update automatically.

Did you actually read the original post?

[GTFO. kk20]

the problem is, you cannot set a copy of steam to "not update" so any of the steam copies can attempt to update/verify game/sync therefore locks the blob files.

[GTFO. Coxy]

Do you reckon it would work with the steam mover program but set both to point at the same files on the network drive?

It probably won't but just an idea

[GTFO. NachoDuck]

Pretty much what Karr suggested I think.

[GTFO. kk20]

junction points over the network becomes a bit funky when you have permissions. sometimes linux NAS drives have a spaz when faced with windows permissions via junctions (or reparse)

[GTFO. TommyBoy]

Think I'll just give up on this idea then

[GTFO. Avenger]

was gonna say, the info on tools like Steam mover and sandboxie etc say not to use the same steam folder for 2 accounts as it can get all messy and break.
Sorry tommy, seems its a no go

[GTFO. TommyBoy]

was gonna say, the info on tools like Steam mover and sandboxie etc say not to use the same steam folder for 2 accounts as it can get all messy and break.
Sorry tommy, seems its a no go

No shit.....

[GTFO. kk20]

This got me thinking.

The idea you are looking for is data deduplication so a NAS with built in data deduplication would (should) work for you. So a NAS with Lessfs should also work. Just a theory though.

[GTFO. Avenger]

Tommy that was for Coxy's benefit really...
No need to be rude about it.

[GTFO. TommyBoy]

Tommy that was for Coxy's benefit really...
No need to be rude about it.

Seeing as how it had already been established that it couldn't be done I thought your your post was fairly moot, hence the sarcasm. Coxy, I hope you benefited