Hi,

welcome to the official GOG Galaxy forum thread. Please read the below info first:

== GOG GALAXY FEATURES IN GAMES ==

List of games supporting various GOG Galaxy features:
Achievements: https://www.gog.com/games?feature=achievements&sort=bestselling&page=1
Cloud Saves: https://www.gog.com/games?feature=cloud_saves&sort=bestselling&page=1
Overlay: https://www.gog.com/games?feature=overlay&sort=bestselling&page=1

== BUG REPORTING ==

Please use: http://mantis.gog.com and include
1. steps to reproduce the bug (if possible)
2. screenshot or movie showing the bug (if possible)
3. Galaxy Client logs (location described on mantis report page)

== FEATURE SUGGESTIONS ==

Please use: http://www.gog.com/wishlist/galaxy. For feature suggestions and votes on them please try do explain how Galaxy and its users will really benefit from it.

== IMPORT ALREADY INSTALLED GAMES TO GALAXY ==

1. For GOG games installed using installers from the last few months (so called Galaxy-compatible installers)
Click the Galaxy logo button on top of the sidebar and select "scan and import folders" - it will find all compatible games within that folder and add them to the Client.

2. For remaining GOG game INSTALLATIONS
Find the game in the Library (click on the image of the game), then click the More button and select "Manage Installation" -> "Import folder" and point the folder selector into the folder where that game is installed.

== KNOWN ISSUES ==
- Galaxy cannot be launched by other users on the same computer

== CHANGELOG ==

1.2.49 (November 29, 2018)
- [Windows] Updater now requires administrator privileges to perform update of GOG Galaxy
- [Windows] Security of directories containing GOG Galaxy files has been improved
- [Windows] Updated Code Signing Certificate
- [Windows] Crash reporter has been added to Galaxy Communication Service
Bugfixes:
- Prevented several potential causes of "broken" games, where only way out was reinstalling
- [MacOS] Fixed a crash on shutdown when fatal error was shown

1.2.50 (December 13, 2018)
Changes & Improvements:
- Speed up startup time
- [MacOS] Strengthen up connection security with ClientService
Bugfixes:
- Fixed "disk access problem" when installing games, occuring mostly on fresh installation of GOG Galaxy
- Fixed a rare occurrence of a game update resulting in displaying "unknown game version"

1.2.51 (December 20, 2018)
- Improved Korean translations
- Fixed connection to notifications pusher in GOG Galaxy SDK

1.2.54 (March 14, 2019)
Changes and Improvements:
- Updated Chromium version to 71:
- Better performance
- Fixes playing Twitch videos on profiles
- Fixes playing Wistia videos
- Security fixes in the game installation process
- Security fixes in GOG Galaxy update process
- GOG Galaxy Updater should perform better under poor network conditions
Bugfixes:
- [macOS] Fixed passing multiple commandline arguments to games
- [macOS] Multiple "friend online" notifications will no longer appear when system wakes up
- Dates are now properly displayed in cloud saves conflict window

1.2.55 (April 17, 2019)
- Hotfix for unintentional opening of Facebook link after entering Forum

1.2.56 (May 06, 2019)
Bugfixes:
- [Windows] GOG Galaxy will fix the path to its internal services, if it finds it is wrong
- Updating of games' local dependencies (e.g. Dosbox) will be handled correctly
- Unexpected files in games' directories will no longer cause failure of games’ update

1.2.57 (June 12, 2019)
Changes and Improvements:
- Minor download speed optimizations
- Changes in PayPal payment flow
Bugfixes:
- Fixed rare crash occurence when reordering games' updates and installations
- GOG Galaxy will correctly reconnect to GOG services after long time of no internet connection

1.2.58 (September 13, 2019)
macOS:
- Enabled hardened runtime, making our application more secure
- Implemented Apple's notarization

1.2.59 (September 23, 2019)
Overlay:
- [Windows] Fixed crash in Overlay affecting some games (including Fallout 3 (Radeon only) and Dragon Age: Origins)
Achievements:
- [Windows] Fixed issue with achievements sometimes not being saved while playing offline

1.2.60 Beta (07 October, 2019)
General:
- Updated CEF version to 3729 (Chromium to 74)
- Security fixes
Updater:
- Will no longer download updates at startup, they will be downloaded in the background, while the application is running
- [Windows] No additional UAC prompt during update

1.2.61 Beta (October 23, 2019)
Updater:
- Fixed an issue where non-admin users would not be able to update to newer versions of GOG Galaxy

1.2.62 Beta (October 30, 2019)
Overlay:
- Fixed crashes for various games

1.2.63 (December 02, 2019)
General:
- Updated CEF version to 3729 (Chromium to 74)
- Security fixes
Updater:
- Will no longer download updates at startup, they will be downloaded in the background, while the application is running
- [Windows] No additional UAC prompt during update
Overlay [Windows]:
- Now supports games which use Vulkan API (e.g. Jupiter Hell, X4: Foundations)
- Fixes crashes for various games

1.2.64 (December 04, 2019)
- Hotfix for launching games

1.2.66 (January 23, 2020)
- Added information about GOG Galaxy 2.0 Open Beta
- Optimization related to showing download progress
- Fixed an issue where Overlay did not launch for some games that use Vulkan
- [Windows] Updated code signing certificate
- [MacOS] Crash fixes

1.2.67 (February 24, 2020)
General:
- [Windows] GOG Galaxy will now show a warning when trying to run on non-NTFS file systems
- Improved security of the application
- Updated POCO library
GOG GALAXY Update:
- Fixes for bugs in the GOG Galaxy update process

I don't see a single word about lack of Galaxy libraries on Linux there but lack of the Galaxy Client itself for Linux - and I think this is what your misunderstanding with Venom is about.

I believe part of this misunderstanding is also assuming that developers are interested in offering on Linux a SKU that lacks in-game features that other OSes / platforms have in the first place. You see, the idea that you're pitching, as I understand it, is some sort of stub library - but that does not address most of key features such as auto updating, multiplayer or publishing and testing builds among many others that still require Client or other tools. In reality it is as "good" (or as "bad") solution as not implementing Galaxy to Linux SKU at all and releasing it without it... which is possibility since we've started offering Linux games.

Please keep in mind, and this is something that Venom pointed out earlier, that we talk to developers for days every single GDC, E3, Gamescom, have regular calls and visit them as well. We are aware of what are they needs and requirements, what options are on the table and what's their viability from the business side.

It's not really an architecture problem, but whether the idea solves anything better in the first place. If you, as a game developer, built SKUs for another platform with certain in-game platform features (like achievements or multiplayer) and then proceed to build a SKUs with new code that is handled by the stub library, then you're as good as disabling / not including that platform-specific code. Either way, assuming that you accept that said SKU could be perceived inferior to others, which I think is a quite bigger question really.

Aside from stub not solving the issue, you still lack auto-updates and won't be able to push and publish builds directly to GOG - features which in many cases are an absolute musth have for developer to release the game on GOG in the first place.

I'm actually perplexed by the suggestion. Considering that GOG Galaxy is not available on Linux, why would be against the Linux game release?
I'll answer you even a step further: if Galaxy was available on Linux it wouldn't change our approach. Both on Windows and Mac it's up to the developer to commit to having specific Galaxy features in the game or not. It's their game, we respect their decision.

Pushing build is just a part of the flow. Many developers upload game builds to an internal branch and download / patch it to check the implementation. Sometimes QA downloads different RCs from other branches. Finally some do internal betas on couple of other branches which also require a way to download them... all this before the button "publish to master" is pressed. As you can see, a tool for downloading and updating builds / jumping between branches and game version is required and that's why GOG Galaxy Client is a part of the equation here.
I guess this might not be obvious as this is rarely visible to the end user, except maybe for some games-in-development titles, but it's there nevertheless.

When you're disabling auto-updating feature, that means you don't want your games to update automatically for one reason or another.
As for the lack of blue dot - we can't really show it, because we can't know whether the update for imported game is available or not. In game's settings, you can see that no version is selected. You will see the blue dot when next version is published - because that certainly means that an update is there for you.
Part of this behavior may be changed in the future (communication of the game's version state), and changing installers/patches to provide this data may also happen - but it's not that simple. I'm just shooting words here, because I don't know whether any of this will happen, but we've considered it.