Long-form document tracing the actual discovery process: the wrong turns,
the aha moments, and the reasoning behind each step. Covers:
- Why EA is involved in a Steam game at all (link2ea:// architecture)
- JunoConfigureRegistry failure and why DISABLEROLLBACK was a dead end
- msiextract bypass as the actual solution
- Why direct system.reg edits don't survive reboots (wineserver ownership)
- The launch wrapper approach for registry persistence
- RPC_S_SERVER_UNAVAILABLE and EALocalHostSvc
- Wolf-specific bwrap capabilities mismatch
- localconfig.vdf atomic rename problem and chmod 555 fix
Written for sharing — no identifying information, explains the "why"
for each fix so readers can adapt if EA changes their MSI structure.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Sonnet 4.6 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01D8ckUJQtj1pH8jtAddBDZs
Two self-contained scripts for getting SWBF2 (2017, AppID 1237950) working
with GE-Proton on Linux — no dependency on the ubuntu-post-install framework.
setup-swbf2-wolf.sh — for Wolf/Games-on-Whales + Moonlight streaming
setup-swbf2-linux.sh — for native Linux Steam (no Docker)
Both implement the same core fix:
- msiextract bypass for JunoConfigureRegistry Wine incompatibility
- EA Desktop files copied into Wine prefix from extracted MSI
- link2ea_fix.reg + ea_services.reg written to drive_c
- Launch wrapper that imports .reg files via Proton on every launch
(direct system.reg edits are overwritten by wineserver on shutdown)
Wolf version also handles Docker cp, container paths, STEAM_UNIX_SOCKET,
and localconfig.vdf directory locking inside the Wolf state folder.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Sonnet 4.6 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01D8ckUJQtj1pH8jtAddBDZs
Automates the complete working solution for SWBF2 (AppID 1237950) on Wolf:
1. Extracts EA Desktop from ea_app.msi using msiextract on the host,
bypassing JunoConfigureRegistry Wine incompatibility that causes MSI rollback
2. Copies EA Desktop files (Link2EA.exe, EALocalHostSvc.exe, etc.) into the
Wine prefix at the versioned path with symlink
3. Writes link2ea_fix.reg and ea_services.reg into drive_c so they persist
across Wine prefix operations
4. Installs a launch wrapper (/home/retro/ea_install.sh) that runs regedit
via Steam's sniper+GE-Proton launch chain — required because direct edits
to system.reg are overwritten when wineserver flushes on shutdown
5. Sets LaunchOptions for AppID 1237950 in localconfig.vdf and locks the
config directory (chmod 555) to prevent Steam overwriting it via
atomic rename on shutdown
Run after: Steam open in Moonlight, GE-Proton set, SWBF2 launched once
(triggers Wine prefix + ea_app.msi creation), EA account linked at ea.com.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Sonnet 4.6 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01D8ckUJQtj1pH8jtAddBDZs
Documents the EA account requirement, first-time login flow, credential
caching for machine transfers, community server options if EA shuts down,
and the SWBF2 2005 alternative for a launcher-free experience.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Sonnet 4.6 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01D8ckUJQtj1pH8jtAddBDZs
Revised approach: skip link2ea:// and EA App account requirement entirely.
Launch starwarsbattlefrontii.exe directly via the wrapper, spoof Origin
registry entries so the game's built-in launcher check passes. Documents
what doesn't work and why (msiexec/bwrap/EA account issues).
Co-Authored-By: Claude Sonnet 4.6 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01D8ckUJQtj1pH8jtAddBDZs
Documents the EA App installation workaround for Star Wars Battlefront II
(2017) running under Wolf/WolfSteam with GE-Proton10-34. Covers the bwrap
capability problem, Steam launch wrapper trick, msiextract bypass for the
JunoConfigureRegistry Wine incompatibility, and correct EA Desktop file layout.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Sonnet 4.6 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01D8ckUJQtj1pH8jtAddBDZs
wine cmd.exe /c "timeout /t 900 > nul" failed silently (docker exec -d
hides errors), leaving no anchor process and letting wineserver die as
soon as EAappInstaller.exe exited.
Replace with wineserver -f (foreground mode) which keeps the server
alive unconditionally until explicitly killed with wineserver -k.
This is the correct primitive for holding a Wine session open.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Sonnet 4.6 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01D8ckUJQtj1pH8jtAddBDZs
EAappInstaller.exe is a WiX/Burn bootstrapper that spawns the real
installer as a background Wine process and exits immediately. When the
foreground wine process exited, wineserver shut down and killed the
background installer before it could write any files.
Fix: launch a cmd.exe/timeout anchor before running the installer so
the shared wineserver stays up while background installer processes run.
Kill the anchor (wineserver -k) after EADesktop.exe is detected or the
15-minute timeout expires.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Sonnet 4.6 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01D8ckUJQtj1pH8jtAddBDZs
Two bugs in install-ea-app:
1. Installer search included compatdata (the Wine prefix), so it found the
temp-extracted copy at drive_c/windows/temp/{UUID}/.cr/EAappInstaller.exe
instead of the bundled copy at steamapps/common/…/__Installer/…/
Fixed: search only under steamapps/common.
2. Our fake InstallSuccessful=true (written by fix-ea-game to bypass the
install-script loop) caused EAappInstaller to detect EA App as "already
installed" and exit in ~15 seconds without doing anything.
Fixed: delete the InstallSuccessful values via wine reg delete inside the
container BEFORE launching the installer. The real EA App installer writes
them back correctly after a successful install.
Co-Authored-By: Claude <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01D8ckUJQtj1pH8jtAddBDZs
install-ea-app: runs EAappInstaller.exe inside the WolfSteam container
using GE-Proton's wine binary. The container has a virtual display so the
EA App installer GUI appears in Moonlight; the user clicks through it and
logs in to their EA account. After EA App installs, fix-ea-game registers
the link2ea:// handler and clears the install-script loop.
diagnose-ea: prints the current link2ea:// registry state from both
system.reg and user.reg, locates EADesktop.exe/Link2EA.exe, shows
StateFlags, and tails the relevant Proton log lines — the first thing to
run when the game returns straight to the Play screen.
_apply_ea_fix: now checks user.reg as well as system.reg for an existing
link2ea:// registration (GE-Proton writes to user.reg during prefix setup);
also searches for Link2EA.exe as a fallback handler when EADesktop.exe is
not yet installed; reports a clear next step when neither is found.
Co-Authored-By: Claude <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01D8ckUJQtj1pH8jtAddBDZs
GE-Proton is required for EA games but was a manual step users had to
remember after first Steam launch. This change eliminates that gap:
- install_wolf() downloads the GE-Proton tarball to
~/docker/wolf/ge-proton-cache/ during initial setup (~500 MB, runs
before the "Start Wolf now?" prompt so it's ready immediately)
- _cache_ge_proton() helper in manage.sh does the same on demand
- ge-proton subcommand checks the cache dir first and extracts from
there instead of re-downloading (~instant vs ~500 MB download)
- start subcommand auto-extracts the cached tarball into Steam's
compatibilitytools.d if Steam has already launched at least once,
so GE-Proton appears in the Compatibility dropdown without any
manual ./manage.sh ge-proton step
Co-Authored-By: Claude Sonnet 4.6 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01D8ckUJQtj1pH8jtAddBDZs
SWBF2 (AppID 1237950) launches, calls ShellExecute("link2ea://..."),
and exits. Without a link2ea:// URL protocol handler registered in the
Wine registry, ShellExecute returns error 31 and the game never plays.
_apply_ea_fix now also writes the link2ea:// Classes registry keys
pointing to EADesktop.exe when it is found in the Proton prefix. If
EADesktop.exe is not yet present (EAappInstaller runs async via
RunType=1 in installScript.vdf), the function warns and skips the
handler registration with instructions to run wait-ea-app.
New 'wait-ea-app [appid]' subcommand polls every 15 seconds (up to 20
minutes) for EADesktop.exe to appear, then calls _apply_ea_fix so the
full fix including the link2ea:// handler is applied automatically once
EA App finishes installing in the background.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Sonnet 4.6 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01D8ckUJQtj1pH8jtAddBDZs
wineserver holds the Wine registry in memory and flushes it back to
system.reg on shutdown, overwriting any edits made while the container
is running. _apply_ea_fix now stops the WolfSteam container first,
patches system.reg + appmanifest StateFlags on disk, then restarts Wolf
so the keys persist when wineserver next starts.
Also sets StateFlags to 6 (fully installed) so Steam skips the
install-script phase entirely and launches the game directly.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Sonnet 4.6 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01D8ckUJQtj1pH8jtAddBDZs
Mount GAME_STORAGE_DIR/steam-cache → /home/retro/.cache so DXVK/Mesa
Vulkan shader compilations survive container restarts. Without this the
cache lived in the ephemeral session home and was wiped on every Wolf
restart, forcing a full recompile each session.
Also create steam-cache/ in initial setup and update-storage so the
directory exists with correct uid-1000 ownership before the container
first starts.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Sonnet 4.6 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01D8ckUJQtj1pH8jtAddBDZs
./manage.sh games now lists installed games numbered with their AppIDs,
then prompts for a number to apply the EA App install-script fix to that
game (Enter to skip). Factored the reg-fix into a shared _apply_ea_fix
helper used by both 'games' and 'fix-ea-game'. The EA Desktop installed
marker is shared across all EA titles, so the same fix works for any EA
game — the picker just supplies the right per-game AppID.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.8 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01D8ckUJQtj1pH8jtAddBDZs
- install-completion: writes a bash completion script to
~/.bash_completion.d/manage-wolf and registers it, so double-tab
after './manage.sh ' shows all available commands.
- fix-ea-game kept as general name (not fix-swbf2-2017): the EA Desktop
registry key is shared across all EA games; the Valve has-run key
follows the same EADesktopSetup pattern across EA's catalog.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.8 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01D8ckUJQtj1pH8jtAddBDZs
- ./manage.sh games: lists installed Steam games with their AppIDs
(parsed from appmanifest_*.acf) so users can find the AppID to pass to
fix-ea-game instead of hunting for it.
- ./manage.sh ge-proton [version]: optional arg pins a specific
GE-Proton release for reproducibility; still defaults to latest.
- Document the full EA-games flow + AppID/version notes in the generated
~/docker/wolf/README.md.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.8 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01D8ckUJQtj1pH8jtAddBDZs
Add two manage.sh commands that bake in the workarounds needed to run
EA Steam titles (e.g. Star Wars Battlefront II 2017) under Proton in a
container:
- ge-proton: downloads the latest GE-Proton into Steam's
compatibilitytools.d (the path Steam actually scans) and chowns it to
uid 1000 so the in-container user can launch it. GE-Proton carries the
EA App installer fixes stock Proton/Experimental lack.
- fix-ea-game [appid]: pre-satisfies the EA App install-script markers
in the game's Proton prefix (InstallSuccessful + Valve EADesktopSetup
has-run key) so Steam stops looping on 'running install script (EA
app)'. Opt-in per AppID, defaults to SWBF2 1237950, no-ops if the
prefix doesn't exist, idempotent, and keeps the prefix owned by uid
1000 so Wine accepts it.
Also document the EA-game flow in the post-install summary.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.8 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01D8ckUJQtj1pH8jtAddBDZs
App containers were defaulting to a non-local timezone (e.g. BST), showing the
wrong local time in Steam — and a skewed clock can stall EA App's installer.
The kernel clock is shared with the host, so this is a display/TZ issue: fix
it by setting each app's TZ env var, sourced from SITE_TZ at install and from
WOLF_TZ in .env for ./manage.sh apps.
Also generalize the array updater to rewrite both `mounts` and `env` (Wolf
reformats either as multi-line), so re-running apps updates the TZ on
already-installed entries without corrupting the TOML.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.8 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01D8ckUJQtj1pH8jtAddBDZs
/etc/localtime and /etc/timezone are bind-mounted read-only so the Steam
container shows the correct local time. A wrong clock causes EA App install
scripts to hang indefinitely (SSL/token validation against EA's servers fails
when the client clock is skewed).
Fix the host clock first: sudo timedatectl set-ntp true
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.8 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01D8ckUJQtj1pH8jtAddBDZs
The GoW firefox image launches `firefox` with no URL and ignores START_URL,
so add-web tiles opened a blank default tab. Instead generate a per-app
Firefox enterprise policy (policies.json) that sets the homepage to the
target URL and bind-mount it over /etc/firefox/policies/policies.json so the
site loads on launch.
Also make add-web replace an existing tile of the same name instead of
erroring, so re-running it repairs a previously broken tile in place.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.8 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01D8ckUJQtj1pH8jtAddBDZs
Wolf rewrites config.toml on every start and reformats `mounts` as a
multi-line TOML array. update_mounts() only replaced the single line
starting with `mounts =`, leaving the remaining array elements and the
closing `]` orphaned — producing invalid TOML ("Expected '=' after a key")
that crashed Wolf on the next start. This bit any re-run of the installer
(or `./manage.sh apps`) against a config Wolf had already reformatted.
Replace the entire array (from `mounts =` to its closing `]`), and also
clean up orphaned remnants left by a previously corrupted single-line
rewrite so re-running the script repairs a broken config in place.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.8 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01D8ckUJQtj1pH8jtAddBDZs
Prompts for a display name and URL, auto-fetches the site's apple-touch-icon
or favicon.png, falls back to a manual URL/local-PNG prompt, then injects a
[[profiles.apps]] block using ghcr.io/games-on-whales/firefox:edge with
START_URL set to the target URL. Wolf's virtual gamepad injection means
controller-aware sites (Gamepad API) work naturally through the stream.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.8 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01D8ckUJQtj1pH8jtAddBDZs
Moonlight shows app tiles in config.toml order with no in-client reordering.
Add ./manage.sh reorder: lists the current [[profiles.apps]] blocks by title,
prompts for a new order (read from /dev/tty since stdin is the heredoc),
rewrites config.toml preserving each block's nested runner subtable and
spacing, then restarts Wolf. Updated help text and README.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.8 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01D8ckUJQtj1pH8jtAddBDZs
docker compose reads variables from .env automatically. Use ${WOLF_STATE_DIR}
in docker-compose.yml so the state folder path is dynamic — editing .env is
enough to relocate it without regenerating the compose file. IP/MAC/render
node stay baked in (hardware-specific, not in .env).
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.8 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01D8ckUJQtj1pH8jtAddBDZs
The right fix, finally. Instead of fighting Steam's libraryfolders.vdf or
symlinking individual app session homes, point Wolf's entire state folder at
the game drive. Steam's install, downloaded games, and Proton prefixes are
born there because Wolf creates every app's session home under
HOST_APPS_STATE_FOLDER.
- docker-compose.yml: mount $WOLF_STATE_DIR (=<game_dir>/wolf-state) at the
SAME path inside and outside the wolf container, set HOST_APPS_STATE_FOLDER
and WOLF_CFG_FOLDER to it. Same-path mount is required because Wolf hands
host paths to the Docker daemon when spawning sibling app containers.
- config.toml now lives at $WOLF_STATE_DIR/cfg/config.toml; all WOLF_CFG
references updated (install + manage.sh, via WOLF_STATE_DIR in .env).
- Optional migration: move existing /etc/wolf data onto the drive on upgrade.
- Removed all symlink machinery: relocate_steam_home, steam-home dir,
_relocate_steam_home in manage.sh, and the fix-perms relocation step.
fix-perms now just re-owns the state folder + game storage.
- Dropped the redundant Steam app mount; updated README/summary text.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.8 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01D8ckUJQtj1pH8jtAddBDZs
Seeding libraryfolders.vdf never stuck: Steam rewrites that file on every
launch and forces its primary library back to its own install dir
(/home/retro/.local/share/Steam), which is the Wolf session home on the OS
drive. That's why Steam Storage kept showing /home/retro with the OS drive's
size no matter how many times we seeded the vdf.
New approach: relocate_steam_home symlinks each Wolf Steam session home
(/etc/wolf/<id>/Steam, bind-mounted to /home/retro) at
$GAME_STORAGE_DIR/steam-home. Steam's one and only library is then the game
drive, so installs, game files, and Proton prefixes all land there and the
Storage screen reports the game drive's free space. An existing Steam install
is moved over once (no re-download) before the symlink is created.
Wired into first install, manage.sh start (self-heals on reboot), and
manage.sh fix-perms. Dropped the redundant /mnt/games/steam mount and the
vdf seeding everywhere; updated the README heredoc with the one-time
connect / fix-perms / reconnect sequence.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.8 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01D8ckUJQtj1pH8jtAddBDZs
Outis