Disabling Snaps in Ubuntu 20.04 • Hacker News Board

Re: Disabling Snaps in Ubuntu 20.04

#231

Post by simosx » Sat, Apr 25, 2020, 1:39 AM UTC

emersion wrote: post #13

It seems like on recent Ubuntu installations some packages are provided by snaps (ie. "apt install XXX" will install a snap). I'd be interested in disabling this behaviour, if anyone knows.

I think that this is just the case with LXD. LXD used to be distributed as a DEB package in Ubuntu 18.04. Therefore, to make it to upgrade from DEB to snap in newer versions of Ubuntu, there is this dummy 'lxd' DEB package in the repositories that in fact installs the snap package of LXD.

Other than that, I do not think other packages are affected.

Re: Disabling Snaps in Ubuntu 20.04

#232

Post by mixmastamyk » Sat, Apr 25, 2020, 1:39 AM UTC

Darmody wrote: post #175

beart wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

multiple monitor support in Linux is high on my list of reasons I keep switching back to my Windows partition.

It worked very, very well on Unity. It also works with other DE like Plasma but I personally find it horrendous on other aspects. I'll probably give Budgie a go.

Two 4k monitors with Ubuntu Mate, works well.

Re: Disabling Snaps in Ubuntu 20.04

#233

Post by hvis » Sat, Apr 25, 2020, 1:43 AM UTC

mixmastamyk wrote: post #228

hvis wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Snaps certainly have some usability problems. E.g. to use videoconferencing in Chromium I had to give it rights to connect to record audio explicitly. I expect you needed to do something like that for the VS Code snap.

I did that too, and it works for one minute, every time I start the browser. Firefox it is.

That's weird. I've been doing Zoom through web browser multiple times for hours since then.

Re: Disabling Snaps in Ubuntu 20.04

#234

Post by simosx » Sat, Apr 25, 2020, 1:44 AM UTC

pixelmonkey wrote: post #4

lainga wrote: post #2

Does Canonical have any 'push' motive for reducing dependence on apt? Or do they really just like snaps?

I think they just realized it gives them a way to package proprietary apps like Skype, Spotify, and Slack a bit more simply than would be required to apt-ify/dpkg-ify them. I really think that's the primary motivation.

In all your examples, it is their respective company that does the packaging. Skype is packaged by Microsoft, and so on. Here is the Skype snap page, https://snapcraft.io/skype

Canonical provides the tools and several companies are providing their software as snap packages.

Another example is JetBrains that provide all their development environments as snap packages.

Re: Disabling Snaps in Ubuntu 20.04

#235

Post by alyandon » Sat, Apr 25, 2020, 1:45 AM UTC

guug wrote: post #227

alyandon wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Debian has its own set of problems. Like the Chromium package maintainer deciding unilaterally several years ago that installing extensions remotely shouldn't be allowed and gated that standard functionality behind a command ling flag. There was zero documentation on the change and the error you received attempting to install an extension was basically "operation failed". I discovered the cause only because there was…

There is also the ffmpeg kerfuffle a few years back when Debian decided to replace the ffmpeg package with an incompatible and inferior fork. You can imagine the amount of confusion that ensued. That said, I think Debian's occasional messups are far less egregious and damaging than Ubuntu's though.

There was also that time many, many years ago they decided to remove the ability to load binary firmware blobs for things like network cards in the kernel because of an interesting interpretation of the GPL. :-/

Re: Disabling Snaps in Ubuntu 20.04

#236

Post by mixmastamyk » Sat, Apr 25, 2020, 1:45 AM UTC

Koshkin wrote: post #148

djsumdog wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I always had problems with both of them. I use Docker a lot and Flatpak/Snap are intended to be a type of Docker for desktop apps. I know with Flatpak it has some shims to integrate with your system UI libraries so themes try to match up, but there are issues with that too (and flatpak apps just not starting up half the time). I really hate Snap/Flatpak conceptually. Use the package manager. That's what it's there fo…

> a type of Docker for desktop apps By the way, what is it with Docker that makes it hard or impossible for it to be used for this exact purpose?

Docker is poorly designed as well.

Re: Disabling Snaps in Ubuntu 20.04

#237

Post by nine_k » Sat, Apr 25, 2020, 1:47 AM UTC

mcpeepants wrote: post #185

jeroenhd wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dang, that really sucks. I was planning on updating my desktop to 20.04 but after reading about Canonical pushing snaps and now this thread basically claiming that moving or renaming the directory is impossible because what is in my opinion a design flaw in the entire system design, I think I'll switch to Manjaro or Arch for my desktop instead. I am on the rolling releases already but I'm not going to install an LTS…

arch is really a pleasure to use on the desktop, especially if you're already comfortable with a rolling release distro.

Void Linux is also great if you're not a fan of systemd.

Re: Disabling Snaps in Ubuntu 20.04

#238

Post by simosx » Sat, Apr 25, 2020, 1:49 AM UTC

zamadatix wrote: post #213

What happens if you just sudo apt purge snapd without the rest?

In a default installation of Ubuntu 20.04 LTS, there are only very few pre-installed snap packages. The only important one is the Snap Store, that allows to install DEB packages and snap packages. If you can put up with the Snap Store and only install DEB packages, then you are fine. If you remove the Snap Store and you are at ease with 'apt', then you can may do so.

Re: Disabling Snaps in Ubuntu 20.04

#239

Post by nine_k » Sat, Apr 25, 2020, 1:50 AM UTC

jschwartzi wrote: post #200

RMPR wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Next step, introduce the mandatory restart as a standard.

But wait for the user to have a week-long job running for three days before you do it. That way they have to explain to their boss why there is now a 3 day delay.

It's critical? Don't use hobbyist software for that then. Take Debian or CentOS or something else with a non-cavalier development culture.

Re: Disabling Snaps in Ubuntu 20.04

#240

Post by cbHXBY1D » Sat, Apr 25, 2020, 1:50 AM UTC

Shared404 wrote: post #62

benjaminjackman wrote: post #31

So I've used ubuntu (Xubuntu, xfce) for quite a while and would rather not deal with this, are there any distros that aim to be ubuntu but without snap? Because hearing things like `sudo apt install chromium` actually aliases to using snap is disconcerting to say the least if true.

Pop!_Os is basically just Ubuntu but better. They will have flatpak integration with the store app with 20.04, but the official stance is to use the deb packages first, and then fall back to flatpak if there is no deb available.

I think Pop_Os is becoming the next Ubuntu. It's already captured a huge percentage of the gaming community. If you read r/linux_gaming a huge amount seem to be using it.