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Linux Mint drops Ubuntu Snap packages

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Re: Linux Mint drops Ubuntu Snap packages

#461

Post by fractal618 »

entropicdrifter wrote: post #27
fractal618 wrote: post #14

I'm hoping they will switch their base to Clear Linux. I have been using Clear Linux on my personal laptop, and it's been a fantastic experience so far.

Isn't Clear Linux an Intel project? Kinda defeats the purpose if you're trying to reduce the influence of one corporation by replacing it with an even bigger, more monopolistic one

It's open source. In a way the linux/GNU initiative has won, because they finally have hardware manufacturers and large companies developing source code in an open way.

Re: Linux Mint drops Ubuntu Snap packages

#462

Post by philliphaydon »

fullstop wrote: post #443
philliphaydon wrote: post #413

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Going to fire this up in a VM now and give it a go, maybe replace Ubuntu 20.04 with it. I just tried out Mint but it installs SO much rubbish. It installs mysql?!? I don't mind it installing some useful software but Mint goes overboard. With 20.04 I'm constantly sitting at 20-27gb of used memory when doing dev work.

One thing which I very much liked about it is that the installer takes care of luks / cryptsetup.

I fired it up in a VM and it’s pretty awesome. Just trying to backup this dying hard drive before I reformat and put pop as my main.

Re: Linux Mint drops Ubuntu Snap packages

#463

Post by ddevault »

jonquark wrote: post #25
psanford wrote: post #7

From the linked announcement: https://blog.linuxmint.com/?p=3906 > Applications in this store cannot be patched, or pinned. You can’t audit them, hold them, modify them or even point snap to a different store. You’ve as much empowerment with this as if you were using proprietary software, i.e. none. This is in effect similar to a commercial proprietary solution, but with two major differences: It runs as root, and it…

I can see why Snap is like it is from Canonial's perspective - but from the User perspective it seems like FlatPaks[1] are much better and address the issues that this article raises [1] https://flathub.org/home (Disclaimer: I'm talking in a personal capacity but the company I work for in my day job now owns Red Hat - I don't work on Linux Operating Systems).

Every attempt at "solving" this "problem", including Snap, Flatpak, and AppImage, are an absolutely awful regression in the state of Linux. I absolutely hate this trend. These tools solve problems for only two kinds of software: proprietary software, and software with suck reckless, runaway complexity that it can only run in one specific environment. I have no interest in either kind and I will give no quarter to "solutions" for their "problems".

Criticism specifically regarding Flatpak: https://flatkill.org/

Re: Linux Mint drops Ubuntu Snap packages

#464

Post by fractal618 »

pyrophane wrote: post #57
fractal618 wrote: post #14

I'm hoping they will switch their base to Clear Linux. I have been using Clear Linux on my personal laptop, and it's been a fantastic experience so far.

What's been fantastic about it? I'm genuinely interested. My only real familiarity with Clear is that I see it dominating those Phoronix benchmarks, but I didn't know it was a complete end-user distro.

I've been using it for a few days now, and it's solid. My personal laptop is getting older, so it's hard to comment on perfomance, but i was able to install a steam video game "path of exile without touching the terminal or file manager.

Re: Linux Mint drops Ubuntu Snap packages

#465

Post by ddevault »

Avamander wrote: post #448
djeiasbsbo wrote: post #432

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well ~/snap is pretty terrible but I am almost as annoyed with something like ~/.tmux.conf and no support for the XDG Base Dirs Spec or setting the config path. With tmux it seems like this is finally possible with version 3.1 or by compiling it yourself but I remember being annoyed about this years ago. I dislike a home directory cluttered with dotfiles just as much as that snap folder choice because when do we actu…

There are way more offenders here. But snap is the most egregious one because it's not hidden. Name and shame: * docker (~/.docker) * Arduino IDE (~/.arduino15) * GNURadio (~/.gnuradio) * IPython (~/.ipython) * FreeCAD (~/.FreeCAD) * HPlip (~/.hplip) * IntelliJ and others (e.g. ~/RubyMine[year]) * Cargo (~/.cargo) * Audacity (~/.audacity-data) * PGAdmin (~/.pgadmin) * ELinks (~/.elinks) * NPM (~/.npm) * sqlmap (~/.sq…

SSH is the most annoying because I need it installed on literally everything.

Re: Linux Mint drops Ubuntu Snap packages

#466

Post by [deleted] »

dcow wrote: post #381
lawl wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> but from the User perspective it seems like FlatPaks[1] are much better and address the issues that this article raises This is interesting, because the last few days I was actually working on packaging an application of mine as a snap/flatpak. From my PoV, they both have their fair share of issues. Snaps enforce a sandbox, which I think is actually a good idea, because the desktop security model is somewhat broken…

`curl | bash` gets a bad wrap. From a security perspective (assuming you trust web pki), it's 100% no different than a) downloading and running a script, b) downloading a package and and installing it, c) downloading a binary blob and executing it, etc. I actually find that piping an install script to an interpreter is the easiest to audit of all the options because I can see exactly the changes that will be made to…

[deleted]

Re: Linux Mint drops Ubuntu Snap packages

#467

Post by znpy »

yesterday I finally decided to investigate why gnome-calculator was so slow at starting up in my ubuntu-based xfce desktop.

It's a snap. instead of just launching a stupid binary (it's a f-ing calculator for christ's sake) somebody decided it was better to use a snap, mount a filesystem, add a cgroup and everything.

For me that was the last straw: I eradicated all the snaps in my system, uninstalled snapd and everything gnome-related that I could. Jesus christ.

Again, it's a f-cking calculator.

I don't need a snap for that.

That's what get people hating snaps.

For the record, I'm now using xcalc. It's less pretty but it starts IMMEDIATELY.

Re: Linux Mint drops Ubuntu Snap packages

#468

Post by znpy »

emerongi wrote: post #220

Snaps are super laggy. GNOME calculator on Ubuntu runs in a snap and it is baffling that whoever made the decision to package it in a snap by default was OK with the fact that it takes 2 seconds to launch a basic calculator on a 2017 laptop (edit: re-tested, it took 5 seconds). To top it off, a couple months ago my calculator disappeared. For some reason I have been having problems with snap applications disappearing…

can confirm, have exact same problem with the exact same software (gnome-calculator).

I now switched to xcalc. gnome-calculator is better, honestly, but it's not worth feeling in the 90ies.

Re: Linux Mint drops Ubuntu Snap packages

#469

Post by ddevault »

pjfin123 wrote: post #84

If desktop Linux is ever going to be mainstream there needs to be an easy to use "app store" where users can use a GUI to install apps which need to be sandboxed like on a mobile phone with defined permissions. Snapcraft is way ahead of Flatpak on this and the current Ubuntu setup works well. On Ubuntu you can go to the Ubuntu software app (gui) search for software and it blends apt results with snap results. This re…

>If desktop Linux is ever going to be mainstream

Who says it needs to be? What if what appeals to Linux desktop users is precisely what differentiates it from the mainstream?

Snap is regressive. What we have now works better, faster, lighter, and more secure. No, you can't have a convenient means of shipping your proprietary electron 10G garbage monster to end users. We don't need it to be "mainstream".

Re: Linux Mint drops Ubuntu Snap packages

#470

Post by berkes »

yxhuvud wrote: post #281
jwlake wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just seems like an unintended consequences confusing situation. I think a pretty rational policy would to _never_ have an apt package install a snap package. Moving to snap is a breaking change, effectively, so you have to bite the bullet at some point. Mixing your distribution systems with references to each other seems like a recipe for confusion and anger. And it looks like they got the expected outcome.

Then people get stuck on old insecure versions of chromium. Or it simply disappears. Do you really think that doesn't create confusion and anger?

> Or it simply disappears.

Worse. Because when you then search the "software store", and install chromium, all your bookmarks, history, forms and other state is lost. At least the "apt package" migrates that for users.

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