this post was submitted on 12 Nov 2023
153 points (96.4% liked)

Linux

48153 readers
753 users here now

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Linux is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991 by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged in a Linux distribution (or distro for short).

Distributions include the Linux kernel and supporting system software and libraries, many of which are provided by the GNU Project. Many Linux distributions use the word "Linux" in their name, but the Free Software Foundation uses the name GNU/Linux to emphasize the importance of GNU software, causing some controversy.

Rules

Related Communities

Community icon by Alpár-Etele Méder, licensed under CC BY 3.0

founded 5 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] [email protected] 18 points 1 year ago (3 children)

As much as I have issues with the snap implementation, I really want to live in a world where my base os is solid and everything else is easily updatable. LTS, with the latest apps.

Snap and flatpak achieve this, and I want more of that. Just less... frustrating. And less not-invented-here like.

[–] [email protected] 31 points 1 year ago (1 children)

And less not-invented-here like.

The only party playing that game is Canonical. Everybody else already agreed on Flatpak.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Flatpak cannot do what's discussed in the article. Snap can and it was started prior to Flatpak. If Flatpak was able to do what Snap can, you'd have half a point.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

Flatpak cannot do what’s discussed in the article.

Nobody claimed 100% feature overlap. For regular GUI applications both work relatively similar, to the point that Snap now happily uses technologies developed for Flatpak, such as Portals.

it was started prior to Flatpak.

That's irrelevant. One could just as well argue that Flatpak evolved from developments (OSTree, etc.) that are even older but that beside the point. Fact is that OSTree and Flatpak are vendor neutral and Snap isn't. Attempts at vendor lock-in caused Valve leave Ubuntu and later choose Flatpak on SteamOS.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Snap has the ability to do the base system in a much more modular way and could be really cool for an immutable system. Forcing them on desktop users with their transitional deb packages and making it heavily integrated with only one repository really screwed it up.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Also I'm not sure about slow startup times. Are those still an issue? If so, then I would be sure to considet Ubuntu dead and not only not recommend it but actively recommend switching away from it.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Yes, they are still an issue. It is irritating enough that I have currently zero snaps and would rather build from source if snap is the only binary option.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

That's basically THE dealbreaker for snaps. Loop devices on lsblk? Most people don't care and wouldn't see it. Proprietary backend? Again, most regular people (Ubuntu's target audience) do not care. So the slow startup time is THE dealbreaker.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

Fedora Silverblue sounds like it fits what you're looking for.