Yeah, imo the problems solved by using snaps for core system stuff are better solved with immutable distros, and I see very little reason to use snaps for anything else.
Yeah, imo the problems solved by using snaps for core system stuff are better solved with immutable distros, and I see very little reason to use snaps for anything else.
Yeah, sorry couldn’t resist.
snaps are very similar to flatpaks and, honestly, is technically better in a lot of ways.
Snap can be used for basically an entire system, while flatpak is limited to graphical apps. (Ubuntu core is built basically entirely off snaps.)
Snap is controlled by canonical, and the backend for the snap repo is entirely closed source. I’ve heard snaps are also easier for developers to work with, but I haven’t experienced that side of them.
Snaps automatically update by default where flatpaks don’t.
Snaps also get treated as loopback devices when they’re installed, which bloats a lot of utilities. (And they keep a few old versions around which makes it even worse). For example, you could run lsblk
and if you’re using snaps like 90% of it will be snaps you’ve installed instead of actual devices.
Flatpaks are also noticeably faster to start up, which for desktop apps matters, but wouldn’t really matter for a server that’s aiming for a lot of uptime.
The loopback device issue is the main reason I don’t use snaps. I also like flatpak being completely open, but realistically that doesn’t matter for much. There used to be an open snap store, but that shut down because nobody used it.
The easiest way to think of it is flatpaks are AppImages with a repository and snaps are flatpaks but bad.
That has benefits and detriments. Appimages contain everything they need to run, flatpak’s mostly do, but can also use runtimes that are shared between flatpaks.
All flatpaks are sandboxed, which tends to make them more secure. AppImages can be sandboxed, but many aren’t.
Flatpaks tend to integrate with the host system better, you can (kinda) theme them, their updates are handled via the flatpak repo, and they register apps with the system.
AppImages are infinitely more portable. Everything’s in one file, so you can pretty much just copy that to any system and you have the app.
Yeah, but people installing GrapheneOS probably aren’t in the vast majority of users
Oh, sorry, it’s called “Panels” app store says it has ads, but I just denied it network access and I’ve never seen one.
Aegis, its not on by default, but its recently customizeable, so play around with the settings
Edge Panels are a samsung only thing, but I use a similar app on my phone.
I use it less as a dock and more as a way to access stuff I want to quickly be able to go in and out of.
For example, the 2fa app I use auto closes when I copy something to the clipboard, so I just swipe into the app, copy it, and I’m back where I was.
Its also great for apps I don’t use frequently enough to want on my home screen, but when I do need them I don’t want to hunt around for them
I agree with pretty much everything they’ve said, though I’ve gotten more use out of the swappable parts. I have a desktop I use for things I need a powerful system for, but being able to swap in the GPU when traveling is great.
When I’m at home I have basically everything on USB C and the empty expansion bay.
When I travel I swap in the GPU and add an HDMI port and some USB a ports.
If you don’t have stuff set up like I do I agree it’s mostly just a reparability / upgradeability thing.
Oh yeah, they’re free to decide, I just disagree with them! I get the decision though, and if I were on charge of a large distro, I’d probably make the same choice (until plasma is on a normal release cycle)
Yeah, like I’m all in favor of having an opinionated design, but their dominance makes their bad decisions actively harm every other de. Stuff like refusing to compromise on cross-desktop protocols
Their whole attitude towards development is similar, down to not working with other dekstops and insisting on doing things the way that works best for them regardless if it’s worse for the linux ecosystem overall.
Nah, GNOME is worse mostly because it’s the default on a ton of distros, so them having this attitude actively get’s in the way of cross-desktop development instead of just being annoying.
Yeah, KDE’s basically at the point you don’t need GNOME imo, it’s so customizable you can make it basically look/function the same as GNOME without having to put up with GNOME’s dumber decisions
Android introduces far more incompatibilities, and the kernel mods are more impactful than the vast majority of other systems. Userspace incompatibilities are basically negligable for most distros.
It’s differences are substantial enough that I think it makes sense to treat it as a separate os.
Eh, it depends how you define Linux. Android uses a modified Linux kernel, but most of what’s above that is different. By the point you’re at the application layer they’re basically completely incompatible.
Is it technically Linux? Yeah but it’s so different from a user’s perspective it’s best to treat them as separate imo.
Yeah, your overall point is 100% correct and well made. Just a few things that don’t really matter to an end user they were complaining about
That was probably Atlas, it disables a bunch of security features as part of debloating, so I wouldn’t recommend it unless it’s an offline device
That just guarantees tech support lol
Yeah, recently I’ve run into 1 game I’ve wanted to play that I just couldn’t (Valorant so probably a better outcome lol) and maybe 2 that had any sort of issue.
If you’re mainly into competitive games it’s still rough, but otherwise it’s honestly smoother than my friends on Windows often.