The real problem for me though is that snaps are slow as hell. I mean like taking 4-5+ seconds to open on a box with an SSD, i7, and 64GB of RAM. That's unacceptable.
The icing on the cake for me is that even through the command line as you mention apt now seems to be giving me snaps instead of debs for a great deal of programs, which affects much more than the store experience. And, also, regarding said store experience: if stuff like Spotify takes 5+ seconds to open I doubt a user coming from Windows giving Linux a try is going to want to stick around long...it would be great if there was just a better solution.
But snaps are - for me - A LOT SLOWER than everything else out there.
*.deb, binaries run stuff in less than a second.
Flatpacks, appimage, I have those running in a second or two. Snap, for the same app takes 3-5 sec. sometimes (I wouln't know why), it evens takes as much as 8-10 sec.
NOBODY can get a pass on artificially making slower apps in 2020.
"If you make it idiot proof only idiots will want to use it". - this holds true. Canonical made the conscious and deliberate decision to treat users like morons by not even giving us the ability to decide how and when to install updates.
I gave up on Windows because of their blindly hostile approach to users, I won't be installing the latest Ubuntu - opting for Mint instead.
Spotify is specifically one of the snaps I use and frankly, I noticed it seemed to start a little slow but just assumed that was because of Electron or something. I literally don't care and never thought anything of it. I run it, it starts, and then I don't close it.
Besides, if Spotify users reject it, they can always switch to PPA or something else. It's their choice.
> apt now seems to be giving me snaps instead of debs for a great deal of programs,
"a great deal"? I've seen two mentioned, chromium and lxd. Where else have you encountered this where Debian has a package available from a maintainer but a snap shim is used instead?
Apt will also tell you a snap is available if there's no deb but that's just useful information.
Some apps, like Chromium have no alternative ppas available.
I installed KDE Neon 20.04 and when I discovered that Chromium was being switchted to snap, I searched for any current *.deb out there. NO proper ppas, just found some outdated Chromium 1-3 versions behind the current version.
If it wasn't for the KDE from Neon, I would have switched of distro in the hour. I switched to Chrome instead.
Got some old compiled Chromium just to have the thing available (I can just run it when I need it, it takes maybe 1/4 of sec to start).
Just hope Canonical doesn't try its snap thing in more critical packages or (FAR) worst, in the LTS server versions.
I would be getting popcorn to see the show when half the Internet start to ditch the LTS overnight over some half-propietary half-baked software being put in charge of its otherwise perfectly GPLed infrastructures.
It's cheaper/easier for them to publish one version across all of Ubuntu.
This is not what happens. The vast majority of users don't know or care why something is slow. They'll just say "Ugh, Linux is slow, I'm going back to Windows."
It's C++ with CEF
The Enterprise Linux ecosystem is a solid alternative to Ubuntu. Fedora for desktop and either CentOS or Fedora for servers, depending on how stable they need to be and how much maintenance you're willing to do.
Very similar roots, also RPM-based, but with a different take on things, such as using Btrfs and KDE by default, which I prefer.
BTW: KDE is not the default, it's just the first in the list :)
I see, so we're angry about things that haven't happened yet. TIL the OSS community has precogs and this is Minority Report!
Look, I get that two whole packages out of literally tens of thousands did this (I've seen lxd and chromium mentioned). But why don't we convict Canonical after they commit their crimes, eh?
How are there greater sunk costs related to switching distros later instead of now if Ubuntu starts actually misbehaving in a significant way?
I grant you, if you haven't picked a distro yet and this whole thing bothers you, by all means, pick something else! That's the beauty of the Linux world!
But if you're already in the ecosystem (and I have to assume most people complaining are... Otherwise why waste energy complaining about the actions of a company that doesn't affect you) I don't see how the sunk costs fallacy applies here.
So yes, there could be huge sunk costs. After fighting with this work laptop for a full work day to get every single step of the onboarding completed, I am not looking forward to doing it again -- even less so if the proprietary and mandatory programs that I have to install can't be guaranteed to work on anything outside Ubuntu.
For one multiple problems with linux containers due to lxd now being a snap package, which auto updates, restarts and sometimes doesn't like switching networks.
Apps that needed mounts that weren't there.
I mainly use nix packages now for ease of installation, removal, updates and for nix shell.
Need to run a shell with ffmpeg? `nix-shell --run bash -p ffmpeg` And ffmpeg is gone after the shell terminates.
I'm sorry but can you explain? How exactly is Snap helping Firefox? (I'm a Firefox user and I have never used Snap)
I guess a more succinct way to put it is: I actively oppose chrome and really don't care if the snap haters are screwed by Canonical's approach to packaging it.
Is the snap version of FF maintained by Mozilla, by any chance?
> But as a desktop user, I appreciate that I have the choice.
Just so we're clear, it's not that the apps auto-update, it's that there's no way to stop them auto-updating.
Unlike Windows 10 you do have a choice here.
One of the biggest problems with Windows is that every app sets up its own update policy and comes from its own App Store. (Steam, battle.net, etc.,) But that's Microsoft's fault for doing too little, not for doing too much. And that's actually kind of nice.
So do I.
Their botched rollout of Edge, including installing it without my permission and placing it on my taskbar, shows that no, you don't have a choice.
> I can pause OS updates in a control panel.
This is misleading at best. You can pause updates for a time period but they're forced at that point.
I don't know why you're comparing it to Windows 10.
Actually you can.
https://snapcraft.io/docs/keeping-snaps-up-to-date#heading--... for instructions on how to defer updates.
If you want to install a snap such that it never updates, see https://forum.snapcraft.io/t/disabling-automatic-refresh-for...
This issue, combined with the snap server being closed source and controlled by a for-profit company that seems to care less about FOSS with every Ubuntu release, makes snaps a very hard sell to anyone with common sense.
With the direction Linux is heading between snaps and systemd, and old-school holdouts like Void and Slackware suffering from a lack of developers and long-delayed releases respectively, I'm leaning more and more towards adopting OpenBSD for daily driver use. Performance has improved, quality of life has immensely improved, and the team behind it actually cares about putting out correct, working, secure software.
Sorry, rant over and I really went out on a tangent there, but my original point is that snaps are definitely no good for the future of Linux and I believe will be a detriment to the platform going forward.
I'm still of the opinion that this should be a front-and-centre feature. Install from the snap store, disable updates for that app specifically, still have to tied to its store instance for manual future updates.
Is this a practical issue for me? Actually, no. However, the fact that they didn't just include it from the beginning is a clear indication that Canonical and I are starting to differ in our thinking when it comes to the autonomy of the user. Also the fact that they didn't allow you disable updating, but merely postpone it for a maximum of two months.
When I need to install some random app from the internet (last one I had to install was an advanced PDF viewer/editor) I manually unpacked the deb and found the binaries and run them as regular user.
It's the same poor behavior that lead to the marginalization of Docker.
I install everything via CLI and pretty explicitly always avoid the GUI they have for installing software. It's never been good, ever.
I'm on 20.04 and I think it's a fantastic release, head and shoulders better than 18.04.
The only thing in the author's list that I really take issue with is installing a snap when a user attempted to install from a .deb file. That sort of shit is antithetical to linux, and if it continues to get worse would actually be a reason for me to leave Ubuntu.
But everything else is just a non-issue to me.
First, I use the command line for package installation and couldn't care less if the store experience is suboptimal.
Second, I use Firefox and anything that discourages people from feeding the Chrome monopoly, frankly, that sounds like a good thing to me.
Third, for some desktop apps I want auto updates. Having an option for some software to be on the latest is pretty slick and previously could only be solved with PPAs, which had their own problems (maintainer headaches, dependency issues, etc).
Would I want them on a server? No.
As a desktop (well, laptop) user, do I want all my software deployed with snaps and auto updating willy-nilly? Also no.
But as a desktop user, I appreciate that I have the choice.
And by lowering the barrier for maintainers who no longer have to worry about multiple distro versions, dependencies, etc, it means I get more software options. Sounds good to me!