7 ms·

I love the part about simplifying packaging via 'snap'. Now, I would love to know, if I'm a maintainer of Foo (and you can get it today via `apt-get install fo

by knocte 11y ago

I love the part about simplifying packaging via 'snap'. Now, I would love to know, if I'm a maintainer of Foo (and you can get it today via `apt-get install foo`), how will I be able to start packaging using snap rather than relying on deb packages that come from debian? I'd love any feedback, cheers!

koolba 11y ago
What is snap? I can't find mention of it anywhere on the release notes page.
- anuragsoni 11y ago
  https://developer.ubuntu.com/en/desktop/ https://developer.ubuntu.com/en/desktop/ https://developer.ubuntu.com/en/snappy/build-apps/ https://developer.ubuntu.com/en/snappy/build-apps/ The ubuntu developer page has a good description of snaps and how to create them. In short its a package that contains all its dependencies.
tomswartz07 11y ago
Just a side note, as well: `apt-get` is depreciated, they've moved to just plain `apt` `apt install foo`
- nailer 11y ago
  Nice. There were a couple of things that were 'apt-cache', I could never remember which, I gather 'apt' does those too?
  - tomku 11y ago
    It does 'seach' and 'show' from apt-cache at least, not sure about any others.
    - __david__ 11y ago
      Oddly apt's `search` output is terrible compared to apt-cache's. If they want me to switch to the new command they should at least make it the same or better, not a couple steps backward.
- dhruvmittal 11y ago
  About time-- I always thought it was absurd for them to keep apt-get and apt-cache separate "for historic reasons." I used to have the hardest time explaining that the occasional new ubuntu users (to say nothing of all the people who were convinced that they needed to type "apt get [packagename]" then "apt install [packagename]".
- falcolas 11y ago
  Last time I tried to use just apt, its help pages warned that it was experimental, and there was still basic functionality which was either not implemented, or implemented differently from the regular apt-* tools. I'd very much prefer to standardize on plain apt, but it doesn't seem ready yet.
ronjouch 11y ago
Also, how does Canonical's snap compare/compete with Freedesktop/GNOME's xdg-app? https://wiki.gnome.org/Projects/SandboxedApps https://wiki.gnome.org/Projects/SandboxedApps
- abrowne 11y ago
  One thing I've noticed is that xdg-app seems to be only for desktop GUI apps, while snappy works for server software and command-line apps too. To me, that makes it more interesting.
creshal 11y ago
> I love the part about simplifying packaging via 'snap'. Bleargh. More container bullshit, now with even less control over it by end users. Now each tiny library update (think OpenSSL security fixes) will pull hundreds of "snaps" instead of a single package… assuming the developers even realize they have to rebuild their snaps.
- criddell 11y ago
  > Now each tiny library update (think OpenSSL security fixes) will pull hundreds of "snaps" Do you think that's worse than the alternative where each tiny (shared) library update potentially breaks hundreds of programs?
  - creshal 11y ago
    ABI breaks from security patches for stable releases, especially of Linux distributions, happen how often? In comparison, outdated npm/gem/pip/hipster-package-manager-of-the-week or docker installations happen how often? With the former, the burden of updating and testing lies with a small handful of distribution maintainers. With the latter, every single developer has to worry about deployment and maintenance.
    - cat-dev-null 11y ago
      Distros shouldn't waste time and effort on supporting and packaging language-specific, high-churn code packages except in very limited circumstances. Let the language specific-tools do those. Upstream is best, local fragmentation is wasteful.
  - jandrese 11y ago
    While that potential was always there (and people were paranoid about it), in real life it was extremely rare. ABIs don't tend to change much between minor versions on sane libraries. I can't remember it ever happening to me.
  - cat-dev-null 11y ago
    False dichotomy fallacy. Linux distributions need to engineer for side-by-side installation of multiple versions and not get tied up to those common locations. nix is just one example as an interesting idea, while Homebrew and stow are better ideas.
anuragsoni 11y ago
If you have the source of the package you might be able to use ubuntu's snapcraft[1] tool to create snap packages. There is a project on github called deb2snap[2] that might help creating snaps from deb packages which is something that might help. I haven't used it so can't provide any feedback on how well it works. The README is pretty detailed though. [1] https://developer.ubuntu.com/en/snappy/build-apps/ https://developer.ubuntu.com/en/snappy/build-apps/ [2] https://github.com/mikix/deb2snap https://github.com/mikix/deb2snap
- knocte 11y ago
  I knew deb2snap thanks, what I'm wondering is the bureaucracy steps to switch Foo to use my snap (instead of debian's deb) by default when being installed in Ubuntu v.NEXT. Thanks again

by knocte 11y ago

koolba 11y ago

What is snap? I can't find mention of it anywhere on the release notes page.

anuragsoni 11y ago
https://developer.ubuntu.com/en/desktop/ https://developer.ubuntu.com/en/desktop/ https://developer.ubuntu.com/en/snappy/build-apps/ https://developer.ubuntu.com/en/snappy/build-apps/ The ubuntu developer page has a good description of snaps and how to create them. In short its a package that contains all its dependencies.

tomswartz07 11y ago

Just a side note, as well: `apt-get` is depreciated, they've moved to just plain `apt` `apt install foo`

nailer 11y ago
Nice. There were a couple of things that were 'apt-cache', I could never remember which, I gather 'apt' does those too?
- tomku 11y ago
  It does 'seach' and 'show' from apt-cache at least, not sure about any others.
  - __david__ 11y ago
    Oddly apt's `search` output is terrible compared to apt-cache's. If they want me to switch to the new command they should at least make it the same or better, not a couple steps backward.
dhruvmittal 11y ago
About time-- I always thought it was absurd for them to keep apt-get and apt-cache separate "for historic reasons." I used to have the hardest time explaining that the occasional new ubuntu users (to say nothing of all the people who were convinced that they needed to type "apt get [packagename]" then "apt install [packagename]".
falcolas 11y ago
Last time I tried to use just apt, its help pages warned that it was experimental, and there was still basic functionality which was either not implemented, or implemented differently from the regular apt-* tools. I'd very much prefer to standardize on plain apt, but it doesn't seem ready yet.

ronjouch 11y ago

Also, how does Canonical's snap compare/compete with Freedesktop/GNOME's xdg-app? https://wiki.gnome.org/Projects/SandboxedApps https://wiki.gnome.org/Projects/SandboxedApps

abrowne 11y ago
One thing I've noticed is that xdg-app seems to be only for desktop GUI apps, while snappy works for server software and command-line apps too. To me, that makes it more interesting.

creshal 11y ago

> I love the part about simplifying packaging via 'snap'. Bleargh. More container bullshit, now with even less control over it by end users. Now each tiny library update (think OpenSSL security fixes) will pull hundreds of "snaps" instead of a single package… assuming the developers even realize they have to rebuild their snaps.

criddell 11y ago
> Now each tiny library update (think OpenSSL security fixes) will pull hundreds of "snaps" Do you think that's worse than the alternative where each tiny (shared) library update potentially breaks hundreds of programs?
- creshal 11y ago
  ABI breaks from security patches for stable releases, especially of Linux distributions, happen how often? In comparison, outdated npm/gem/pip/hipster-package-manager-of-the-week or docker installations happen how often? With the former, the burden of updating and testing lies with a small handful of distribution maintainers. With the latter, every single developer has to worry about deployment and maintenance.
  - cat-dev-null 11y ago
    Distros shouldn't waste time and effort on supporting and packaging language-specific, high-churn code packages except in very limited circumstances. Let the language specific-tools do those. Upstream is best, local fragmentation is wasteful.
- jandrese 11y ago
  While that potential was always there (and people were paranoid about it), in real life it was extremely rare. ABIs don't tend to change much between minor versions on sane libraries. I can't remember it ever happening to me.
- cat-dev-null 11y ago
  False dichotomy fallacy. Linux distributions need to engineer for side-by-side installation of multiple versions and not get tied up to those common locations. nix is just one example as an interesting idea, while Homebrew and stow are better ideas.

anuragsoni 11y ago

If you have the source of the package you might be able to use ubuntu's snapcraft[1] tool to create snap packages. There is a project on github called deb2snap[2] that might help creating snaps from deb packages which is something that might help. I haven't used it so can't provide any feedback on how well it works. The README is pretty detailed though. [1] https://developer.ubuntu.com/en/snappy/build-apps/ https://developer.ubuntu.com/en/snappy/build-apps/ [2] https://github.com/mikix/deb2snap https://github.com/mikix/deb2snap

knocte 11y ago
I knew deb2snap thanks, what I'm wondering is the bureaucracy steps to switch Foo to use my snap (instead of debian's deb) by default when being installed in Ubuntu v.NEXT. Thanks again