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That reminds me of the stake Ubuntu Core was born with in its heart: > An Ubuntu SSO account is required to create the first user on an Ubuntu Core installatio

That reminds me of the stake Ubuntu Core was born with in its heart: > An Ubuntu SSO account is required to create the first user on an Ubuntu Core installation. They just keep flinging shit at nothing and hoping to hit a wall they can build a gate in. They're trying to boil the frog slowly with Snap on the Server/Desktop branches. There is no possible genuine motive for these maneuverings to be in the position of gatekeeper. If anyone at Canonical is listening, you should be aware it doesn't matter how slowly and carefully you approach this, or how you justify it, the first time I'm forced to kiss the ring to get my software to work, your software is gone from any system I own or manage, immediately and forever. You're not going to get within a thousand miles of monetizing the ecosystem by gatekeeping it -- the moment you even so much as assert the position of gatekeeper you're trying to create for yourselves you're dead to me.

psanford 6y ago
I was excited for Ubuntu Core and then "noped" out as soon as I saw the Ubuntu SSO account requirement. I'm not going to use an OS that you can't login to without it phoning home to a third party.
- kyrofa 6y ago
  You realize that's literally just to fetch SSH keys, right? It's the authentication method so they don't have to provide a default password. It's not some sort of phone-home method.
  - ifmpx 6y ago
    I, like GP, noped out as soon as I saw the SSO requirement. I also noped out of Microsoft's /free/ embedded offing for the same reason. I don't care why it's needed. I'm not interested in voluntarily tying my business to your product if you're going to restrict access to it this early on.
  - psanford 6y ago
    Yeah giving a third party the ability to control what ssh keys get provisioned on a machine isn't a big deal.</sarcasm>
abnercoimbre 6y ago
To go back to Snap for a second: didn't Linux Mint drop it recently? I'm not happy on Ubuntu with snap because of what seems to be auto-updates -- maybe it's another thing that's auto-updating? I use Hugo [0], whose binaries are still < v1.0, and my websites break when they upgrade so I want to do that manually. Imagine my surprise after an update / reboot to see I can't build my sites anymore. This has happened several times. [0] https://gohugo.io https://gohugo.io
- vladvasiliu 6y ago
  Snap is auto-updating and you can't stop it [0]. I actually liked the idea of the snaps on paper, especially combined with Ubuntu Core for running lightweight VMs (via LXD). But the tone on that exchange and the "we know best" attitude put me off it. I have an Ubuntu 20.04 installed for tests on one of my home machines, and from time to time I catch doing who knows what. What tips me off is seeing the drive light going crazy when I'm doing basically nothing. And for some reason it doesn't log anything while doing this... [0] https://forum.snapcraft.io/t/disabling-automatic-refresh-for-snap-from-store/707 https://forum.snapcraft.io/t/disabling-automatic-refresh-for...
  - Izkata 6y ago
    > Snap is auto-updating and you can't stop it Kill the daemon and make it non-executable. Only restore it when you want to manually do an install.
    - AnIdiotOnTheNet 6y ago
      What is this, Windows 10?
      - hansvm 6y ago
        I wish Windows 10 were that nice. First you need a nice race condition to break the updater's updater's unauthorized change prevention service....
jeroenhd 6y ago
To be completely honest, if Canonical ever wants the theoretical "year of the Linux desktop" to happen, they need a way to get proper cloud accounts working. A big part of the value of Apple's ecosystem is iCloud. Microsoft has done the same thing with the syncing and cross platform capabilities of their Microsoft Accounts. Most Linux users today don't care much if they need to create separate email, cloud storage, backup storage, password recovery and application store accounts. That's because many Linux users have a preference for one service or even self host. Normal people aren't like that. A desktop without a cloud account is like an Android phone without Google apps or a theoretical Apple phone without Apple apps. Technically fully functional and customisable via sideloading, but ultimately pointless because nobody wants to go through that. Just ask any regular Jane or Joe on the street if they can set up IMAP email on their phone; I bet they just use Gmail or Outlook. It's not the Linux power users Canonical wants to attract; it's regular users. Their requirements are different from yours or mine. The Ubuntu Core website specifically says it's built for business. It's focus is on configurability and enterprise deployment, making it closer to a managed Windows 10 enterprise network than something you run on your laptop at home. Lockdowns and gatekeeping are practically what the service is intended to do.
- coreblocks 6y ago
  Honestly I think it’s simpler than that. The Linux desktop experience is just terrible... I have never successfully installed a Linux distro without having to fiddle with some boot flag or some config file. Every major Linux desktop environment has been unreliable at best. Software support is fragmented across dozens of distros. I think WSL has been the biggest win for Linux on the desktop, but ironically it’s on windows.
  - unixhero 6y ago
    What year is this? Linux desktop experience is fantastic in 2020. It has been for several years. That's bordering FUD you're spreading.
    - AnIdiotOnTheNet 6y ago
gjsman-1000 6y ago
Canonical doesn't seem to understand that if I wanted a gate-kept system, there are plenty of better, non-Linux options in this world. Canonical seems to have forgotten why Linux exists to begin with.
- im3w1l 6y ago
  Canonical is betting on there being people who want to run some Linux exclusive software but don't care about idealism. Edit: In hindsight I think this comment was too cynical. I like canonical mostly.
  - ColanR 6y ago
    That's the wrong bet to make, because those are the people that will end up using the Microsoft WSL. From what I can tell, the problems with Canonical will sort themselves out when the market they've created for themselves is eaten by Microsoft's incorporation of Linux into Windows. The only people left using 'pure' Linux/Unix will be those who care about quality software, FOSS, and privacy. I hope that day comes sooner than later.
    - freeone3000 6y ago
      Canonical is the #1 distributor of Linux on Windows. It seems to fill that niche perfectly.
  - the_af 6y ago
    > run some Linux exclusive software Like what? I run Linux because I want control of my computer. The minute a distro starts gatekeeping, the moment I switch to a different distro. Increasingly, you can run Linux software on non-Linux OSes, if a piece of software is all you care about.
    - umanwizard 6y ago
      Docker is the most major example I can think of of something that only runs on Linux.
donor20 6y ago
Wow - strong language. Can I ask - do you contribute meaningfully to any open source packages? Do you buy software at a significant commercial level? I've noticed this sort of total absolutest, outraged, scorched earth style sometimes comes from the free riders. At least in some businesses I've worked with - if you can eliminate customers that approach things in this way your staff are happier, your life more relaxed AND you make more money. A customer paying $100K/year sometimes has really competent folks who have pretty reasonable perspectives - a pleasure to work with. Someone paying $20/year can just rage and rage on forums, endless support tickets for user error issues etc, no perspective in terms of what is going on. Not sure if this has been seen in broader contexts. "the moment you even so much as assert the position of gatekeeper you're trying to create for yourselves you're dead to me." I think Redhat did the gatekeeper to 30 billion route. If you are a customer paying for support from them might be worth giving them feedback and more importantly a suggested way forward that works to pay their staff. What's weird is part of the value ADD for other companies in the tech space is the cloud account that you are railing against. Microsoft has basically forced it on their windows user base, but provisioning users now isn't so bad if you want to give someone office, just add their email to your admin page and entitle them. Boom, they can self solve even at home. Google has made their cloud account EXTREMELY valuable. The same "you are dead to me" ragers are often knee deep in google account / xbox account / netflix go anywhere accounts etc.
- commoner 6y ago
  You're making plenty of unfounded assumptions about the parent poster's personal character. One is not obligated to contribute to open source packages or pay for high-price contracts to provide feedback on a company's software on a public forum. (And the server portion of Snap is closed source.) Just because Microsoft and Google do worse does not mean that Canonical cannot do better.
  - marmada 6y ago
    Open source contribution is not a requirement for providing feedback but people who actually understand the industry are more legitimate in most people's eyes.
skywhopper 6y ago
It's true. I've long been a fan of using Ubuntu on the server because its consistent release and long-term maintenance schedules make planning a lot easier than with Debian, and because the server stuff was relatively stripped down. But the gradual creep of snap into the server is really worrisome. From minor things like a bunch of annoying loop filesystems on a default install, to truly problematic things like how removing snapd led to a broken OS after automatic security upgrades, forcing us to relent and leave snapd installed. And the fact is, as you say, this is a clear pattern for Canonical.
heavyset_go 6y ago
> If anyone at Canonical is listening, you should be aware it doesn't matter how slowly and carefully you approach this, or how you justify it, the first time I'm forced to kiss the ring to get my software to work, your software is gone from any system I own or manage, immediately and forever. They're taking a look at how Microsoft is slowly doing this with Windows, and following suit.
- ifmpx 6y ago
  That's not the only thing they copied unfortunately. Snap force update after a while and there is no proper way to stop it.
coldtea 6y ago
>You're not going to get within a thousand miles of monetizing the ecosystem by gatekeeping it -- the moment you even so much as assert the position of gatekeeper you're trying to create for yourselves you're dead to me. On the other hand, at that point they might finally be a great option for millions of Windows / macOS users...
schoolornot 6y ago
There are so many FOSS projects out there that we use at work that we're willing to contribute financially to. Either for support, or for specific feature development, or as as donation masked as one of the two. But as you mentioned, the second a vendor introduces code that creates _another_ external dependency, we have to walk away.

psanford 6y ago

I was excited for Ubuntu Core and then "noped" out as soon as I saw the Ubuntu SSO account requirement. I'm not going to use an OS that you can't login to without it phoning home to a third party.

kyrofa 6y ago
You realize that's literally just to fetch SSH keys, right? It's the authentication method so they don't have to provide a default password. It's not some sort of phone-home method.
- ifmpx 6y ago
  I, like GP, noped out as soon as I saw the SSO requirement. I also noped out of Microsoft's /free/ embedded offing for the same reason. I don't care why it's needed. I'm not interested in voluntarily tying my business to your product if you're going to restrict access to it this early on.
- psanford 6y ago
  Yeah giving a third party the ability to control what ssh keys get provisioned on a machine isn't a big deal.</sarcasm>

abnercoimbre 6y ago

To go back to Snap for a second: didn't Linux Mint drop it recently? I'm not happy on Ubuntu with snap because of what seems to be auto-updates -- maybe it's another thing that's auto-updating? I use Hugo [0], whose binaries are still < v1.0, and my websites break when they upgrade so I want to do that manually. Imagine my surprise after an update / reboot to see I can't build my sites anymore. This has happened several times. [0] https://gohugo.io https://gohugo.io

vladvasiliu 6y ago
Snap is auto-updating and you can't stop it [0]. I actually liked the idea of the snaps on paper, especially combined with Ubuntu Core for running lightweight VMs (via LXD). But the tone on that exchange and the "we know best" attitude put me off it. I have an Ubuntu 20.04 installed for tests on one of my home machines, and from time to time I catch doing who knows what. What tips me off is seeing the drive light going crazy when I'm doing basically nothing. And for some reason it doesn't log anything while doing this... [0] https://forum.snapcraft.io/t/disabling-automatic-refresh-for-snap-from-store/707 https://forum.snapcraft.io/t/disabling-automatic-refresh-for...
- Izkata 6y ago
  > Snap is auto-updating and you can't stop it Kill the daemon and make it non-executable. Only restore it when you want to manually do an install.
  - AnIdiotOnTheNet 6y ago
    What is this, Windows 10?
    - hansvm 6y ago
      I wish Windows 10 were that nice. First you need a nice race condition to break the updater's updater's unauthorized change prevention service....

jeroenhd 6y ago

To be completely honest, if Canonical ever wants the theoretical "year of the Linux desktop" to happen, they need a way to get proper cloud accounts working. A big part of the value of Apple's ecosystem is iCloud. Microsoft has done the same thing with the syncing and cross platform capabilities of their Microsoft Accounts. Most Linux users today don't care much if they need to create separate email, cloud storage, backup storage, password recovery and application store accounts. That's because many Linux users have a preference for one service or even self host. Normal people aren't like that. A desktop without a cloud account is like an Android phone without Google apps or a theoretical Apple phone without Apple apps. Technically fully functional and customisable via sideloading, but ultimately pointless because nobody wants to go through that. Just ask any regular Jane or Joe on the street if they can set up IMAP email on their phone; I bet they just use Gmail or Outlook. It's not the Linux power users Canonical wants to attract; it's regular users. Their requirements are different from yours or mine. The Ubuntu Core website specifically says it's built for business. It's focus is on configurability and enterprise deployment, making it closer to a managed Windows 10 enterprise network than something you run on your laptop at home. Lockdowns and gatekeeping are practically what the service is intended to do.

coreblocks 6y ago
Honestly I think it’s simpler than that. The Linux desktop experience is just terrible... I have never successfully installed a Linux distro without having to fiddle with some boot flag or some config file. Every major Linux desktop environment has been unreliable at best. Software support is fragmented across dozens of distros. I think WSL has been the biggest win for Linux on the desktop, but ironically it’s on windows.
- unixhero 6y ago
  What year is this? Linux desktop experience is fantastic in 2020. It has been for several years. That's bordering FUD you're spreading.
  - AnIdiotOnTheNet 6y ago

gjsman-1000 6y ago

Canonical doesn't seem to understand that if I wanted a gate-kept system, there are plenty of better, non-Linux options in this world. Canonical seems to have forgotten why Linux exists to begin with.

im3w1l 6y ago
Canonical is betting on there being people who want to run some Linux exclusive software but don't care about idealism. Edit: In hindsight I think this comment was too cynical. I like canonical mostly.
- ColanR 6y ago
  That's the wrong bet to make, because those are the people that will end up using the Microsoft WSL. From what I can tell, the problems with Canonical will sort themselves out when the market they've created for themselves is eaten by Microsoft's incorporation of Linux into Windows. The only people left using 'pure' Linux/Unix will be those who care about quality software, FOSS, and privacy. I hope that day comes sooner than later.
  - freeone3000 6y ago
    Canonical is the #1 distributor of Linux on Windows. It seems to fill that niche perfectly.
- the_af 6y ago
  > run some Linux exclusive software Like what? I run Linux because I want control of my computer. The minute a distro starts gatekeeping, the moment I switch to a different distro. Increasingly, you can run Linux software on non-Linux OSes, if a piece of software is all you care about.
  - umanwizard 6y ago
    Docker is the most major example I can think of of something that only runs on Linux.

donor20 6y ago

Wow - strong language. Can I ask - do you contribute meaningfully to any open source packages? Do you buy software at a significant commercial level? I've noticed this sort of total absolutest, outraged, scorched earth style sometimes comes from the free riders. At least in some businesses I've worked with - if you can eliminate customers that approach things in this way your staff are happier, your life more relaxed AND you make more money. A customer paying $100K/year sometimes has really competent folks who have pretty reasonable perspectives - a pleasure to work with. Someone paying $20/year can just rage and rage on forums, endless support tickets for user error issues etc, no perspective in terms of what is going on. Not sure if this has been seen in broader contexts. "the moment you even so much as assert the position of gatekeeper you're trying to create for yourselves you're dead to me." I think Redhat did the gatekeeper to 30 billion route. If you are a customer paying for support from them might be worth giving them feedback and more importantly a suggested way forward that works to pay their staff. What's weird is part of the value ADD for other companies in the tech space is the cloud account that you are railing against. Microsoft has basically forced it on their windows user base, but provisioning users now isn't so bad if you want to give someone office, just add their email to your admin page and entitle them. Boom, they can self solve even at home. Google has made their cloud account EXTREMELY valuable. The same "you are dead to me" ragers are often knee deep in google account / xbox account / netflix go anywhere accounts etc.

commoner 6y ago
You're making plenty of unfounded assumptions about the parent poster's personal character. One is not obligated to contribute to open source packages or pay for high-price contracts to provide feedback on a company's software on a public forum. (And the server portion of Snap is closed source.) Just because Microsoft and Google do worse does not mean that Canonical cannot do better.
- marmada 6y ago
  Open source contribution is not a requirement for providing feedback but people who actually understand the industry are more legitimate in most people's eyes.

skywhopper 6y ago

It's true. I've long been a fan of using Ubuntu on the server because its consistent release and long-term maintenance schedules make planning a lot easier than with Debian, and because the server stuff was relatively stripped down. But the gradual creep of snap into the server is really worrisome. From minor things like a bunch of annoying loop filesystems on a default install, to truly problematic things like how removing snapd led to a broken OS after automatic security upgrades, forcing us to relent and leave snapd installed. And the fact is, as you say, this is a clear pattern for Canonical.

heavyset_go 6y ago

> If anyone at Canonical is listening, you should be aware it doesn't matter how slowly and carefully you approach this, or how you justify it, the first time I'm forced to kiss the ring to get my software to work, your software is gone from any system I own or manage, immediately and forever. They're taking a look at how Microsoft is slowly doing this with Windows, and following suit.

ifmpx 6y ago
That's not the only thing they copied unfortunately. Snap force update after a while and there is no proper way to stop it.

coldtea 6y ago

>You're not going to get within a thousand miles of monetizing the ecosystem by gatekeeping it -- the moment you even so much as assert the position of gatekeeper you're trying to create for yourselves you're dead to me. On the other hand, at that point they might finally be a great option for millions of Windows / macOS users...

schoolornot 6y ago

There are so many FOSS projects out there that we use at work that we're willing to contribute financially to. Either for support, or for specific feature development, or as as donation masked as one of the two. But as you mentioned, the second a vendor introduces code that creates _another_ external dependency, we have to walk away.