That makes sense; though to be clear, you're essentially saying that apt isn't appropriate for 3rd party packages. And that: - The question of which files go i

That makes sense; though to be clear, you're essentially saying that apt isn't appropriate for 3rd party packages. And that: - The question of which files go in which directories in the system is a question for canonical (or whoever) to decide. Not end users or 3rd party developers - The namespace of apt package names is special, and 3rd party / external dpkgs shouldn't add anything into it I think this stance is entirely reasonable. Its essentially what windows and macos both do (and to increasing degrees with each version). But its a pity its taken the current apt packaging disaster to realise it. Its really convenient for users to have a package manager, and for 3rd party developers be able to write software for it. And these problems seem solvable: - Namespace all 3rd party packages. Eg, @apple/foundationdb-server (as distinct from @canonical/git) - Use overlayfs or something to essentially make /usr, /usr/bin, etc read only by normal processes. If these paths were only writable by system packages, the whole system would be much more predictable (and verifyable) - since that filesystem would only - could only contain a subset of the files in apt. I get that flatpak and snap are both attempts to replace apt. But its a pity they're needed. I'm enjoying mint, but if I ever rebuild this machine I'm going to give nix a try.