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To me, Snap and Flatpak are less about security than they are about universal application distribution that doesn't rely on third party maintainers and is free
by AnIdiotOnTheNet 5y ago
To me, Snap and Flatpak are less about security than they are about universal application distribution that doesn't rely on third party maintainers and is free of conflicts. There are much simpler ways to achieve that goal[0], but the fragmentary nature of the Linux Desktop community makes the necessary standardization all but impossible. Similar to your statement about security, I loathe the traditional package manager/repo model because it consistently makes software unavailable to me either because it is missing from the repo, isn't updated yet, isn't maintained at all, or has library conflicts. All of its supposed advantages are useless if I can't actually run software.
To that end, I've put my money on Flatpak. I have my issues with it, both in practice and in design, but it isn't as user-hostile as Snap and seems decently popular and growing.
[0] AppImage is a valiant attempt, but simple AppDirs before it were much simpler
- vorpalhex 5y agoI've only come across a few AppImage apps in the wild but they have worked flawlessly. My only complaint is that installing their desktop icons is a bit of a doing and should be automatic - but that is a very fixable problem.
- arminiusreturns 5y agoAppimages are the only ones I ever bother with, and everything snap/flatpak related is removed as soon as possible. I spent enough time trying to debug the others to know they really arent worth the trouble.
- AnIdiotOnTheNet 5y agoI love AppImage, but unfortunately they seem to be generally ignored. Very few projects distribute AppImages and there doesn't seem to be any momentum behind their adoption.
- vorpalhex 5y agoA lot of project maintainers are very open to people porting their project to other distribution methods. As long as you setup CI, it should be pretty self maintaining in most cases too. No experience building AppImages but if it's something you can contribute to projects, that is the best way to see more of them in use. This is a big part of how a lot of apps got on flatpak.