Relying on AppImages/flatpack/etc for apps is a feature of immutable distros like VanillaOS, not a bug. The point is you never mess with the base system image.

Relying on AppImages/flatpack/etc for apps is a feature of immutable distros like VanillaOS, not a bug. The point is you never mess with the base system image. The goal is to leave the root as untouched as possible, with a transactional modification system when you absolutely must poke at the base system image, and install everything using your app packing format of choice. Fedora Silverblue is another distro following the same 'immutable' principle based on OSTree. Silverblue wants the base system to be immutable, bundling in toolbox (similar to distrobox) to create a container with a regular mutable sysroot that can use the regular package managers. If you break the container you can tear it down and build a fresh one without nuking your host OS. The goal is a reliable base system image that you can't break. It's something I've had happen many times with standard distros. Updating when too far behind is fairly likely to break something. 'Compatibility with Ubuntu' doesn't really matter as the system is already different enough even when based of Ubuntu for just googling 'issue Ubuntu' isn't going to be applicable. Do that stuff in a distrobox container.