By: tanishaj
In reply to <a href="https://www.osnews.com/story/140090/if-your-immutable-linux-desktop-uses-flatpak-im-going-to-have-a-bad-time/#comment-10441203">nico78</a>.
I came here to say the same thing.
I like Arch via Distrobox as it gives you access to all the Arch repos and the entirety of the AUR. Enjoy the best feature of Arch on any distro.
By: Milo_Hoffman
Flatpak is the future for Linux app distribution.
It has some rough edges, but the tooling and standards are getting better all the time.
By: Alfman
In reply to <a href="https://www.osnews.com/story/140090/if-your-immutable-linux-desktop-uses-flatpak-im-going-to-have-a-bad-time/#comment-10441229">wingnut2292</a>.
You aren't wrong, but in practice it isn't just a matter of libraries but also versioned APIs. If you want updated libraries it can involve lots of code refactoring across an entire distro. Or make do with lots of duplication using packages as the are, which is one of the criticisms of flatpak and the reason it is bloated compared to a repository with coordinated dependencies.
By: wingnut2292
What if there was a centralized registry of libraries indexed to the programs that depend on them. That way, when I install a file, I only install the libs I need, instead of having xyzMiB sitting on my hard drive. Program updated?, refer to the index, change or replace what's needed - just what's needed, and then update the index. If you need a program in a sandbox, can't you chroot or jail(8) it?
Flatpacks sound like a nice idea, but it doesn't get around the lack of a common, universal, *smart* package/library manager.
By: Alfman
In reply to <a href="https://www.osnews.com/story/140090/if-your-immutable-linux-desktop-uses-flatpak-im-going-to-have-a-bad-time/#comment-10441215">dsmogor</a>.
dsmogor,
<blockquote>Flatpack (or similar environments) turns Linux from OS into a platform because it provides standardized application environment that eliminated human labour in integrating each application. It’s not Linux in general (or Linux users) that love it, it’s distribution maintainers and application developers, because it saves thousands of mandays in maintainence work. It’s simple economy.</blockquote>
+1.
Some people don't want to consider software beyond the centrally managed repos,, but the truth is that central repos require a huge amount of labor to keep all projects and dependencies synchronized. By letting every project manage itself you loose some of the repo benefits, but you save so much work and it would seem logical for flatpak distros to have a competitive edge in terms of reducing maintainer overhead.
By: Alfman
In reply to <a href="https://www.osnews.com/story/140090/if-your-immutable-linux-desktop-uses-flatpak-im-going-to-have-a-bad-time/#comment-10441216">Morgan</a>.
Morgan,
<blockquote>As for Snap, that pile of horse manure can die a lonely painful death as far as I’m concerned. The harder Canonical pushes that trash, the more I dislike it. Their refusal to open source the Snap server speaks volumes...</blockquote>
I forgot to respond to this, but I agree completely. The stack not being completely open source is extremely unappealing.
By: Alfman
In reply to <a href="https://www.osnews.com/story/140090/if-your-immutable-linux-desktop-uses-flatpak-im-going-to-have-a-bad-time/#comment-10441216">Morgan</a>.
Morgan,
<blockquote>I don’t believe in banning any open source project from the public at large. Of course, any distro can decide for themselves what they will and won’t support, and I as an individual can choose what I want to use. I use Void Linux and while it does support Flatpak I don’t use it. The only application I need that Void doesn’t supply in the repos, Pinta, is available as a Flatpak but I prefer to build it myself even though that involves messing around with .NET/mono garbage. It’s worth the extra time and effort to avoid Flatpak’s themeing issues and bloat.</blockquote>
Some people want their distros to stick to repos. When repos have the right version of software need, it works out well. But I also understand the criticism of centralized repos and why a decentralized medium like flatpak can be important.
I installed OBS studio from debian repos and while it worked, all the plugins for it that I wanted to sideload/use are naturally built against the latest version. Installing the official flatpak managed by the official developers works quite well, much easier than building the project and managing the dependencies myself. I wouldn't be against building from source if everything just worked, but it gets so tedious and to be honest I've just grown tired of dependency hell so if I can find a way to avoid it I will.
I also had a similar experience with VLC. The repo version worked but was outdated. The flatpak version provided an easy path to the latest official version.
All the usual criticisms of flatpak apply, but it still seems to me that many will find the tradeoffs worth it anyway.
By: jarkkot
Having used linux as my main desktop os for 25 years, and not been that excited about flatpaks or snaps, I decided to try Aeon and installed it on my main machine month ago, as btrfs snapshots seemed interesting and good way to provide this immutable desktop or whatever you want to call it. And Im still running it, absolutely love it, and I think I will be running this for many years to come. Gnome desktop with all apps as flatpaks works very well, you get all the graphical applications and updates to them via gnome software center, that has good interface for discovering them. My main shell is tumbleweed container with distrobox, so I have all other bits I need, and that also works trouble free. Then I have one bookworm container for one graphical application needing that env, launcher exported via distrobox-export so it shows up in gnome shell, that also works flawlessly. Another build env for openwrt build stuff, all these switching is simple and can easily re-create if messing things up or want something else or start clean. So I think if you give something good chance and try it out, you might be surprised in good way. Big thanks to Aeon developers for great work and looking forward to improvements towards release.
Oh and what comes to language rant, my flatpak config lists en;fi by default.
By: Morgan
In reply to <a href="https://www.osnews.com/story/140090/if-your-immutable-linux-desktop-uses-flatpak-im-going-to-have-a-bad-time/#comment-10441173">fulgheri</a>.
I don't believe in banning any open source project from the public at large. Of course, any distro can decide for themselves what they will and won't support, and I as an individual can choose what I want to use. I use Void Linux and while it does support Flatpak I don't use it. The only application I need that Void doesn't supply in the repos, Pinta, is available as a Flatpak but I prefer to build it myself even though that involves messing around with .NET/mono garbage. It's worth the extra time and effort to avoid Flatpak's themeing issues and bloat.
As for Snap, that pile of horse manure can die a lonely painful death as far as I'm concerned. The harder Canonical pushes that trash, the more I dislike it. Their refusal to open source the Snap server speaks volumes, and is one of the reasons I avoid Ubuntu and Ubuntu based distros these days. As much as I like Pop!_OS, until it rebases on Debian or Fedora it's dead to me.
By: dsmogor
In reply to <a href="https://www.osnews.com/story/140090/if-your-immutable-linux-desktop-uses-flatpak-im-going-to-have-a-bad-time/#comment-10441178">Shifu</a>.
Flatpack (or similar environments) turns Linux from OS into a platform because it provides standardized application environment that eliminated human labour in integrating each application. It's not Linux in general (or Linux users) that love it, it's distribution maintainers and application developers, because it saves thousands of mandays in maintainence work. It's simple economy.
By: dsmogor
Hey Thom, I think this particular case is the distro failing to properly communicate its supported languages settings to flat pack engine. User shouldn't be expected to maintain that connection manually.
While having to make such links explicit is the "beauty" of sandboxed application environment, a distro that prides itself to support them shall do its job properly in that ragard and it clearly failed to do. I wouldn't put all the blame to flatpack.
By: Alfman
In reply to <a href="https://www.osnews.com/story/140090/if-your-immutable-linux-desktop-uses-flatpak-im-going-to-have-a-bad-time/#comment-10441178">Shifu</a>.
Shifu,
<blockquote>I don’t get the Linux world’s love of flatpck. It stupidly inefficient. Monster downloads, tied up bandwidth, and power wastage. Not everyone is on unmetered accounts either. It just doesn’t gel with ideal of lean, efficient computing. I’m very happy with my distro’s packaging endeavours and the only thing they don’t have I compiled myself using the provided instructions.</blockquote>
I get every one of your criticisms, however flatpak kind of exists to work around the critisisms of the centralized repos, which themselves have their own cons. Flatpak gives linux app installation capabilities closer to that of android/ios (both for better and for worse).
By: nico78
You don't need to use Flatpak if you don't want to. You can use distrobox to create an image of your choice (Ubuntu, Fedora, Alpine or whatever), install an application from the distros' repository and export it to the host via distrobox-export (https://github.com/89luca89/distrobox/blob/main/docs/usage/distrobox-export.md).
I've been using immutable distros for a while now and you need to do a little bit of research based on what you expect of a distribution and its goals.
I just wanted to post something useful instead of what I'm reading lately in the comments.
By: sukru
In reply to <a href="https://www.osnews.com/story/140090/if-your-immutable-linux-desktop-uses-flatpak-im-going-to-have-a-bad-time/#comment-10441195">colinstu</a>.
Yes, I can see them wanting more control.
According to:
https://www.zdnet.com/article/the-secret-origins-of-googles-chrome-os/
<blockquote>
That's not the end of the story though. While Gentoo's Portage is still used for package management in Chrome OS, sources say that today's Chrome OS "kernel is a regular upstream kernel plus our own changes. We don't pick up anything from Gentoo in that area." So, today's Chrome OS is based on Google's own take on the vanilla Linux kernel while Portage is still used for software package management.
</blockquote>
By: sukru
In reply to <a href="https://www.osnews.com/story/140090/if-your-immutable-linux-desktop-uses-flatpak-im-going-to-have-a-bad-time/#comment-10441190">sukru</a>.
Well,
They are a "free and open-source Linux distribution", and use the GNU runtime. But what would I know?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ChromiumOS
By: Titanius Anglesmith
One of my first experiences with Flatpak was when I installed Fedora and wanted to install dconf-editor, and I couldn't access the relevant settings because the application was sandboxed. I avoided flatpak for years after that.
On my Steam Deck I do love the convenience of Flatpak because so much is available and right now it does 'just work'. Getting flatpak games to launch through the Steam Deck UI is a bit of a hassle but it does work.
I'm not a huge fan of all the overhead, but as a way of making certain software works without being dependent on compatibility with the OS library versions... it does make some sense.