You choose whatever build system you like, create a single-line "install.sh" which runs some "apt install" command, and you are done -- things just work.
The main downsides are that packages are somewhat old, and that your users need the have the same distribution. But containers help a lot with the latter problem.
I hold to a very similar sentiment. I sold Bazel on my blog like this:
> Our builds will be pure functions from source to deployable. This will represent a durable evolution the software engineering field, and Bazel will become as essential as git and source control. Like git, we will often find it annoying. We will punch out comments about how it’s API is not quite right, or that it’s too hard to learn, and we will likely be right. But we will never suggest going back.[1]
Unfortunately Google is not throwing its weight behind Bazel enough to overcome Bazel's significant up-front costs. Maybe in time...
1. https://thundergolfer.com/build-systems/software-engineering...
Nope. It’s unfortunate that Bazel is written in Java. There is no overcoming that. You have to have been isolated at Google for years to be blind to that.
Edit: I suppose e.g. Debian is generally for binaries, but what I'm pretty sure source packages still work the same way? There's also Gentoo, and maybe Nix.