It's antithetical to pretty much everything about what we think of as a "Linux distro".
I would absolutely never run Ubuntu or install Snap because of this. I'll stick with Debian, thanks.
You can't really act like Microsoft with people that are using your OS because they ran away from Microsoft and expect them to shut up.
see https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/ubuntu-advantage-t...
It advertises some Commercial product by Canonical and /r/linux subreddit.
I use Linux because I can configure it to work the way I want. If they take that away, they are just another proprietary pile of shit.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linux_Mint
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fedora_Linux
Snap infestation is highest in Ubuntu - so I am planning to switch to some alternative (and due to other Canonical excesses like ads in CLI system tools).
My current candidates are Debian and Pop!OS.
How do you figure? It's all open source, you can easily see it on GitHub... I know Ubuntu hosts snaps on their servers, but every distro does that. What's the proprietary part?
There have been proof-of-concept server implementations by third parties, and some of those have been open-source. But IIRC none of them are maintained or used anywhere.
It could be worse, but at the end of the day it still just seems like a controlling, proto-monopolistic design compared to something like Flatpak, or to any traditional package management repos on Linux.
So fork it and change the code. This isn't the definition of "proprietary". There's still nothing stopping people from having their own snap store except a lil effort.
I expect better from 'open-source' in my personal computing life, and competitors seem happy to deliver it. If that makes me fussy, oh well.
IMO Debian is by far the saner distribution these days and there’s no reason at all to use Ubuntu for most people.
You mean Debian stable. But you have a choice, you can select testing or unstable, which gives you newer software.
There is no real need for "ancillary package managers", and all they do is complicate system maintenance.
Anyway, using Guix, Nix, or Flatpak is definitely a better idea than installing standalone debs for a different version of Debian than you're running, where it may be built against libraries that aren't part of your distro.
If you want to use the Debian package from Sid on Testing, better to rebuild it from source. openSUSE's public instance of the Open Build Service is a convenient way to manage keeping a repo for that up to date. But that definitely complicates system maintenance, too!
Only if you assume new bugs are better than old.
https://www.mozilla.org/en-GB/firefox/all/#product-desktop-r...
Can you please give an example of an application you needed available only as a snap?
Which might be fine! If that's the kind of system that works for you.
~$ firefox -v
Mozilla Firefox 102.5.0esr
I guess I don’t want up to date browsers.
When I install something through snap or flatpack, invariably it starts slower, has worse performance, is much more bloated and is generally a much more janky experience than just getting it from the apt repo. Snaps are the number one reason why I use popOS or mint over ubuntu.
My main gripe with Snap the last time I evaluated the system was that they will not let you disable automatic updates, as a matter of policy [1]
I do not know if this is still the policy 5 years later
[1] https://forum.snapcraft.io/t/disabling-automatic-refresh-for...
There are two main packaging systems for Linux that are well known and usable. You can also use standard config management software to roll out configs for each package. Snap is a solution in search for a problem by people who are too lazy to use standard packaging that has been in existence for decades.
Listen up kids: "New" is seldom "better" when it comes to system tools. Put your creativity to applications, not trying to reinvent the wheel with "new" packaging systems.
Snap is a bloated mess, and we wish is was not on any system we administer.