Fan of Flatpaks ...or Not?
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The issue I have with flatpaks is the size for most applications. It just doesn't make sense for me. Not that it's not useful and has it's purposes.
and has it’s purposes
Unlike that apostrophe.
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While I wouldn't want flakpak going deep into the OS I think the advantage of using them on the desktop is obvious. Developers can release to multiple dists from a single build and end users get updates and versions immediately rather than waiting for the dist to update its packages. Plus the ability to lock the software down with sandboxes.
The tradeoff is disk consumption but it's not really that big of a deal. Flatpaks are layered so apps can share dependencies. e.g. if the app is GNOME it can share the GNOME runtime with other apps and doesn't need to ship with its own.
FTFY: Flatpaks are layered so apps can share dependencies. e.g. if the app is GNOME 4.2.11.3 it can share the GNOME 4.2.11.3 runtime with other apps and doesn't need to ship with its own, but every app requires a different GNOME version anyway
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I seem to have constant issues with AppImages. Every single one I have currently won't open. I get an error message relating to either qT or GTK. Tried searching for the error and get a bunch of old forum threads talking about either not being compatible with Wayland at all, or comments stating that the one specific AppImage in question must have been "packaged badly". Thankfully, nothing 'mission critical' for me is an AppImage currently, but it is quite upsetting that I have the most problems with the supposed "just works" app packaging/distribution option.
Yeah that's why I'm a bit weary of switching to Wayland, so many apps still seem unsupported, or have issues, whereas on X11 everything for me just works. Plus, the two DE's I'd actually consider using either don't have Wayland support at all or have very early experimental support (Cinnamon and Xfce) so it'll still be a while for me before I am able to consider switching to Wayland, assuming everything else works.
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Size and gnome/GTK dependencies are main reasons why I don't use Flatpaks (I have nothing against gnome though, it just pulls in too much and KDE is worse in this regards, which is why I use Sway and River)
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saying it can happen in the AUR feels disingenuous to me when you consider how integrated the AUR is to the arch ecosystem. this is a genuine complaint from a user perspective and is an issue with the design philosophy imo. it is a special case but it’s so frequent as to be annoying, is my point.
not sure why everyone is replying like i’m unaware and totally ignoring the actual grievance i have. im very well aware of pacman and yay’s intended behaviors, i just think they’re shit in some cases. idk if people who say this have never tried to daily drive arch before or something but the AUR is absolutely not optional unless you want to constantly hand roll your own shit. see my edit to the original comment.
wrote on last edited by [email protected]Feyd did a pretty good job of outlining the AUR disclaimers in a different comment so I won't do that here. It's true that Arch won't stop you from shooting yourself in the foot, but again it's nuts to claim that routine compiling is the usual case for all rolling distros and belies your claim that you're familiar with usual case experience. There's absolutely no routine experience where you're regularly compiling.
I've used debian and apt-get most of my life, I've used arch on a pinetab 2 for about 6 months, regularly playing with pacman and yay and someone who's never met me is saying I'm a fanboy for being familiar with linux package management.
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But why is that?
Because the OBS developers say so.
And since I’m not on Ubuntu, I use the Flatpak version to get OBS as intended bey the OBS developers.
So its not the package formats issue, but your distribution packaging it wrong. Right?
Exactly. Most distributions fail hard when it comes to packaging OBS correctly. The OBS devs even threatened to sue Fedora over this.
https://gitlab.com/fedora/sigs/flatpak/fedora-flatpaks/-/issues/39#note_2344970813
I don't know what you are smoking, I've used OBS for years installed from the AUR with zero problems...
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Yeah that's why I'm a bit weary of switching to Wayland, so many apps still seem unsupported, or have issues, whereas on X11 everything for me just works. Plus, the two DE's I'd actually consider using either don't have Wayland support at all or have very early experimental support (Cinnamon and Xfce) so it'll still be a while for me before I am able to consider switching to Wayland, assuming everything else works.
I don't actually know if it is a Wayland issue - most of those forum posts are like 3 years old... And I have definitely used these same AppImages in the past on Wayland without issue. I think the AppImages are expecting some specific dependency to be installed on my system that is no longer installed due to updates. (which I thought was counter to the entire point of an AppImage? I thought it was supposed to be kinda like Flatpak where it has it's dependencies in the image? Maybe I just misunderstood AppImage...)
To give you some hope, my Distro switched to Wayland as default a little over a year ago (i think) and I have not been running into problems (outside this AppImage problem, if it is indeed a Wayland issue, which I cannot confirm or deny).
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I need OBS on this new computer!
Let's install the flatpack!
V4l problems
Plugins Problems
Wayland Problems
I'm just going back to the .deb, thanks.
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I need OBS on this new computer!
Let's install the flatpack!
V4l problems
Plugins Problems
Wayland Problems
I'm just going back to the .deb, thanks.
Flatpak being securely sandboxed by default is both its biggest strength and its worst point of contention. The XDG is still scrambling to replicate the permission requests paradigm from Android on the Linux desktop. -
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Not a fan for a few reasons. Flathub (as far as I know) works on the app store model where developers offer their own builds to users, which is probably appealing to people coming from the Windows world who view distros as unnecessary middlemen, but in the GNU/Linux world the distro serves an important role as a sort of union of users; they make sure the software works in the distro environment, resolve breakages, and remove any anti-features placed in there by the upstream developers.
The sandboxing is annoying too, but understandable.
Despite this I will resort to a flatpak if I'm too lazy to figure out how to package something myself.
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The quoted image does not say so, they do not say the native packaging from your distribution is borderline unusable. That judgement was added by YOU. The devs just state the package on Archlinux is not officially supported, without making a judgement (at least in the quoted image).
As for the Fedora issue, that is a completely different thing. That is also Flatpak, so its not the package format itself the issue. Fedora did package the application in Flatpak their own way and presented it as the official product. That is a complete different issue! That has nothing to do with Archlinux packaging their own native format. Archlinux never said or presented it as the official package either and it does not look like the official Flatpak version.
So where does the developers say that anything that is not their official Flatpak package is "borderline unusable"?
The quoted image does not say so
It does exactly say so. Flatpak is the only supported and official method of installation when you’re not using Ubuntu.
As for the Fedora issue, that is a completely different thing. That is also Flatpak, so its not the package format itself the issue.
Exactly. And the Flatpak version from Fedora was unusable.
So where does the developers say that anything that is not their official Flatpak package is “borderline unusable”?
They don’t. It’s just unsupported.
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I'm a big fan of the idea of sandboxed apps. Flatpak is not great as it compromises sandboxing for compatibility (both with distros and apps) and also it's quite stagnant now. But there are no other options anyway, so I use it.
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This post did not contain any content.wrote on last edited by [email protected]
Enter the calm and quiet room
Pass out torches and pitchforks, guns and knives
“Snaps exist”
War erupts.
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I "grew up" with Slackware, so I definitely understand the dependency issue.
I like flatpaks (and similar) for certain "atomic" pieces of software, like makemkv. For more "basic" software, like, say, KDE, I want it installed natively.
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I use Aurora DX so most of my apps are flatpaks. Its fine.
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Enter the calm and quiet room
Pass out torches and pitchforks, guns and knives
“Snaps exist”
War erupts.
SNAP BAD
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Just another tool in the toolbox. Use it or not, up to the user. I've even seen Slackware users who say they use Flatpak to ward off dependency rabbit holes.
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The one "good" thing about containers is that you keep your DLL-like mess localized. Just one or a few related apps run in the container and if they want / need some weird library version, they can have it without breaking other things.
Yeah but that’s a huge benefit already. I am not savvy enough in the development side to know whether that’s a reward that justifies any of the frustrations people have. Personally I don’t really mind varying methods to do any one job, as long as it’s well-documented, easily managed, and does not create a higher load on the system in any respect.
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Yeah but that’s a huge benefit already. I am not savvy enough in the development side to know whether that’s a reward that justifies any of the frustrations people have. Personally I don’t really mind varying methods to do any one job, as long as it’s well-documented, easily managed, and does not create a higher load on the system in any respect.
I view the delays during launch and the extra time spent during updates as a "load on the system."
Also, it entirely depends on your deployment environment. I develop system images that go out on thousands of devices deployed in "Cybersecuity Sensitive" environments, meaning: we have to document what's on the system and justify when anything in the SBOM (list of every software package installed on the machine) is identified as having any applicable CVEs... soooo.... keeping old versions of software anywhere on the machine is a problem (significant additional documentation load) for those security audits. Don't argue with logic, these are our customers and they have established their own procedures, so if we want their money, we will provide them with the documentation they demand, and that documentation is simplest when EVERYTHING on the system has ALL the latest patches.
The most secure systems are those that don't do anything at all. You can't hack a brick.
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Size and gnome/GTK dependencies are main reasons why I don't use Flatpaks (I have nothing against gnome though, it just pulls in too much and KDE is worse in this regards, which is why I use Sway and River)
Naw fuck gnome and fuck GTK. Over invasive and controlling crapware.
