[HN Gopher] KDE and GNOME seeks $100k to turn Flathub into a Sto...
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KDE and GNOME seeks $100k to turn Flathub into a Store for the
Linux desktop
Author : evasb
Score : 119 points
Date : 2023-02-23 21:22 UTC (1 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (github.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (github.com)
| Octabrain wrote:
| I like Flatpak. I've even flatpaked some apps and made them
| available on Flathub. The only thing that dissapoints me is the
| fact that it integrates poorly with CLI apps.
|
| Off topic: An idea that came to my mind a few days ago is that
| would have been great to add support for desktop apps to Podman
| by adding some extension or plugin capabilities to it instead of
| creating a new whole technology. Probably a silly idea though.
| sys42590 wrote:
| Flathub could become the killer "app" for the Linux desktop. No
| need to juggle dependencies and third party repos. The software
| you need in an instant.
| heywhatupboys wrote:
| >relevant xkcd comic on standards inserted here
| tombert wrote:
| I agree that it is "yet another standard", but I gotta say
| that Flatpak is pretty sweet, and does actually do a good job
| of making "one package manager to rule them all".
|
| I think part of the problem with a lot of "selling stuff on
| Linux" has been mucking around with different dependencies
| for the thousand different versions of Linux.
|
| Historically, this has led to a couple solutions: either a)
| Just officially support _one_ distro (usually Ubuntu), or b)
| just don 't release a Linux version.
|
| Flatpak has actually succeeded in making a system that kind
| of works everywhere, and I think it actually has a shot of
| being an equivalent to the Mac App Store.
| pmontra wrote:
| As a web developer currently working on a Debian laptop I
| don't know which software I would want to buy if I was
| using Windows or a Mac. Everything I was using for free to
| do this job with Windows in 2008 was also available on
| Linux for free, that's why I moved to Ubuntu in 2009. I
| never had to buy any software in all these years but maybe
| my use cases are pretty simple.
| input_sh wrote:
| > and I think it actually has a shot of being an equivalent
| to the Mac App Store.
|
| This I agree with, but not this:
|
| > and does actually do a good job of making "one package
| manager to rule them all".
|
| That's not its goal. There are no terminal apps in it, so
| everyone that wants to run custom packages from a terminal
| is still going to need something like apt/dnf/homebrew.
| PlutoIsAPlanet wrote:
| Flatpak is actually made by the same groups of people who
| make these open source DEs, as well as the various open
| source stacks we use on the desktop, it's had the advantage
| that it's integration into the desktop is decent and quite
| cool (hello pipewire).
|
| Regardless of your opinions of GNOME and KDE, it's hard to
| argue Flatpak has anything but good intentions, it's made
| by people who want the Linux desktop to be better
| Slighted wrote:
| Uh no, I wouldn't even hand over a penny to the GNOME project.
| xen2xen1 wrote:
| $100,000 to build up a system that totally ignores the system
| package manager? Sounds great!
| Gigachad wrote:
| Good. The "system package manager" is good for updating the OS,
| it's not good for packaging desktop applications, especially
| proprietary ones.
|
| If you use the gnome Software app, it merges flatpak, dnf, and
| the firmware updater in one "updates" page with a single button
| to update it all.
| c-hendricks wrote:
| I don't even know what I get out of the system package
| manager these days. Apps are mostly flatpak / appimages, dev
| tools I'm using Homebrew.
|
| I guess it's mostly the kernel and my DE these days.
| alerighi wrote:
| Having two ways to update the system doesn't either seem
| great to me. Having the same software that can be installed
| from two sources neither.
|
| Also as far as I remember flatpack is something more complex
| than a simple package format, it has a runtime where each
| application runs in an isolated container where it can access
| only some of the resources (e.g. the filesystem). This adds
| to me useless complications to a system.
|
| I think that the best approach to the integration of third
| party software is the one followed by ArchLinux, that is the
| AUR: a series of build instructions, maintained by the
| community, that allow you to package practically any piece of
| software that exists.
| crispinb wrote:
| That very incoherence is probably why it rarely works.
| Gigachad wrote:
| I completely know what you are talking about, I'm used to
| the Software app virtually never working, although I came
| back a few months ago and it all seemed to be working
| perfectly fine. So perhaps there have been some major
| improvements in this space. At any rate, the problem is not
| unsolvable, it was mostly just bad UX where underlying
| errors were not surfaced and the app would get stuck in an
| endless loading spinner.
| crispinb wrote:
| > the problem is not unsolvable
|
| Perfectly true, and my comment was the kind of irritated
| snark about imperfect open source software that I don't
| like hearing from other people! It just so happened that
| I had launched Software literally about 5 minutes
| previously for the first time in months and it .. sat
| there and did nothing.
|
| I do think it's a good idea though, at least while we
| have this hopefully transitional period of multiple
| overlapping packaging/update systems. I get a bit tired
| of having to think in terms of flatpack and dnf and asdf
| and cargo and pnpm and .. not to mention all the odd bits
| and pieces I install & compile from source and forget to
| update.
| jug wrote:
| A Flatpak proponent would tell you that's the whole point. But
| that's not where the cost lies, but staffing and running a
| store.
| eikenberry wrote:
| The system package manager is useful for updating the
| underlying system, not necessarily the user's environment.
| Think of it as a in the classic root/user divide. The system
| package manager is there for updating the core system and
| things like flatpaks/toolboxes are there for the users. They
| don't follow the same updating patterns so it makes sense to
| keep them separate.
| freedomben wrote:
| I haven't been the biggest fan of flatpak and generally wish
| software would either be packaged as an rpm or an AppImage, but
| the OP makes a pretty strong case for why it's a good idea
| (because existing options are too niche, and have no ability to
| incentivize developers who need to get paid for their work. This
| leads to Linux desktop having far fewer applications available to
| them compared to windows and mac.)
|
| I do hope the command-line UX around flatpaks (installing,
| updating, etc) improves a lot though as currently it leaves much
| to be desired.
| snshn wrote:
| [flagged]
| znpy wrote:
| love to see flatpak flourishing, it's really great.
|
| i like it because it actually solves problem (getting proprietary
| software like slack) instead of creating ones and/or getting in
| the way (i'm looking at you snap).
| winrid wrote:
| how much to add thumbnails to the file picker?
| [deleted]
| eptcyka wrote:
| GTK4 is getting them.
| awill wrote:
| It's not GTK4, it's nautilus
| PlutoIsAPlanet wrote:
| The recent GTK4 release added them to the file picker.
|
| Apparently changes in GTK4 made it easier to add
| gp wrote:
| Looks like there has been some progress on this front -
| https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/gtk/-/commit/b0f65ead84c1ecd5...
| moojacob wrote:
| It has been fixed in GNOME 44.
| throw_m239339 wrote:
| I had to use flatpack to install Bottles, I'm on Porteus because
| it's the only distrib I found that would fit on a 15 year old
| 512MB USB stick and then in the RAM directly... Let just say it
| wasn't a seamless experience but I'm glad I managed to run
| Cinema4D R20 or MPC Software with Bottles without too many bugs.
| Anyway Bottles is just fantastic, I tried Wine before but it
| never worked properly, but having to install a package manager
| (flatpack) on top of another one (slackpkg) just felt absurd...
|
| What about appimage instead, like Krita? To me it's sounds like
| the best way to distribute a linux app in 202X...
|
| Managing to make things run on Linux gives a sense of
| accomplissement, at the same time, I can understand why most
| people won't move to Linux anytime soon given all the complexity
| involved... or it's just me and there was an easier way to
| install flatpack at first place?
| cld8483 wrote:
| AppImage is great, definitely the best of the bunch.
| PlutoIsAPlanet wrote:
| Said no one relevant
|
| AppImage solves the packaging problem in a bad way (ugh,
| loopback mounts), but does not solve the dependency problem,
| try run AppImages compiled for Ubuntu on Fedora..
| cld8483 wrote:
| > _Said no one relevant_
|
| [Retort insult.]
| synergy20 wrote:
| maybe it's indeed time to let the system package
| management(apt,rpm,etc) just manage a solid BASE system, and let
| Flatpak etc to manage their own application sandboxes on top,
| kind of like dockers.
|
| Appimage is macos flavor, it never needs your sudo to install the
| package, which is nice.
|
| Flatpak is a redhat flavor(kind of), it needs sudo sometimes, but
| OK.
|
| Snap is a ubuntu flavor(kind of), it is like systemd that can
| overtake the whole system, it can install package and even the
| whole system I was told, too much as a package manager for me.
|
| I don't use Snap. Appimage is not as widely adopted as the rest
| two? I think Flatpak is a great middle ground.
|
| It will be really cool if KDE and Gnome work together to build
| this.
| Liquix wrote:
| Opinions on Flatpaks/snaps notwithstanding, it's encouraging to
| see KDE and GNOME collaborating on projects like this. IMO
| desktop GNU/Linux has benefited greatly from moving away from
| offering LXDE/LXQT/Mate/Enlightenment/Cinammon flavors and
| towards a more digestible subset (GNOME only, GNOME/KDE/XFCE,
| etc) of polished desktop environments. Pipe dream, but it would
| be incredible to see all of the passionate, talented folks
| working together on one definitive GNU/Linux DE.
| sureste wrote:
| > LXDE/LXQT/Mate/Enlightenment/Cinammon
|
| Of these, I would say that Cinnamon is one that could be
| comparable to XFCE or even GNOME and KDE. Seriously, it's good.
| The system settings menu has all of the options one could need
| and the look and feel of the dektop is very customizable.
|
| I'm a KDE user, but if it ever stopped working/disappeared I
| would use Cinnamon. In fact I plan to use it whenever KDE
| Plasma 6 releases to wait out until the it becomes more stable.
| themodelplumber wrote:
| I'd prefer to see more easily-communicated DE standards and
| published levels of adherence, rather than moving to the uni-
| desktop.
|
| Like if you want to select a desktop and are kind of new to
| desktop environments, maybe aim for the (imaginary example
| here) DE-5 level of standards-adherence. DE-4 and lower might
| suck in various ways even though they could have cool new
| features.
|
| There are way too many benefits from the huge variety of DE
| approaches, including the benefit that Linux-critics often hide
| behind critique of a single desktop experience, which is lazy
| and attempts to steal focus from exactly this open, creative,
| diverse approach that is the jewel in the Linux ecosystem's
| metaphorical crown.
|
| It's definitely great to see the groups working together on
| these projects that benefit everybody.
| derefr wrote:
| > I'd prefer to see more easily-communicated DE standards and
| published levels of adherence, rather than moving to the uni-
| desktop.
|
| What's the difference? If everything works perfectly with
| everything else, and the standards adherence is so high that
| you can't tell the difference which apps are from which
| organization, then how is that not a "unified DE"?
| reilly3000 wrote:
| I really think you are into something here. Some simple
| rating and standard icon would help users differentiate
| quickly. I know and love distrowatch and the rest, but it's
| definitely inaccessible for most beginners and hard to
| discover what the best fit is for me.
| jacooper wrote:
| I think that's what Freedesktop does, and why Flatpak heavily
| relies on XDG variables.
| themodelplumber wrote:
| Where is this chart for levels in Freedesktop? I'm only
| vaguely familiar with the project.
| JohnFen wrote:
| This fills me with dread. I don't think the app stores we've seen
| have been good things for a number of reasons.
|
| I hope, if this succeeds, it turns out to be a good thing.
| jacooper wrote:
| Unlike google play and apple's appstore and canonical's Snap,
| flatpak isn't limited to a single repo, apps from other repos
| will show up in the store ui just like any other app.
| JohnFen wrote:
| Yes, I understand that. That is orthogonal to my opinion of
| app stores, though.
| mastazi wrote:
| I'm an Ubuntu user and the first thing I always do in a new
| system is removing the Ubuntu Store, completely removing snapd,
| and installing the Flathub Store.
| fl0ps wrote:
| Here here! In answer to a below question, I use Ubuntu because
| of the number of sdks that mainly support Ubuntu but don't
| require the Ubuntu Store (which I personally find annoying).
| Also I like Synaptic. Though imperfect it's far less annoying,
| feeling less like a "curated experience" and more like a tool
| that's trying to get out of my way and let me work.
| mesebrec wrote:
| Honest question; why do you still use Ubuntu then?
|
| By now, Snap is such a fundamental part of Ubuntu that it begs
| the question whether Ubuntu is right for you if you want to
| avoid it. Why not use a derivative or upstream that makes
| different choices?
| dmonitor wrote:
| I use it mostly out of ignorance, but also because I'm fairly
| used to aptitude as a packet manager and kubuntu has a pretty
| solid distribution put together.
| awill wrote:
| agreed. Ubuntu are trying to hard to differentiate
| themselves, and it usually just hurts them. I'm guessing
| they'll drop snap in the future and blame the industry (like
| they did with systemd and wayland)
| cld8483 wrote:
| Ubuntu is an African word which means "Afraid of Debian"
|
| Seriously though, just install Debian. It's not hard, the
| netinstaller may be text-mode but it walks you through the
| simple steps one by one just like Ubuntu's GUI installer.
| Anybody who's comfortable using Ubuntu in the first place
| should be able to get through the Debian installer just fine.
| jacooper wrote:
| If you are using Ubuntu Pro(free or not) Debian isn't
| really an alternative. Also I am not sure if Debian is as
| fast as Canonical in patching CVEs.
|
| I like Debian, but after (free)Ubuntu pro, it really became
| attractive for me as a small server operator, its even
| better than free RHEL.
| mastazi wrote:
| GP here. I use some tools that are Ubuntu specific. But I
| might look at Ubuntu derivatives such as Pop or Mint. As I
| said in my other comments, these are desktop/HTPC machines
| so, it's not as straight forward to change distro as it
| would be with a server.
| aaomidi wrote:
| If you're using desktop, then honestly look into fedora or
| arch (EndeavourOS). I really am not sure why Ubuntu is
| still being used. I know it's the main thing people
| recommend but it is awful for day to day desktop use due to
| its release cadence and holding packages back.
| yamtaddle wrote:
| 95% of "here's how to fix that braindead default that's
| giving you troule" or "here's what that misleading error
| message means and how to fix it" how-tos or whatever, for
| servers, are written either for Ubuntu or Red Hat (and
| friends) and sometimes the exact same steps won't work
| even on Debian. 3rd party commercial software often
| supports only Ubuntu or Red Hat, and you're on your own
| if you use it on something else. I've never liked RPM-
| based distros and specifically dislike Red Hat as a
| company, so, Ubuntu it is.
|
| (For work, where I just want something that won't make me
| "the asshole who chose [non-standard thing]". I prefer
| Void or FreeBSD or, sometimes, Debian, for my own stuff)
|
| [EDIT] Oh, right, specifically for desktop? Yeah, I'd go
| Void or Arch probably. Buuuuuut if it were for work, I'd
| just use Ubuntu, even on the desktop, so it wouldn't be
| _my_ fault when it misbehaves.
| harry8 wrote:
| One reason is 3rd party software. Frequently there is a deb
| compatible with the last couple of ubu LTS releases. Seems
| like more frequently than Debian stable releases? There's
| always things you don't like, are not distro packaged, but
| have to install for reasons to get work done to get paid.
| Xilinx vivado being the first example for me that springs
| to mind but I'm sure there are others and I'm sure I don't
| know what the next one will be yet. I _feel_ like when it
| crops up ubu LTS is a better bet than debian stable. I 'd
| love to be shown to be wrong about that.
|
| Running with the crowd has some advantages. Many feet
| passing on the path before you trample more bugs before you
| get there etc.
|
| For anyone looking to use debian I highly recommend it and
| prefer it to any other distro.
| XorNot wrote:
| Ubuntu packages get updated on a much faster cadence then
| Debian in my experience.
| JohnFen wrote:
| By design, yes. Debian prioritizes stability over being
| on the cutting edge. If you always want the latest and
| greatest, Debian isn't the right distro for you.
| cld8483 wrote:
| Debian Sid makes a pretty good "rolling release" distro
| for home/hobby use at least, although I prefer OpenSUSE
| Tumbleweed for this.
| metadat wrote:
| Is this still true today? 15 years ago it was a different
| story, but nowadays I haven't noticed a difference in
| update cadence between the two.
|
| Edit: I just checked for the classic case of latest
| Python (3.11), and the answer for Debian is to build from
| source, which is annoying (not difficult to compile, but
| then future updates can't be pulled in via apt). Does
| Debian not have a vibrant PPA community to fill the gaps
| like Ubuntu?
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31643316
| Barrin92 wrote:
| I don't personally remove snaps but if I did I'd still use
| Ubuntu for the sole reason that it is somehow the only distro
| that gets fonts right. I don't know what it is but on every
| other linux distribution font rendering looks horrible, and I
| could never figure out how to reliably fix it.
| mastazi wrote:
| Honestly just inertia. Those are not servers where you could
| easily migrate to another distro taking advantage of infra-
| as-code tools, they are a desktop and a HTPC. I have
| accumulated a lot of custom dotfiles and scripts over time,
| not all of them would work in another distro unchanged.
|
| Removing Snap is not that hard, the "hardest" part is making
| sure that Firefox is installed from the Mozilla PPA and even
| that takes just a moment once you have the script saved
| somewhere.
|
| By the way I had a look at some Ubuntu derivatives like PopOS
| or Mint and I might take the plunge at some point.
| A4ET8a8uTh0 wrote:
| I get where you are coming from, but my first attempt at
| setting up nextcloud was with a snap and it made the experience
| a lot less challenging to a newbie ( though these days, I would
| likely not do it that way ). What is the benefit of flathub
| over ubuntu store?
| gjsman-1000 wrote:
| The fact that Flatpak supports multiple repositories whereas
| Snap only works with Canonical's store. This is because the
| open-source Snap utility on your Ubuntu install doesn't
| support adding other repositories; and the server it talks to
| is closed-source and undocumented. (Oh, and don't get
| brilliant ideas with DNS redirection in your head, there's
| digital signing, which means the only way to get Snap to
| accept other Stores is with a full recompile.)
|
| As for Flathub _itself_ , it's like the Snap Store... but you
| aren't locked in, and the backend is open-source, and it's
| not directly owned by a distribution maker (even though it is
| definitely closer-in-kindred with the Fedora Project), which
| makes it far more palatable to people with even a modicum of
| understanding of the Linux and FOSS philosophy.
|
| I harassed them _nearly 6 years ago_ about this.
| https://forum.snapcraft.io/t/external-repositories/1760
| fooker wrote:
| Maybe Valve could fund them?
|
| Anyone have the connections to make this happen?
| PlutoIsAPlanet wrote:
| I believe Valve already makes contributions to Flatpak and its
| backend container stack, bubble wrap.
|
| Valve actually uses bubble wrap on the Steam deck for proton.
| jdoss wrote:
| I used to think Flatpaks were a huge pain the butt, but over the
| last few years, I moved to using them for all third party
| software that I run on my Fedora Linux workstation. Zoom, Slack,
| Spotify, Steam, Discord, Obsidian all run without issues and they
| get consistent updates. I am convinced now that they are one of
| the best ways to ship commercial software on to Linux desktop.
| Flatpak has been a key part of me becoming 100% Windows free for
| my PC gaming. Not having to run a desktop KVM to switch between
| my work workstation and my Gaming PC has been super great.
| silisili wrote:
| I really like the idea.
|
| I think the only issue I ever had with them was the inability
| to inject files inside. Do you know if that's possible?
|
| I was trying to use a browser, I think Vivaldi, that had
| instructions for enabling widevine by copying a file to a
| certain directory, but I couldn't find a clean way to do so.
| jchw wrote:
| One big tricky thing is plugins, such as for OBS. ABI
| incompatibility and sandboxing can make it tricky and confusing
| for end users. Flatpak itself could theoretically provide
| answers here.
| Entinel wrote:
| I use Fedora and this is how I use Flatpak as well. Some
| software does have some problems when used through Flatpak. I
| vaguely recall Blender's Flatpak version having some issues. I
| would also like to see more transparency with who is publishing
| the Flatpak on Flathub. Maybe I'm just dumb but it is not
| immediately obvious to me who the publisher is and whether or
| not this is an officially supported Flatpak application.
| idonotknowwhy wrote:
| So these integrate well now? I normally just use AUR for
| everything now, and remember having issues with a flatpak for
| rpcs3 a few years ago, ended up compiling from src
| yamtaddle wrote:
| Last I tried all three of the semi-popular formats like this,
| AppImage was the only one that didn't feel fundamentally
| _wrong_ (though what I gather was the closest thing to an
| official repository for them looked sketchy as hell--somehow
| they copied the exact CSS _vibe_ as a content-scraped
| StackOverflow spam site). But that was a couple years ago. I
| know Snaps still suck, but haven 't messed with Flatpacks since
| then, so maybe they're better now.
| Darmody wrote:
| Meanwhile Ubuntu is making sure that none of its flavours has
| flatpak installed by default.
|
| Smells like that old MS attitude to me.
| wetpaws wrote:
| Why the hell do you need store when you have pacman/AUR
| Grimburger wrote:
| How do I sell my software on pacman?
| Gigachad wrote:
| I'm not sure people will ever want to sell apps on a 3rd
| party store. Especially a Linux one. The entire industry has
| moved away from buying things directly on a single
| marketplace and moved to tying a payment or subscription to
| an account which works across OSs and store platforms.
|
| I'd be happy to pay for Linux software but there is no way
| I'd want to be tied to a particular distro/repo/storefront.
| Grimburger wrote:
| That's fair but some companies do want to sell their
| software and it's not particularly easy on Linux platforms.
|
| There's basically Steam or DIY.
| skeaker wrote:
| User adoption, I guess
| freedomben wrote:
| The OP answers that question pretty throughly. Because pacman
| is niche and distro-specific and largely distro-controlled, and
| has no ability to incentivize developers who need to get paid
| for their work. This leads to Linux desktop having far fewer
| applications available to them compared to windows and mac.
| eikenberry wrote:
| Because traditional packages are running out of steam. IMO
| people want a stable (not changing) underlying OS with a
| dynamic set of frequently updating applications on top. Arch
| nails the second part but completely fails on the first. Debian
| nails the first but fails on the second. Something new is
| needed.
| dimaor wrote:
| I'm not sure if PopOs uses flathub by default for its PopShop,
| but I've always had some issues with it and they prevented me
| from using it and directly using flatpak CLI.
|
| - I don't know how to see running logs by default (if it's
| possible even) and it's a must when you have slow internet -
| sometimes it just hangs and I need to kill (probably leaving
| residue along the way)
|
| hopefully my issues are my own OR it will get resolved as well.
|
| other than that flatpak is amazing.
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(page generated 2023-02-23 23:00 UTC)