Ubuntu 20.04 LTS Beta Released

[ThanosApostolou]

choromium-snap doesn't work with plasma on focal currently and there hasn't been any integration work on it since November.
Unless that's fixed soonish, I'd imagine Kubuntu will have their own chromium-browser package which doesn't require snap.

Nope they cannot change it. chromium-browser deb package exists in official repositories but it just installs the snap package with hooks:

https://packages.ubuntu.com/search?suite=focal&keywords=chromium-browser

so no official ubuntu spin can override it.

Since this is an LTS release maybe they will be enough interest for someone to create a ppa for it. I'm guessing linux mint won't want to use snap packages so they'll probably build it in their repositories before mint 20 release, so grabbing the deb from there should be compatible with an ubuntu installation (but hard to keep it updated).

[Mez']

The Ubuntu team has done a pretty good job at hiding (what I consider as) the flawed Gnome design. I don't know for how long they will be able to do so.

Every Gnome release feels to me as more disappointing than the previous one.

Why on earth did Gnome add an extra step to suspend on the aggregate appindicator/menu!? It was a simple click (or click-hold-release for the no extension sect members) on an icon, and it's now buried in the power off/log out sub-menu.

Apparently, the Gnome team didn't have enough with the activities overview needing twice as much mouse movements as a dock, so they needed to mess with something else, just for fun. Every release, they seem to have quite the fun mocking their users. Ubuntu and other distros are trying to make up for it but boy this is a huge endeavor.

[Mez']

ppas do not generally offer official support. This can be a security risk, and doubly so when a web browser is concerned.

I've never had a problem in 15 years, and I don't actually care that much (for now) if it's a possible security risk.

Since Chromium is snap-only, I've removed it (it was a backup browser for Firefox) and replaced it with Chrome (as backup), which offers a good old easily manageable PPA. Snap or Flatpaks, thanks but no thanks.

[k1e0x]

I'm with 144 Hz on this one - snaps centralization (there is no possibility to change the URL of the upstream repository without recompiling the software and it explicitly doesn't support working with multiple repositories) makes it hostile to the open-source, federated approach. It's more similar to the Windows Store and Google Play store than it is to Flatpak

I think RedHat is really bad for the community. Convergence on one thing is not what open source is about. It's about choice..

But.. maybe I don't understand the issue.. I've never used Snap or Flatpak or anything else.. If I want an application I install it with the package manager or if that isn't possible I git pull it and build it from source. Why is that not good? Am I missing something here?

For me I'm very excited to see ZFS on root support in a LTS. ZFS is supported in Linux now till 2030, sorry if you don't like that.. you'll get over it.

(And truth is, it already was.. despite them crying about it all the time. If you pay RedHat enough money, even they will support ZFS)

[Iksf]

Like 3 comments to go to a systemd argument from a completely irrelevant topic, never change phoronix forums

[Britoid]

I think RedHat is really bad for the community. Convergence on one thing is not what open source is about. It's about choice..

But.. maybe I don't understand the issue.. I've never used Snap or Flatpak or anything else.. If I want an application I install it with the package manager or if that isn't possible I git pull it and build it from source. Why is that not good? Am I missing something here?

For me I'm very excited to see ZFS on root support in a LTS. ZFS is supported in Linux now till 2030, sorry if you don't like that.. you'll get over it.

(And truth is, it already was.. despite them crying about it all the time. If you pay RedHat enough money, even they will support ZFS)

You should try using Linux without any Red Hat code and see how far you get.

1) There is no ZFS support in Linux
2) Red Hat won't support ZFS at all, that's a bunch of hogwash. No one wants to be the next Oracle vs $TARGET.

[jo-erlend]

Yes, I totally agree with you. I would prefer if Ubuntu officially support and use flatpak instead of snap.

Flatpak cannot be used because it is designed to require a desktop and not all Linux users have a desktop system installed.

[jo-erlend]

It's more similar to the Windows Store and Google Play store than it is to Flatpak

Yes, it's very similar to Windows Store and Google Play except it's Free Software. In that sense, it's sort of like how Debian is just the same as Microsoft. But another way of saying that, is that Snap isn't similar to Windows Store and Google Play, because it's Free Software, in the same way that Debian isn't similar to Microsoft because they don't behave like Microsoft behaves and doesn't license its packages the way Microsoft licenses its software.

But disregarding licenses, culture and the general nature of the system, it's almost the same.

[vb_linux]

chromium-browser on Ubuntu is now snap only, so that's not really an option if you want to use it. They might make other apps snap-only as well in the future.

Well I don't use Chromium or Chrome. Brave is better Chromium. Offers privacy, offers hardware accerlation on linux. I have Nvidia 1080 card, and still Netflix, Youtube and HBO play with hardware acceleration. That is amazing.

[Viking73]

JensRex First step after installing Ubuntu is to get rid of apparmor which removes snapd as a reverse dependency: sudo apt purge apparmor && sudo rm -rf /etc/apparmor*

Sorry, this is off topic, but why would you want to remove Apparmor?