For me snap is good, but it could do better.
2 Likes
I detest it.
It litters my home directory with files. It is slow. So painfully slow. It's wasteful on memory and system resources. Literally the first thing I do after an install is to change the desktop to use the Traditional Panels, the second is to install what I need from the Welcome Center\Software boutique. Then I remove Snaps from my system.
I'd be much happier if there was a way to install Ubuntu without having Snaps on it in the first place.
5 Likes
I use it for things that arent available through the repository and at times to try new things so I don't have to pull in a bunch of dependencies, i guess I'm choosy I'll use it, but generally not if it's available in the same version in the repositories, I've used flatpaks and they're ok, but I'm not crazy over them
1 Like
There is, it is called Linux Mint Mate. I have moved one laptop there, but still have Ubuntu Mate on the other one. Which one I will ultimately go to depends how much snaps is forced on us by Ubuntu. While I don't like the Mint Mate Themes (I also hate Yaru), the Mate theme packages was there and I use the TraditionalOK theme. If you just looked at my two installations you wouldn't be able to tell them apart. Sometimes I even forget which one I am using.
The biggest reason I still stick with Ubuntu Mate is this forum. It is Mate centered, where Mint is Cinnamon centered and has Xfce too. The people here are nicer, knowledgeable, more helpful, and I like the format of the forum better too.
3 Likes
Overall, I'm pleased with the snaps that I use. I think of snaps as 2 different types.
The first takes a complicated setup and packages it in a snap which makes it easy to install and get running. A good example is Nextcloud server. You can get it as a snap or you can set it up manually. The snap packages the web server, database and PHP all set up and ready to go with a simple "sudo snap install nextcloud" and you are pretty much finished with the installation. Compare that with installing and configuring the individual components and you can see the advantage.
The second type of snap are applications such as Firefox and Shotcut, both of which I use and had used the non snap versions. In both cases when they first came out they were very slow to load the first time. Both were quickly sorted out within months and now I can't tell any performance difference.
On a perspective note, if publishing as a snap eases the developer's burden of having to track down compatibility bugs or code around version issues then I'm all for them. Having been a developer and a manager of developers I know that compatibility and versions are a headache that detracts from your primary interests and contributes to burnout.
2 Likes
Lefebvre's issues with the Jews aside, the previous times I downloaded LinuxMint and started a live session it was missing the Classic Menu so I gave it a pass. Have they relented on their incessant push to make MintMenu\BriskMenu the default launcher and allowed the traditional desktop look and feel for Mate?
Can't say I know anything about any developers political views. First I ever heard that. I use the classic menu, on both installations, and always have, so if it went away it must have come back before I installed Mint.
::sighs::
I guess it's time to download LinuxMint again to see if you're right.
Just to be sure we're talking about the same thing here, you're referring to this being available, right?
EDIT: To my surprise the Classic Menu was available on the system, so I went ahead and installed Mate-Tweak to set the panel themes the way I liked them. To my immense disappointment, trying to change panel themes resulted in....absolutely nothing happening. I don't know if it's something to do with being in a live environment or some change Linux Mint did to the system but I have no desire to fight them on keeping my preferred desktop between updates. I left behind such user hostile setups when I walked away from Microsoft and Apple.
So it's a half and half situation here. Yes the Classic Menu is an option but to use it you'll have to manually recreate all the panels and hope they stick around between updates.
1 Like
Keep positive @Basil_Cat (Firefox installation guide (Non snap)) will still be relevent once they fix and release the point release. 
https://ubuntu-mate.community/t/wonder-what-happen-to-um-22-04-1/25688/3
1 Like
The move to snap has made us scramble to look for another distro.
We had high hopes for Ubuntu-Mate, we installed 18.04 at 8 networked sites for some time now.
The fact that snap does not work for users that have a networked home location has stopped the full deployment to our users.
We are a non-profit medical Lab with several branches. The staff, log into any machine in the network to access information from any of our sites.
Looking for a replacement distro now.
Thank you for your support over the years, you have been a good alternative to Microsoft Windows, we are sorry to move on.
We wish you and your team all the best!
Dr.
3 Likes
Welcome @drhoule to the community!
1 Like
I've been trying Mint Mate, which is a lot like Ubuntu Mate. Also the standard Mate Themes area available in the repository, so you can make it look the familiar. The forum is not as good though. I still keep Ubuntu Mate on one laptop though, hoping the snap thing will get fixed.
2 Likes
I don't like snap, because I prefer having all my package management in one place, but it doesn't seem to have caused me any problems so far.
2 Likes
no issues at all. I bit the bullet when Firefox became a snap and gave up removing all snaps when installing Ubuntu MATE. I have really not noticed anything different save for the mount command which is almost useless now and too hard to read when all the snaps are 'mounted'... the speed issue for loading Firefox is not noticeable on my installation.
2 Likes
I removed snap. And yeah removing snapd even before installation ( squashfs and chroot are my friends) it works.
Firefox i take the tar.gz bundles and it just works.
3 Likes
Snaps work fine on Kubuntu 22.04 LTS and 22.10. No complaints with KDE’s Discover software store. Much better experience than Ubuntu proper. I no longer like GNOME. Linux Mint Cinnamon is my favorite and it doesn’t have Snaps by default. I was a big fan of Pop!_OS with no Snaps too but their were a few thing I started to dislike about GNOME’s notification tray. Hoping Ubuntu-MATE’s Debian only version is better. It won’t have Snaps by default!
Normally I don't use snaps (besides welcome/boutique) but there are some exceptions:
- If I want something in a sandbox/jail (like firefox)
- If I want something that is not available in repo or ppa
- If I want a 'static' softwarepackage completely independent of toolkit-du-jour or OS version.
- If I want to run a service temporarily that normally would be very complex/invasive as regular install.
Snaps do work without problem here.
Debian Mate maybe? It uses dpkg and deb and might work for users who have a networked home location.
Otherwise, try sparkylinux.
1 Like
I like Sparky Mate, but it is a semi-rolling distro, which might make a difference to some users.