I have found nothing that matches Software Boutique anywhere else. It was perfect. You could select all your software and have it installed with one click, all at once.
Has anyone found anything else that does this?
Such a shame it was dropped.
I use Synaptic for the purpose.
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Hi, @moggers and welcome to the Ubuntu MATE Community!
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True dat, but Synaptic basically assumes that you know most of the package or app names, in which case apt or apt-get is even better.
App Center in my somewhat limited experience with 24.04.3, is much better than the Boutique ever was for me. Perhaps the “apply all at once” was the root of the boutique problems, combined with the need to retype the root password on “big and slow” installations like Chrome.
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I use Synaptic as well! It is an indispensable tool!
However ... I love the concept of the "Software Boutique" as a mechanism to showcase "quality" software, helping those "window shoppers" to land with selections that, by "coralling" new users towards a more select set of tools, ensures larger User bases that motivates developers to "stick with it" and continue the evolution/improvement of those tools, for the benefit of the Community at large!
I believe a tool or service that offers a "curated" list of applications adapted to various fields of activity, incorporating at least a "vetting" of what is offered at large, possibly including a "Admin-recommended" label for some, in parallel with a sense of level of actual usage (I know this one is hard to measure/gauge), is indispensable as an attractant, and a selling point, for prospective Linux adopters looking to choose which Distro should become their landing pad!
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A plus for Software Boutique was that it was quality assured by the Ubuntu MATE Team (at the time) before each release. Everything in there was designed to present the "best in class" - especially users coming from elsewhere who might be looking for alternates.
I suppose users may not realise it never was a "full" software centre, but I guess if it existed today, it could plug in to the Ubuntu repositories (apt/deb), Snaps, maybe even Flatpaks...? (There was friction with that last one)
Code wise, it was not the best - me and @Wimpy would describe it as a "prototype gone production" - but it worked! There had been at least 2 attempts to reboot the project (years ago) but it is quite a task and never materialised. I didn't really like how snap distribution slowed the initial launch - but being a snap flexed some rules around its inclusion as a default app, because official flavours have rules of what can be preinstalled, especially if it uses third party repositories like it did.
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So, Luke,
- did the other Ubuntu flavours balk at the specific implementation?
or
- did they simply reject on the basis of NIHS (not-invented-here-syndrome)?
Did they not see the benefits of a facility like the "Software Boutique"?
Did none of the other flavours express any interest in the general concept?
Did anyone at Canonical fully think thru the benefits and implications of having this kind of "Wedge Capability" to pull in the disaffected from the Windows camp in a "somewhat" orderly manner which would create market potential for developers looking to offer Support Services for a category or a tool in particular?
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You can search by function to, say music player, video player, drawing program (sections too). I will say Synaptic is not the most intuitive and takes a bit to learn, but it is will worth the effort as it is the most powerul GUI apt tool available.
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I don't have the answers to that. It does seem today Ubuntu's welcome wizard shows icons for popular software for various audiences, available via snap. (for example: VS Code 
, GIMP 
, Audacity 
)
To clarify the "flexing" with snap: it meant that both 
Welcome and 
Software Boutique could be updated days before the final ISO is created 
... because it'll pull the latest 'stable' snap, of course. Kind of opening a hole to bypass the official "freeze" dates. 
It just allowed more quality assurance time for the curated listings, whereas as a regular Ubuntu package, uploads need approval or an exception.
Back in the earliest days, there was a manual "subscribe" button to add the ppa:ubuntu-mate-dev/welcome PPA like a workaround, because sometimes the curated software by third parties wasn't available until after release. Nothing worse for users then trying to install something but the repository or package name changed... or it disappears... or "Hey! Why can't I get X any more?". At the time, third party repositories (mostly from devs directly) usually had latest versions quicker then what was in the Debian/Ubuntu repositories.
I guess, strictly from a Debian philosophy, Software Boutique pulled in third party repositories, which could conflict with what's in the "tried & tested, trusted" official repositories. That has its risks too. Canonical's snaps addresses that by sandboxing and giving the developer the advantage of directly push updates quicker, all while not conflicting with the rest of the system. Maybe we were their inspiration, who knows?
I liked Software Boutique's approach too - I like the concept of repositories (with trust) and rather have one package system (debs) where everything integrates/runs native on the system, and was great for discovering software for specific purposes that integrate well with MATE.
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Can’t really say that i miss it, i always hated that thing… especially as a “new user”. Ubuntu Mate really only became useful for me when i figured out that i could just replace it with Gnome software instead.
these days i’m perfectly happy with the snap store, even though it’s quite buggy for me on Mate.
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