this post was submitted on 11 Jul 2023
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I am currently using Linux Mint (after a long stint of using MX Linux) after learning it handles Nvidia graphics cards flawlessly, which I am grateful for. Whatever grief I have given Ubuntu in the past, I take it back because when they make something work, it is solid.

Anyways, like most distros these days, Flatpaks show up alongside native packages in the package manager / app store. I used to have a bias towards getting the natively packed version, but these days, I am choosing Flatpaks, precisely because I know they will be the latest version.

This includes Blender, Cura, Prusaslicer, and just now QBittorrent. I know this is probably dumb, but I choose the version based on which has the nicer icon.

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I have been for awhile. It also all exists in my home directory, so when I format my root and throw a different OS on, all my flatpaks are ready to go without installing any native packages. It's just a more consistent experience using flatpaks.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (10 children)

Whoa. I had not considered backing Home that way! That is slick.

Honestly, reinstalling or moving to a new distro is such a bear precisely due to the time setting up my environment and all the software. I KNOW I can script all this, or at least have a list of packages I use, but it does not really work when different package managers use different naming schemes.

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

I'd rather have 5GB of binaries than deal with unmet dependencies one more time (despite many people claims, it is still easy to fall into), my only criticism for flatpak though, is that any kind of modification for a file requires you to navigate through at least ten directories.

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I haven't used any flatpacks, mostly because they don't seem to have a good solution for running terminal programs. (Also I don't like that the application developer chooses the permissions to expose rather than the user.

However, I have been using bubblewrap which is what flatpack uses under the hood to sandbox. This allows me to run both gui and non-gui programs, and I have the control of exposing the minimum required permissions that I'm comfortable giving an untrusted piece of software.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

I will be honest and reveal my naivete about the permissions. I don't really mess with permission for any program, but I can see how some defaults may be bad.

I will look into bubble wrap, since the sandboxing is important, but the sheer convenience and availability of software is what is appealing.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (3 children)

Flatpaks are my second choice when there isn't a recent enough version in the repos. They're fine but take 1. too much storage space, and 2. are usually slower

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (2 children)
[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago
[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago
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