I think a unified package manager/app store model that is vetted by all contributing distros would go a long way. SteamOS/Steam deck is bringing gamers to linux and that’s great. But it would be easier to bring on a lot more desktop users if there was an app store that every distro could visit. Flatpak is close, snaps however I think are too polarizing.
despite my xkdc smartassedness I would love to see something that made an easy to do thing like this for linux https://portableapps.com/ there are some close things but not quite so easy.
I disagree. Each distro is a user of a thousand different open source systems. When a distro developer integrates gnome, systemd, bluez, or whatever other system they’re finding, reporting, and possibly fixing bugs that end users might miss. Other than arch users, who else is compiling these things from scratch and really digging into the documentation?
That kinda is his point. A distro maintainer patching and distributing a thousand packages is duplicitous. Especially when the only real difference to the user is the DE. Putting those efforts upstream is a better use of resources. I develop software, and I’m not going to test a million different distros especially when the difference between Ubuntu and Zorin is a DE and some additional packages. It makes Linux users very mad, but the reality is that they are too fractured to support every distro they use equally.
The primary thing that makes FOSS popular is that you can fork it. You’re saying that people need to not do the main thing it’s designed to be able to do!
We need fewer distros and more focus on things that matter.
you are free to not make distros
Damn, those silly volunteers are doing the wrong things in their free time!
You’re right. I will start a new distro that focuses on the the things that matter.
Man, I laughed so hard at this one
I think a unified package manager/app store model that is vetted by all contributing distros would go a long way. SteamOS/Steam deck is bringing gamers to linux and that’s great. But it would be easier to bring on a lot more desktop users if there was an app store that every distro could visit. Flatpak is close, snaps however I think are too polarizing.
https://xkcd.com/927/
You’re 100% right that this is a danger of attempting to consolidate
despite my xkdc smartassedness I would love to see something that made an easy to do thing like this for linux https://portableapps.com/ there are some close things but not quite so easy.
I disagree. Each distro is a user of a thousand different open source systems. When a distro developer integrates gnome, systemd, bluez, or whatever other system they’re finding, reporting, and possibly fixing bugs that end users might miss. Other than arch users, who else is compiling these things from scratch and really digging into the documentation?
Us weird debian testing users.
Gentoo users? Void users?
They’d still be doing that.
That kinda is his point. A distro maintainer patching and distributing a thousand packages is duplicitous. Especially when the only real difference to the user is the DE. Putting those efforts upstream is a better use of resources. I develop software, and I’m not going to test a million different distros especially when the difference between Ubuntu and Zorin is a DE and some additional packages. It makes Linux users very mad, but the reality is that they are too fractured to support every distro they use equally.
The primary thing that makes FOSS popular is that you can fork it. You’re saying that people need to not do the main thing it’s designed to be able to do!