Ubuntu Core has existed since 2014, offering a fully containerized, immutable Linux distribution geared toward Web of Issues (IoT) and edge computing purposes.
That form of system, based mostly on Ubuntu distributor Canonical’s personal Snap package deal format, could possibly be accessible for desktop customers with the following Ubuntu Lengthy Time period Assist launch, in accordance with an Ubuntu cellular engineer. Pointing to a comment in one of his prior posts, Ubuntu blogger Joey Sneddon means that an non-compulsory “All-Snap Ubuntu Desktop” can be accessible with Ubuntu 24.04 in April 2024.
It is necessary to notice {that a} Snap-based Ubuntu would seemingly be an alternate choice, not the first desktop supplied. DEB-based Ubuntu would nearly definitely stay the mainstream launch.
“Ubuntu to supply alternate model for obtain” would not usually be a lot of a headline, however that is Snap. Snap was developed by Canonical, and Canonical presents Snaps by means of its personal Snap Retailer. It has been ported to other distributions. And but, as Ars contributor Jim Salter noted in late 2021:
[T]here’s a frequent notion outdoors the Ubuntu ecosystem that the snap system “belongs to Canonical, to not the neighborhood,” and that tends to guide—rightly or wrongly—to suspicion or outright hostility from followers of different distributions.
Then there are the opposite complaints, together with disk area utilization, loading and efficiency points, erratic Snap updating habits, a number of variations of libraries working for various applications, and file-chooser confusion. Ask an Ars author who as soon as wrote about a Snap-ified version of Steam and thought he had disclaimed the character and problems round Snap sufficient: There may be by no means sufficient Snap disclaiming.
Nonetheless, a model of Ubuntu that’s inherently tough to mess up at a core degree and extra constant throughout installations is intriguing. Fedora offers this with Silverblue, which relies on Flatpak. Silverblue, Fedora claims, is “extra secure, much less liable to bugs, and simpler to check and develop.” It additionally retains older variations of the system (itself only a containerized Flatpak) for rollback and restoration.
Ubuntu has been transferring to push some items of the mainstream Ubuntu desktop into Snap packages, be they CUPS printer drivers and even graphics drivers. Whether or not desktop customers undertake and push a completely Snap-based Ubuntu desktop ahead—and whether or not it really turns into accessible in April 2024—stays to be seen.
We have reached out to Canonical for remark and affirmation and can replace the submit if we hear again.
Itemizing picture by Getty Photographs
