| As a package manager for my app snaps have really been an anti-pattern and we're considering removing support for them. Here are some problems I've had: - snaps use a different directory than our main app. So if you install our debian package, then go to a snap package, all your data seems to vanish. It's just in another hidden directory. I tried to figure out how to get the directories to sync up but couldn't get it to work as it's yet 'another thing to support'. I only have so much time. - snaps have various bugs that you encounter after you've shipped the app that aren't present at build time. Mostly due to being in a container and 'reasonable' things not being accessible and needing to be granted access to via a configuration file. The strategy I'm thinking of migrating to is to just distribute as a .deb and have our own apt line that is installed during the .deb installation. I think this is what Slack and other Electron packages have migrated to which is easier for them to support. I mean conceptually it sounds great. Put your apps in a container. They will be isolated. Great. But in practice it's a nightmare. To be fair though. MacOS has similar issues when they started going with isolation and privileges. I think the main issue is that none of the OS maintainers spend a day in the shoes of a package maintainer. And if they did they don't care because they own the OS and many of these apps compete with your core product. At least you have plausible deniability that your behavior isn't anti-competitive - you're just trying to improve the security for the user! For example, Zoom got a ton of crap about their installer but they compete with Facetime which DOES NOT have to constantly ask the user for privileges. Apple granted Facetime these privileges via the OS. From the perspective of a user, it's horrible. "Can this app access your Downloads folder?" "Can this app access your Webcam?" "Can this app access your Microphone?" "Can this app access your Documents folder?" ... and on and on ad nausea. |