Snap maintainer here - this makes no sense whatsoever.

I can confirm the auto updates work. When I push a new version, all devices start using it within days.

I like Ubuntu and related technologies around it so when I wanted to learn Linux packaging I went for snap. It turned out to be not as hard as I thought, and from my experience they run just fine. And are capable of packaging more types of apps than flatpak.

idk what to tell you, I used it on an old Hp laptop from 2008 with an HDD. Ran just fine. Maybe try it again in 2025

No thanks, I like snaps

Both are official and work well so there isn't really a need for it. But some people just want to make their experience harder because snap bad.

it's a parody of the memes where it's typing commands for 20 minutes to install a web browser

You can use snap set system refresh.retain=Number to change the number of stored versions. It's unfortunate it filled up your storage but in case a dev pushes a faulty update, all you have to do is snap revert app

Hi, a real snap packager here. In comparison to flathub the devs are not required to publish their snapcraft.yamls but the store won't accept an app with privileged access. By default you can't even connect to dbus. You go to the forum, link your snapcraft.yaml and explain why you need the access. The process is the same with plugs that don't auto connect, which ones are those you can read here. You can upload an app with a plug that doesn't auto connect but your users will have to manually do so.

The requirements for classic snaps (no confinement) are much stricter and the admins are careful about granting that privilege. The store also makes it clear whether a package is official or from a star developer so if the app is going to handle sensitive data, you probably won't trust an unverified developer.

As for the walled garden, you're free to share your .snap files and their snapcraft.yamls anywhere you want. Canonical has control of the central store but nothing can stop you from having a repo with snaps that your users install locally. The vast majority of apps won't do that because there's no reason to, but you can. I know Obsidian Notes used to do that at some point.

Corporate owned

Let's shill Fedora and OpenSUSE instead, who depend on the money and support from their corpos. At least they don't directly own them amiright?

Old ass repos

Take a wild guess why snap was created. To have up to date packages across all Ubuntus.

Not even stable

https://youtu.be/JKZKpXaJsPI

"The tech behind Europe's space missions

Linux Mint better

Their main version is literally customized Ubuntu, LMDE is barely recommended or used

Does not ask before doing anything major

What?

More snaps

More fun

On a technical level, they've gotten very capable and in some ways are better than flatpak (packaging CLI software is super easy). Yes in the beginning they were slow but 10 years has passed.

What a lot of users dislike is Canonical not open sourcing the backend that hosts the files. You can always install them locally, similarly to apks on Android. I don't see it as an issue because once the parent company/organisation dies that's usually it for the project, be it open source or proprietary.

Snaps also use runtimes based on Ubuntu itself so Canonical dying = losing core functionality that is open source but nobody else will bother to take on that job.

Having a closed source backend isn't the reason for malicious packages. There's a clear distinction between official and unofficial packages, and flathub isn't immune to this either.

In comparison to flatpak, each runtime (core[number]) is supported for 10 years, so developers aren't pressured to update it if the app keeps working. The side effect is that over time you will end up with a few extra core snaps on your system but the peace of mind for the maintainers is worth it imo.