> On the other hand what every single post really complains about is Flathub.
> This is what was truly disruptive about Flatpak. This is what the haters are mad about.
I think reaching this point in an argument requires willful misinterpretation of what people actually complain about with Flatpak.
To me (and pretty much everyone else) Flatpak is just another distro to package for. It has it's own runtime, packaging schema and deployment instructions like pretty much every other Linux distro. This is more work - yes, I can deploy it to any OS I want, but the same can be said for my Nix package or my AppImage. From a technical level, the only thing Flatpak has going for it is Bubblewrap integration, which should really be managed by your OS/DE instead of an incredibly complex sandbox that doesn't work for most applications. The Nix and AppImage packages are technically superior in pretty much every way, if those could be automatically repackaged into Flatpaks then the community probably wouldn't complain.
Is Flathub part of this problem? Kinda, but the author is redirecting concern for the baby to the bathwater here.
> unless your Surname is Mr. IBM or Mr. Canonical, you gain nothing by asking for this on your desktop
Well, you do get a simpler directory structure, things not all dumped in ~/.var, less redundant application runtimes, more consistent GTK text rendering, fewer places for things to break and, apparently, friendlier devs.
"Hating" on any piece of free software is a waste of time, but this entire essay feels intended to dodge the question rather than adressing what people actually dislike about the Flatpak model. The high-and-mighty "our way or the highway" rhetoric doesn't do a lot to make me feel like they're listening to their audience, but that's nothing new for GNOME devs I suppose.
> This is what was truly disruptive about Flatpak. This is what the haters are mad about.
I think reaching this point in an argument requires willful misinterpretation of what people actually complain about with Flatpak.
To me (and pretty much everyone else) Flatpak is just another distro to package for. It has it's own runtime, packaging schema and deployment instructions like pretty much every other Linux distro. This is more work - yes, I can deploy it to any OS I want, but the same can be said for my Nix package or my AppImage. From a technical level, the only thing Flatpak has going for it is Bubblewrap integration, which should really be managed by your OS/DE instead of an incredibly complex sandbox that doesn't work for most applications. The Nix and AppImage packages are technically superior in pretty much every way, if those could be automatically repackaged into Flatpaks then the community probably wouldn't complain.
Is Flathub part of this problem? Kinda, but the author is redirecting concern for the baby to the bathwater here.
> unless your Surname is Mr. IBM or Mr. Canonical, you gain nothing by asking for this on your desktop
Well, you do get a simpler directory structure, things not all dumped in ~/.var, less redundant application runtimes, more consistent GTK text rendering, fewer places for things to break and, apparently, friendlier devs.
"Hating" on any piece of free software is a waste of time, but this entire essay feels intended to dodge the question rather than adressing what people actually dislike about the Flatpak model. The high-and-mighty "our way or the highway" rhetoric doesn't do a lot to make me feel like they're listening to their audience, but that's nothing new for GNOME devs I suppose.