> the developers claim that too much of their time is spent supporting and packaging the software for Linux relative to the size of the user base.
That is a fact. Even those of us who _only_ target Linux-esque OSes cannot keep up with the vagaries of the ecosystem. The only truly viable option for the widest reach is to release as source code, with a makefile, and hope that the users can deal with any dependencies and system oddities themselves.
AppImage is another one of the aforementioned "vagaries of the ecosystem." No single developer can sensibly manage snap, flatpak, appimage, deb, rpm, apk, and whatever other package formats de jour are common these days. The lowest common denominator is source releases.
i run a debian so b0rked that apt usually don't work. AppImages do work, usually.
"no single developer can sensibly manage $LIST" .. that why there's the variety of systems that attempt to avoid the laundry list.
But the last time i sold software was back when "turnkey" with hardware and everything was the way things were done and we had something like 3/4 of our units ship as part of a package we integrated.
i'm not complaining about there being variety. i'm expressing support for the vendor's decision to avoid supporting Linux on the grounds that such variety makes it untenable for them to support. As someone who co-manages active FOSS support forums 24/7, they have my full sympathy. No matter how many OS flavors a project attempts to support, there's always that next person crying out, "but what about _my_ OS of choice?"
Wondering if they took into account that this leaves a gap in the Linux community, and an open source competitor might rise from this move. Competitor that might at some point eat market share in the other OS as well.
That is a fact. Even those of us who _only_ target Linux-esque OSes cannot keep up with the vagaries of the ecosystem. The only truly viable option for the widest reach is to release as source code, with a makefile, and hope that the users can deal with any dependencies and system oddities themselves.