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Linux is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991 by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged in a Linux distribution (or distro for short).

Distributions include the Linux kernel and supporting system software and libraries, many of which are provided by the GNU Project. Many Linux distributions use the word "Linux" in their name, but the Free Software Foundation uses the name GNU/Linux to emphasize the importance of GNU software, causing some controversy.

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Did we kill Linux's killer feature? (lemdro.id)

submitted 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

268 comments fedilink hide all child comments

A few years ago we were able to upgrade everything (OS and Apps) using a single command. I remember this was something we boasted about when talking to Windows and Mac fans. It was such an amazing feature. Something that users of proprietary systems hadn't even heard about. We had this on desktops before things like Apple's App Store and Play Store were a thing.

We can no longer do that thanks to Flatpaks and Snaps as well as AppImages.

Recently i upgraded my Fedora system. I few days later i found out i was runnig some older apps since they were Flatpaks (i had completely forgotten how I installed bitwarden for instance.)

Do you miss the old system too?

Is it possible to bring back that experience? A unified, reliable CLI solution to make sure EVERYTHING is up to date?

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[–] [email protected] 34 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I can't really relate? At least on my desktop. The software manager integrates with Flatpaks and upgrades them at the same time.

For most apps I'm going to prefer the usual way of doing things. But there are some apps that I actually kinda prefer as Flatpaks. Like Calibre I'm happy to install as a Flatpak. The updates are faster and it doesn't add a whole host of dependencies that only it uses to my system.

[–] [email protected] -2 points 1 year ago (2 children)

There was a time when using the update button of Software Center was exactly equal to running "sup apt dist-upgrade". Everything was simple and straightforward.

[–] [email protected] 16 points 1 year ago

And broke all the time, and was a nightmare for devs to create and maintain packages for multiple distros, and was hard to find packages outside the official repos, and could create a package version hell, and had only a very rudimentary permission system.

Change is sometimes not a bad thing, you know?!

[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 year ago

Everything was simple and straightforward except for updating an app after new release before the distro maintainers updated it in repos (which often took months).