After creating a fresh installation of Ubuntu 24.04, I installed DEB Firefox from APT by following Mozilla’s instructions from here. But I noticed that it was secretly replaced with Snap Firefox. I was able to verify this by checking the About Firefox page. This is the third time I noticed this.
I suggest Mint or straight Debian. I prefer Mint for anything graphical, Debian for headless
What benifit does Mint have over Debian for anything graphical?
I’ve just found it’s more polished right out of the box. Definitely more new-user-friendly, like Ubuntu, but with Snap gutted out.
I have been using the regular Mint (based on Ubuntu), but I’m probably going to use the Debian edition next time I install a new system
Its driver manager is better for newbies. Worse for experienced users though imo.
Why use Mint when Mx exists.
Not a secret, but annoying as hell. I usually replace it with a Flatpak and uninstall Snap.
Agreed, not a secret, and not wanted. I uninstall Firefox and install Google Chrome from a .deb - disadvantage: you have to update it manually. Advantage: it doesn’t update itself automatically.
Disadvantage: you’re now using a browser from the biggest
spyad-ware company and killed web heterogeneity.Too late, they own my soul already. I have successfully resisted Meta, X, Microsoft, and any number of lesser daemons, but the one true G has shown me their light and I am unable to look away.
Try sunglasses? But maybe other souls can still be saved from evil…
They delivered their promise: they were at least not evil, at first.
Why would you use an inferior product? Firefox via Snap is shit but it’s still better than any version of Chrome
I have used both, back and forth for years.
Chrome serves me better.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/To_Serve_Man_(The_Twilight_Zone)
From a security standpoint? Not even close. From a software-release validation requirement, not even in the same galaxy. If they look the same, it’s only due to Clarke’s law.
You are missing the attribution. The person you are replying to is making a joke that Canonical says they are the same, not that they are actually the same.
Clearly they’re cosplaying as a Canonical engineer whose internal explanation and pleas for them to not take this approach fell upon deaf ears /j
It’s a joke based of the fact that when you type apt install firefox on ubuntu, it will install the snap instead of the deb package, which is what you would expect when you use apt to install something.
In Ubuntu they are the same.
firefoxversion1:1snap1-0ubuntu5is a deb that literally runs the commandsnap install firefoxin the preinst script. Check line 77 infirefox-1snap1/debian/firefox.preinstin the source tarball: https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/firefox/1:1snap1-0ubuntu5There’s no magic there.
That is not the same thing as “snap and apt Firefox are the same”. They just hijacked apt to force snap in.
So both commands do the same thing… right? I’m not saying snap and apt are the same in general.
Yeah for sure, I read your comment as excusing canonical screwing with user intent but I see that’s not what you meant.
Yeah, I really dislike snap and have puppet clean it out and add in the real mozilla repo for me. If I wanted sandboxed apps I’d probably look at flatpak but I think there’s still work to be done there also.
You are missing the attribution. The person you are replying to is making a joke that Canonical says they are the same, not that they are actually the same.
Yeah they’ve been doing that for a while
They started doing that in a couple of years back. Saw quite a bit of backlash in the Linux news media at the time.
I’m aware that when the user runs(without adding Mozilla’s apt repository),
sudo apt install firefoxthe snap version of Firefox is installed. But I never heard that, though APT is configured to install Firefox from Mozilla’s repository, the DEB version will be uninstalled and the Snap version will be installed.
Yes, this is known. They do the same for Chromium. If you want a browser from ubuntu, it’s going to be a snap.
Firefox now has instructions on their “Debian-based” install section about pinning their repo over Canonical’s so that doesn’t happen.
Because you’re right, Canonical does think so highly of their product that they will constantly attempt to undermine other options against your will.
That snap shit was so bad it made me switch to Arch.
Not defending Ubuntu but wasn’t this clarified to be Mozilla’s deploying it via Snap and requesting to remove the apt installation?
Source: https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2022/04/how-to-install-firefox-deb-apt-ubuntu-22-04
It was a collaboration, although I’m having trouble finding a source for who wanted it first.
Welcome to 2020, where Debian is once again your trusted distro.
Always was.
Yeah it’s not really a secret
I got a notification about it when I upgraded from 20.04 LTS that they will only serve it as a snap package.
Yes. That was the last straw for me. I switched to debian stable, and haven’t looked back since
Hah! Me too, exactly this.
Me too
Debian will have snaps and flatpaks and all the same insecure black-box drek.
Given how much they violate ISO27002, I can’t see them ever being run in a regs-compliant shop.
I feel like snaps are black boxier tho.
It is one of the reasons many people turn away from Ubuntu.
This is why i switched to Debian. It’s 99% of Ubuntu, without the crap.
I must have hit that 1% last time. I assembled a new PC, wanted to install debian and could not get a login screen after installation. At that point I wanted something that just works. I installed Xubuntu and had the machine ready right away.
Thats… odd. The installer packages aren’t really that different. When was this?
My guess is: prior to Bookworm, when they started including non-free firmware on installation media by default.
Ahhh yea, that would make sense.
I… I… I don’t know why I haven’t done that myself. (Am now on NixOS btw) but for work maybe I ask for Debian cloud box.
For work, you could also try Fedora Workstation or Linux Mint Debian Edition. Debian is pretty barebones, but if that isnt a bother then do whatever.
It’s not barebones. I use it as my main desktop and barely notice any difference from Ubuntu, it has every package I’ve ever needed. I think that mentality of Debian being “bare” is outdated.
@beeng@discuss.tchncs.de this is for you, too.
I had a friend jump ship from Windows and they said that Debian felt barebones. I personally dont have any problem with it, I use it all the time for VMs, server, and I used to main it. I still think it is missing a lot of user-friendly small things that i never noticed on my own because I am very comfortable with Linux.
They do install less by default, but I’d love to pick their brain to understand what they meant. Oh well ¯_(ツ)_/¯
Linux just isnt transparent about some things. Beginners most have problems when they use a GUI tool and then have to still edit a file. Like dirt example, adding a new drive using GUI disk utility and then sometime in the future disconnecting the drive and being forced into emergency mode.
Uhh, that’s a thing in any modern distro? I plug and unplug SATA drives all the time.
I’d suggest the KDE flavor of Debian, then. Its settings manager is divine, and its software management platform ties every other package management system in (apt/dpkg for Debian, yum for Redhat, pacman for Arch, plus flatpak, nixpkg, and even snaps if you absolutely must). By default starting in Plasma 6.0.
More to @fmstrat’s point, and to suggest a possible cause your friend had that impression: if you install the Minimal flavor of any distro, you’re going to get a minimal experience.
I like gnome, but i guess i could look at fedora.
I would like to stay with apt as package manager so the package names stay the same to what I know, or is yum/dnf/etc gonna use the same for most?
Mostly the same, and if not all it has taken for me to figure it out was searching “fedora $pkgname”
You can get Gnome on Fedora. It won’t have Apt.
Packages will have a different naming scheme based on the maintainers’ preferences, even between Debian and Ubuntu (though those are usually pretty minor).
Your muscle memory is gonna trip you up for a while though.
Yup. They also did this with Docker, and it broke my setup (and was a bitch to debug).
This was a couple of years ago, and I haven’t used Ubuntu unless absolutely necessary (and then usually in a container).
Docker in a snap is too meta for me.
Just wait for snap 2.0 which actually runs everything inside docker containers /s
Solve the problem. Drop ubunutu
Or you can just remove snap. I have been running a up-to-date snap-free ubuntu for 2 years
And pin other repos so Ubuntu doesn’t replace it. And change the apt.conf rules that alias out apt install commands for the snap install equivalent. And whatever the countermeasure is for the next sneaky ploy they put into action.
I like my operating system to work for me not against me. So no. I’ll just never use their shitty spin of Linux and rely on someone that makes a quality distro. Not one that forced it’s users to use their pile of shit proprietary nonsense.
Definitely not you, they absolutely do this with snaps and have for a while. This was the main reason I stopped using Ubuntu.
I battled that for about a year and then ditched Debian based diatros altogether.
OpenSUSE ftw
You could have gone pure Debian. There are no snap shenanigans over there :)
OpenSuse is also a great pick tho!
This isn’t Debian’s fault! It’s purely an Ubuntu/Canonical problem. Debian’s only apt by default, no snap.
I’ve had it happen too. In fact it is what prompted me to move away from Kubuntu.
