this post was submitted on 22 Apr 2024
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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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It's not supposed to compete with actual package repos so not sure if it would benefit from something like that. The whole thing is amateur hour, amateur implementation mainly targeted at beginners and niche use cases. It fulfills a very specific need and does it well and at the end of the day that's the Unix philosophy. So I don't think it should try to be something it's not.
While I share your views about being amateur hours we've been seeing an increase in usage and releases on it. At this rate flatpak/flathub will become the defacto way of getting desktop software for Linux and it does solve a lot of annoyances and makes things more secure however it lacks features.
Even if it becomes super popular it doesn't have enough packages. Very small amount compared to distros.
The security in theory could be good but between not knowing who packed an app and the containerization rules being configured very lax by default it's not so great in practice.
I wish one of the serious distros experimenting with immutable distros would pick it up and start using it properly.
It's also competing with install methods like AUR or other native stuff that's better integrated, depending on distro.
I think it's too early to say it will become the preferred way of getting apps, all things considered.