[kwlug-disc] Zorin vs Mint

[Jason]

I just tested this in a new Xubuntu VM to confirm:

> You just do:
>    sudo apt purge snapd
> And it is gone forever.

Now try installing firefox via apt.
You'll find that it's not actually an apt package, but a wrapper for the
snap version of firefox, which reinstalls snapd as a dependency.

Thankfully there aren't a lot of packages that are done like this, but I
really don't like how Ubuntu just snuck snap into apt this way, despite
promising they wouldn't be replacing apt.
This is one of the reasons Linux Mint doesn't include anything for snap:
https://linuxmint-user-guide.readthedocs.io/en/latest/snap.html

Also, the man page for firefox (and other software installed vis snap) is
broken without manual work - has been for years annoyingly.
https://bugs.launchpad.net/snapd/+bug/1575593

Sorry.. didn't want to rehash this again, as I'm sure it's been discussed
before.


On Thu, Nov 27, 2025 at 12:44 PM Khalid Baheyeldin <kb at 2bits.com> wrote:

> Snap is a non issue on Xubuntu or Ubuntu Server LTS.
>
> You just do:
>    sudo apt purge snapd
> And it is gone forever.
>
> All of my systems are snap free, be they desktops or servers.
>
> Only on the GNOME variants is it an issue because there are dependencies
> that prevent its removal.
> (Or so I have seen in past discussions).
>
> On Wed, Nov 26, 2025 at 10:49 PM Chris Irwin via kwlug-disc <
> kwlug-disc at kwlug.org> wrote:
>
>> On Wed, Nov 26, 2025 at 02:27:11PM -0800, Ron wrote:
>> >Chris Irwin via kwlug-disc wrote on 2025-11-26 13:30:
>> >
>> >>That said, I don't know what you're actually getting vs just
>> >>standard Ubuntu nowdays.
>> >
>> >Agreed, but I expect the answer is "no Snaps", even though there's
>> >nothing really wrong with them.
>>
>> Ah, didn't even cross my mind. I dropped Ubuntu for Fedora just before
>> the snap era - when they were doing buggy GTK+ patches that caused weird
>> issues and forging ahead with Unity.
>>
>> Yeah, maybe Mint is the way to go -- Ubuntu minus snaps, even if there's
>> a whole extra step in the chain.
>
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