this post was submitted on 18 Dec 2023
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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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Ubuntu is nice. Apt/DEB works as they should. Some default apps, mostly browsers, are snaps now, but this does not bother you at all. You were getting them from your distro anyway.
Flatpak and AppImages work just fine if you need them.
The Ubuntu desktop (any flavour) just works. Others are different, but nothing is bad about Ubuntu.
Ubuntu is trying new things, proprietary to their ecosystem, e.g. Unity or snap. On the big picture, those are experiment. Ubuntu is still Linux.
The community reaction to snap is overblown. So Canonical developed something you don't like? Ignore it. This has mostly been a waste of time for them.
(Yes, maybe that dev time would be better spent on flatpak or open-source apps. But that's their time. I'm not paying Ubuntu developers, so can I really complain?)
They tried Unity and gave up for Gnome 3 - however they ship a heavily customized Gbome 3.
Now they're trying Snap. How long before they give up and use flatpak like every other distro?
What's the point of this?
Well, I'd file this as innovation. Innovation is trying and failing. It's an experiment. And I'm okay with this.
Is it wasteful to have KDE and Gnome? Why don't they give up and merge with each other? Did we really need systemd? Or docker? And why Wayland when every single distro is on X and every single application is on X?
Ubuntu started as a Gnome-based distribution and it is was better than the competition on the desktop at the time. Or good enough. It got popular.
Personally, I wasn't a big fan of Unity or Gnome 3, but it worked. I found snap totally weird and against how things should be on a Linux system. But snap updates (while still annoying) have solved problems with deb-based updates of browser ("Quit all running firefox or you'll experience problems").
Maybe I'd like Debian more. After all I came from Debian to Ubuntu. But it's not worth to make a fuzz.
I don't think it's wasteful to have both KDE and Gnome. It's healthy competition and as you say, innovation.
However the job of a distribution is to gather upstream software into a meaningful OS, and rewriting everything that should be an upstream software shared with other distributions is a distraction.
So Unity was unnecessary "not invented here" syndrome. Just like Snap is.