This is a serious matter, and I genuinely don’t understand the purpose of having a Fedora Flatpak repository. It feels like a waste of resources, as the apps from that repository often seem to be of lower quality. Eliminating the Fedora Flatpak repo might actually be the best decision Fedora could make. Instead, the focus should be on implementing more impactful features, such as improving the desktop experience, integrating Bootc, enabling HDR support, adopting a unified kernel image (UKI), and so much more. There are countless ways to make the distribution better, and prioritizing these advancements would be far more beneficial…
Interesting. I’ve always used OBS on Fedora from official repos as RPM.
More Flatpak repositories, the better (down with centralization).
In addition, like in the Fedora RPM repository, you can find only free and unpatented software: same thing in the Fedora Flatpak repository.
These tasks should be achieved upstream, they usually are not duties of a Linux Distribution.
BTW I have clashing opinions on this matter. It is not the first time that I read developers that asks distribution maintainers to stop packaging stuff. (i.e. Bottles) I think that some software have also a brand. Like Fedora itself. If you poorly compile a software and you distribute it just because it's free and the license permit that, if it doesn't work as expected, I can understand the user that blames the software and not the downstream work. And I can understand the discomfort of the developers, that receives reports, complaints, and so on not because of their mistakes or responsibility.
On the other hand, Linux distributions are a collection of software compiled from source. It has always been like this. Upstream developers asking to stop this work sound weird. Calling “unauthorized” or “unofficial” a software compiled from sources sounds strange.
I think that we are in a tense moment. Something in the Linux distributions world has to change and will change in the upcoming years.
I know, the reason we use flatpak not snap is the same reason that snap is centralized but flatpak is not but the main issue i think is the fedora itself as they only use open source licensed software packages for there build that creates unnecessary errors just a simple appp called gimp if you install it from fedora you can’t open avif images where as you can if you install this from flathub due to they use a package called libheif for there avif image decoding. Probably you and most of the community members know this but majority of the users are like linus they might put a bug report for this thinking this app has an error.
I feel like Flatpaks were supposed to solve having to grab different stuff from different repos, yet it’s leading to fun stuff like 3 different versions of VLC: Unable to view newer .MOV video files on Fedora 41 - #35 by anotheruser
I prefer centralization when it comes to non-Windows since everyone has their own way of doing stuff; if Fedora wasn’t shipping a usable OBS Studio as RPM, I’d have probably distro-hopped a while ago.
Windows seems to have the right idea with software shipping as installable exes
Worse way of doing something like software.
I like the idea of android more like we have same technology with playstore fdroid amazon app store so on maybe galax store
Reminds me of how I didn’t realize Catima on F-Droid wasn’t official, even though that’s the place I heard of it
I’m not sure the reason to have a Fedora Flatpak repo, but it would be interesting to do a survey to learn how much it is used, liked, or disliked.
Personally, the first thing I do is enabling Flathub, and disabling Fedora Flatpak (I do this with my laptop and my kids laptops). I can’t see the reason to have both.
To understand this you would have had to been here at the beginning of Flatpak and how beneficial it was early on. In a way it can still carry the benefits, and I honestly was on board when it began around the Fedora 29 days.
Flathub took off and almost all the applications we could not get in flatpak form are now easily available or can be “flatpak’ed” fairly easily. Things have changed.
To be fair I thought the whole software experience would be flatpak on the desktop, and I moved to a mostly flatpak workflow with the only exceptions being Firefox, Steam since they are harder to package and work properly. To reiterate, thing change.
OBS is one of those applications that it’s just better to follow the official packaging from the developer not the Distro, which is not official in any way. Repackaging, and modifying the package should denote it is not official and potentially break functionality which it does.
There are a number of other packages that fit this profile and I think the only solution is to simply rename the package and remove logos, trademarks and copyrights of name etc.
If Fedora Maintainer want to modify the original for a Fedora-style flatpak, the should call it something else “Fedora Broadcast & Streaming” for example.
The only official packaging is the flatpak and a ppa on Ubuntu. There is no official .rpm
I meant official Fedora repos; the default RPM ones on Workstation.
What is Flathub?
My limited understanding is that it’s a large anything-goes repo like Packman on openSUSE, or wider-scope RPM Fusion. I’m thinking someone outside of Fedora or other distros is in-control of what gets on or removed from Flathub, implying distros can’t ensure quality from packages they don’t directly control or sanction.
If that’s the case, I would require a Fedora Flatpak repo for security if it ensured that Flatpaks are sanctioned by the distro (Fedora). I get that with RPM repos on Workstation, and can decide if I want to introduce RPM Fusion.
I like the idea of the distro maintaining packages known to work on their OS as it implies the packages goes through a security and vetting process, vs grabbing a generic package from a dev on a platform mainly popular because of convenience (zero chance I’d entertain Flathub on a server).
However, this OBS-specific ordeal broke that theoretical trust if Fedora is willing to publish broken packages.
FYI, Flathub has defended its approach: Flathub Safety: A Layered Approach from Source to User | Flathub Documentation
A GNOME dev has also given a staunch defence here.
Fedora doesn’t vet code for security, they care more about the licence and patented code.
I’d like to think someone at Fedora might think twice before allowing a different build of Wine with this wackiness before Flathub? License violation and suspicious app on Flathub · Issue #5195 · flathub/flathub · GitHub