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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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Why does nobody maintain PPAs anymore? (self.linux)

submitted 5 months ago by christophski to c/linux@lemmy.ml

81 comments fedilink hide all child comments

When I first started using Linux 15 years ago (Ubuntu) , if there was some software you wanted that wasn't in the distro's repos you can probably bet that there was a PPA you could add to your system in order to get it.

Seems that nowadays this is basically dead. Some people provide appimage, snap or flatpak but these don't integrate well into the system at all and don't integrate with the system updater.

I use Spek for audio analysis and yesterday it told me I didn't have permission to read a file, I a directory that I owned, that I definitely have permission to read. Took me ages to realise it was because Spek was a snap.

I get that these new package formats provide all the dependencies an app needs, but PPAs felt more centralised and integrated in terms of system updates and the system itself. Have they just fallen out of favour?

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[–] iopq@lemmy.world 10 points 5 months ago (1 children)

I used ppas and then noticed the updates take forever and start failing as those ppas don't exist anymore. I switched to NixOS to eliminate having to deal with this. NixOS packages perfectly integrate with your system and you can install almost anything you need, even networking software and other things that need root. For everything else you can package it yourself, and nixpkgs will accept your pull requests

[–] possiblylinux127@lemmy.zip 1 points 5 months ago (1 children)

Nix is also a pain in the ass in some ways. Also it doesn't seem to care about licensing.

I'll just stick to Debian, Fedora and Linux Mint.

[–] iopq@lemmy.world 1 points 5 months ago

It literally doesn't install non-free software until you manually configure it to do so. What do you mean by not caring about licensing?