Re: Guidance on deprecating debs for snaps

[Mark Shuttleworth]

Policy for non-core apps is that newer versions should be provided as
snaps, LTS-released versions should be maintained as debs (but not
updated to newer versions).

By non-core I mean anything that is not in the ubuntu-core snap.

By apps I mean things that would make a natural snap or (in the case of
libraries) snapcraft part.

So Marco is exactly right to ask this question now, since we need to
evolve a best practice for how to socialize that there is a newer
version of the software available as a snap.

Mark


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Re: Guidance on deprecating debs for snaps

[Marco Ceppi]

On Wed, Aug 17, 2016 at 5:42 PM Seth Arnold 
wrote:

> On Wed, Aug 17, 2016 at 09:28:32PM +, Marco Ceppi wrote:
> > Has anyone deprecated debian packages yet in favor of snaps? My end goal
> is
> > people who've installed the debian package from the xenial archive will
> get
> > an updated debian package which no longer is the software but instead
> > either guides them to installing the snap or installs it for them.
>
> This sounds like a surprising and inconsiderate thing to do to our
> users. There's probably still time to get your transitional package into
> yakkety before feature freeze (or file for a feature freeze exception) but
> once it was shipped in an LTS we've agreed to support it for five years.
> (Where "support" is of course variable -- for main, we support it. For
> universe, the community supports it and someone will sponsor updates.)
>

Well, it's either that or basically anyone who installs the debian version
from the archive just deals with an out of date, never updated, version of
the software. That to me, as a maintainer of a software project, feels more
inconsiderate.

I ask because I'd like to get my users the latest bits, but there seems to
be no way for me to have a snap "conflict" with a deb package (which, I get
is the whole point). So now, if you snap install, /usr/bin/ still takes
priority over /snap/bin. This means I have make sure not only to tell
people to snap install the software, but also uninstall the previous deb
packages.

I can only imagine this leading to a lot of confusion as updates are
released in the snap but aren't reflected on users systems.


> Be sure to consider how 16.04 LTS -> 18.04 LTS upgrades will work. We also
> support LTS to LTS upgrades.
>

It sounds like I simply need to pull my packages from yakkety now. I don't
plan on continuing to build debian packages going forward. I just don't see
a point in it.
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Re: Guidance on deprecating debs for snaps

[Seth Arnold]

On Wed, Aug 17, 2016 at 09:28:32PM +, Marco Ceppi wrote:
> Has anyone deprecated debian packages yet in favor of snaps? My end goal is
> people who've installed the debian package from the xenial archive will get
> an updated debian package which no longer is the software but instead
> either guides them to installing the snap or installs it for them.

This sounds like a surprising and inconsiderate thing to do to our
users. There's probably still time to get your transitional package into
yakkety before feature freeze (or file for a feature freeze exception) but
once it was shipped in an LTS we've agreed to support it for five years.
(Where "support" is of course variable -- for main, we support it. For
universe, the community supports it and someone will sponsor updates.)

Be sure to consider how 16.04 LTS -> 18.04 LTS upgrades will work. We also
support LTS to LTS upgrades.

Thanks


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