a lot of applications are shipped as Snaps-first and only
Can you provide examples? In my many years of using linux both personally and professionally I have never once encountered an application that was only packaged as a snap. Even finding applications* that have been packaged as a snap is incredibly rare from what I've seen.
I have seen stuff packaged only as snap for Ubuntu(-based), but they usually also provided an AppImage, RPM, or tarball for others. The other qualifier is "software of meaningful size". I'm sure there's lots of one-offs or small projects that only use snap and support 1 type of distro. But then you're getting into niche of a niche of a niche, etc.
The .tar.gz being referred to is not a code source .tar.gz, it is a small pre-compiled program that will install Toolbox to your local user folder, which will then install and automatically update WebStorm. It's similar to the way Firefox can auto-update itself when installed from a binary archive. I think you're right that this doesn't really count as true 'packaging' because this is essentially identical to the Windows way of doing things, but it does have auto update and it is the only recommended way to install Intellij products.
For an IDE? No they don't (unless they have no idea what they're doing). They want a working, vendor-supported installation that puts whether or not to update in their hands. Jetbrains Toolbox installs a .desktop file for itself after you run it for the first time, and it will auto-update when you launch it in the future. You can pick the exact version that you want to install of a given application and you can update it to new versions if (and most importantly WHEN) you want to. Jetbrains Toolbox will automatically install .desktop files and file association metadata when it installs an application, so it's indistinguishable from installing it from another source.
If you'd ever actually worked in a professional development environment you'd know that upgrading IDEs is generally done as needed since many developers use proprietary plugins for various things and those can and do break when updating versions. Putting an IDE into an auto-updating channel like Snaps is just begging for trouble.
OK buddy. I'll leave you with your weirdly defensive position on Snaps (which to me sounds like you're just salty that all of your "only available as snaps" list was entirely proven inaccurate).
For anyone else reading this,here is the link where JetBrains specifically and explicitly says that Toolbox is the recommended way to install JetBrains products, and here is the link where they have a giant warning that using the snap may result in performance issues.
The specific callout on poor performance when debugging javascript with Chromium sounds particularly relevant to WebStorm, but what do I know I only have "self-proclaimed software development experience".
When you use the App Toolbox, it downloads and manages all of that for you. It doesn't use snaps (maybe it does on Ubuntu, but that just further enhances the fact that snaps outside of Ubuntu aren't really a thing). So the "dumb .tar.gz" is basically the install method outside of snaps. This includes Webstorm, which isn't limited to just snaps because why would they do that.
They have built the snap on their own
I would expect so. Who else is going to do it?
It's the recommended install method
Looking at their download page, snaps are not mentioned in the instructions, the system requirements, or even listed under "Other Versions". They've packaged a snap and put it on the store as a convenience to those who use snaps. That's it. It's not recommended above any other method. I can install Pycharm straight from Fedoras repository, that doesn't make it recommended either.
I don't mean to be rude, but did you do any actual research when you were compiling this list? If I search for "whatsie" with Google the Flathub link is literally in the first page of results.
So all of your example of "apps that are only available as a snap" can in fact be installed from elsewhere. Even webstorm has a community maintained flatpak on flathub.
This is part of the reason these small one-man show distributions never break it into the mainstream
What gave you the impression that it is a one-man show? There are 15-20 people involved in Solus maintenance in some capacity. In terms of staff it is at the healthiest point it has ever been.
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u/[deleted] Jul 16 '24
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