They started doing that in a couple of years back. Saw quite a bit of backlash in the Linux news media at the time.
this post was submitted on 05 Feb 2025
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I'm aware that when the user runs(without adding Mozilla's apt repository),
sudo apt install firefox
the snap version of Firefox is installed. But I never heard that, though APT is configured to install Firefox from Mozilla's repository, the DEB version will be uninstalled and the Snap version will be installed.
Yes, this is known. They do the same for Chromium. If you want a browser from ubuntu, it's going to be a snap.
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Not defending Ubuntu but wasn't this clarified to be Mozilla's deploying it via Snap and requesting to remove the apt installation?
Source: https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2022/04/how-to-install-firefox-deb-apt-ubuntu-22-04
It was a collaboration, although I'm having trouble finding a source for who wanted it first.
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It is one of the reasons many people turn away from Ubuntu.
Yes. That was the last straw for me. I switched to debian stable, and haven't looked back since
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Not secretly, no.
But it's not obvious either. When I say 'apt install firefox', specially after adding their repository to sources.list, I'd expect to get a .deb from mozilla. Silently overriding my commands rubs me in a very wrong way.
It takes a little more than just adding a different repository to your package manager, you have to tell apt which to prefer:
echo '
Package: *
Pin: origin packages.mozilla.org
Pin-Priority: 1000
Package: firefox*
Pin: release o=Ubuntu
Pin-Priority: -1' | sudo tee /etc/apt/preferences.d/mozilla
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Yeah it's not really a secret
I got a notification about it when I upgraded from 20.04 LTS that they will only serve it as a snap package.
I suggest Mint or straight Debian. I prefer Mint for anything graphical, Debian for headless
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Not a secret, but annoying as hell. I usually replace it with a Flatpak and uninstall Snap.
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Definitely not you, they absolutely do this with snaps and have for a while. This was the main reason I stopped using Ubuntu.
Yeah they've been doing that for a while
Jesus Christ this is Windows-tier insane computing behaviour from Ubuntu. Fuck Ubuntu.
At this point, why is anyone using Ubuntu for desktop? You have soooo many options
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Wasn’t that one of the main critiques of snap/ubuntu/canonical a few years ago already?
Among my personal dislike for its shade of purple, that has been my primary reason to not recommend ubuntu for a while, at least.
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Switch to Debian and you'll be fine :)
This is why i switched to Debian. It's 99% of Ubuntu, without the crap.
I must have hit that 1% last time. I assembled a new PC, wanted to install debian and could not get a login screen after installation. At that point I wanted something that just works. I installed Xubuntu and had the machine ready right away.
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It's a known and documented issue that Ubuntu does. They secretly install the Snap version, even if you tried to install the Deb package. This is an issue since years: https://askubuntu.com/questions/1345385/how-can-i-stop-apt-from-installing-snap-packages (posted 3 years and 7 months ago)
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I suspect that what's happened is you installed the apt version, then at some point upgraded it and there was a version in the main repo that had a higher version number and installed the snap version. If two repositories both have a package with the same name, and no other rules in place, the higher version number wins.
If that is the case, you need to pin the firefox package to the mozilla repository. You can find more details here: https://wiki.debian.org/AptConfiguration
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Yup. They also did this with Docker, and it broke my setup (and was a bitch to debug).
This was a couple of years ago, and I haven't used Ubuntu unless absolutely necessary (and then usually in a container).
Ubuntu uses Snap as first-class method to install software. So if a piece of software is available as DEB or Snap, Ubuntu will always use Snap.
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For awhile I was getting firefox crashes in Mint all the time. Turns out it was the snap version being unstable.
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I battled that for about a year and then ditched Debian based diatros altogether.
OpenSUSE ftw
You could have gone pure Debian. There are no snap shenanigans over there :)
OpenSuse is also a great pick tho!
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I've had it happen too. In fact it is what prompted me to move away from Kubuntu.
My work cannot manage permissions well so I cannot remove snap Firefox cos its in use by another user.
Meanwhile current snap version of Firefox is crashing on my profile
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