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nazar2sfive
Asked: 2019-09-04 20:24:57 +0800 CST

How to completely remove snap and replace with flatpak?

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I want to remove every piece of existing software/package on Ubuntu related to snap and replace with flatpak.

How to completely remove snap in Ubuntu 19.04 and replace with flatpak without crashing or messing my existing system?

snap flatpak 19.04

2 Answers

  1. You can do this manually or with unsnap (more at the end).

    Why? Here is a nice article. On the other hand, worth to say that Flatpak and GNOME are developed mainly by Red Hat/Fedora (might imply conflict of interest with Canonical), and have its problems too.

    How:

    Remove Snap

    Probably for people who just hope Canonical give up with Snap/snapcraft (at least for Desktop):

    # Stop snapd services
sudo systemctl stop snapd && sudo systemctl disable snapd

# Purge snapd
sudo apt purge -y snapd gnome-software-plugin-snap

# Remove no longer needed folders
rm -rf ~/snap
sudo rm -rf /snap /var/snap /var/lib/snapd /var/cache/snapd /usr/lib/snapd

# Prevent reinstall
sudo apt-mark hold snap snapd
cat <<EOF | sudo tee /etc/apt/preferences.d/snapd
Package: snapd
Pin: origin *
Pin-Priority: -1
EOF

    If you are unsure about removing snap completely, you can at least reduce it at its minimum: remove snap-store, remove snap plugin from GNOME Software; and of course remove any snap also available as flatpak, like Ungoogled Chromium 1.
    Worth to mention that "it's possible to remove all the snaps, and remove snapd... the desktop will function fine" Alan Pope (former snap developer; see unsnap below). gnome-... snaps are just backends for GTK snap apps.

    sudo snap remove snap-store  # And anything you don't use of  snap list
sudo apt purge gnome-software-plugin-snap
sudo apt install gnome-software-plugin-flatpak

    Sources:

    Install Flatpak

    1. Install Flatpak on Ubuntu 18.10 or later (check here for older versions).

      sudo apt install flatpak

    2. Install the Software Flatpak plugin: The Flatpak plugin for the Software app makes it possible to install apps without needing the command line. To install, run:

      sudo apt install gnome-software-plugin-flatpak

    3. Add the Flathub repository: Flathub is the best place to get Flatpak apps. To enable it, run:

      flatpak remote-add --if-not-exists flathub https://flathub.org/repo/flathub.flatpakrepo

      Add --user if you'll install per-user apps.

    4. Restart your system (reboot).

    To adjust flatpak permissions check Flatseal (flatpak install flatseal).

    Common commands

    Using flatpak install/uninstall nameOfTheApp usually is enough. It will search and suggest alternatives.

    • flatpak run name: Run an installed application.

    • flatpak install remote name: Install an application from a remote source. --user will install per-user. Examples:

      $ flatpak install flathub org.gnome.gedit
$ flatpak --user install flathub org.gnome.gedit//3.30
$ flatpak --user install https://flathub.org/repo/appstream/org.gnome.gedit.flatpakref

    • flatpak list: List all installed applications and runtimes.

    • flatpak update: Update all installed applications and runtimes.

    • flatpak remove name: Remove an installed application. --unused also remove unused refs on the system.

    • flatpak info name: Show information about an installed application.

    unsnap

    Ex snap developer Alan Pope had developed unsnap (currently on pre-alpha status) to Quickly migrate from using snap packages to flatpaks:

    Quickly and easily migrate from using snap for applications to flatpak. unsnap runs as a two-stage process. unsnap itself generates the scripts to do the actual migration. This enables users to view and/or edit the scripts prior to execution to validate or tweak them.

    Related

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  2. sudo apt purge snapd gnome-software-plugin-snap

    Thanks to doug. It feels so clean now, all snap removed.

    screenshot

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