this post was submitted on 01 Aug 2024
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100% there will be more malware and scams as Linux grows. In fact, it's happening already.
Just look at there being multiple instances of cryptowallet theft on Ubuntu's app store by devs uploading fake copies of crypto wallet managers.
And that's before we even get onto DEs â and much of the desktop Linux stack in general â generally not being designed with security in mind, as it's not been something they've had to worry about.
We will see more malware, more scams. We will see glaring security problems that were allowed to stay in place for years be exploited. We will see infighting in the Linux community over all of this stuff.
It is the price we must pay for being an increasingly relevant platform.
With any luck, more users will mean more contributors, more financial support for devs, and of course better security as a result of that - you only need to look at how much KDE Plasma has improved with support from Valve, and how much work Gnome has been getting done after Germany's "Sovereign Tech Fund" contribution to see that even a little bit of support can go a long way.
I'm not sure this is entirely correct. But there's truth here in the sense that things have been becoming more complex over time, so now an average desktop system has much more packages than 10 years ago, and supply chain vulnerabilities are a thing.
Now, using snap store, flathub and all that is just unhygienic.
I'm certain most of the failures will be in the new shiny stuff, and thus most of the losses in that infighting too.
Why is that?
What is this based on? What do you mean by "unhygienic" anyway?
Flatpaks are more secure than system packages. They're not installed with installation scripts that run as root (and can therefore do anything to your system if malicious code is slipped in.
Flatpaks also have sandboxing. It's not a perfect implementation mind you, but it's better than zero sandboxing.
Snaps is a bit more complicated, but sandboxing works if you have a fistro that uses AppArmour, so basically Ubuntu and some derivatives. Although who else would use snaps anyway lol. Flatpak won that fight.
I don't know why you'd be certain of that. New stuff is generally designed from the ground up to be more secure.
Look at Flatpaks Vs repo packages.
Look at xdg-portals Vs 500 different implementations to do the same thing.
Look at the absolutely cataclysmic security catastrophe that is X11 compared to Wayland.
Because a vulnerability in one DE's file manager, for example, will have smaller impact because many people don't use that DE.
Same with other things.
Also because that's something we still had to worry about.
Not all package managers even run install scripts (from packages) at all.
Flatpaks may contain vulnerable versions of libraries bundles, IIRC. While the one from the normal package manager has been updated.
I just don't like the general direction of this. Running more and more complex and untrusted crap and solving that with more complexity.
More complexity - bigger probability of mistakes. Sometimes fundamental laws are enough.
I'm afraid of the day that may come where people will say that Emacs is a security catastrophe due to lack of isolation.
This essentially all boils down to "I don't like new things, and despite it being made more secure, I don't trust it"
How are sandboxes "untrusted crap"?
You talk about complexity being bad, yet you seem to prefer X11 over Wayland, and 500 different implementations of the same thing, implemented separately by every app developer, rather than using a standardised xdg-portal. Surely you see the contradiction there?
No, quite the opposite, I like new things, just in my own direction. Which would be simplification. We've had this exponential growth of computing power and complexity and expectations in the last 30 years, which can't go on.
Again, where you'd use a screwdriver 100 years ago, you'll still generally use a screwdriver, possibly one as simple as 200 years ago, but with computers we for some reason have to hammer nails with a microscope today.
A personal computer should be as complex as Amiga 500 tops.
Wasting 1000 times the energy to try and make it easier to use than that still hasn't yielded satisfactory results, for a sane person this means stop.
The rest is just gaslighting.
What you run in them is untrusted crap.
Yes, what's standard in X11 has N different variants with Wayland. Correct.
I don't use it at all.
If you meant that Wayland is simpler than X11, let's compare them when Wayland reaches feature parity. Also X11 as a standard is simple enough.
I also consider Nix and Guix to be better solutions to some of the problems Flatpak and Snap solve, and Flatpak and Snap to fall short of solving others.
Like I said, much of the new things you're complaining about is simplification. Flatpak, Wayland, xdg-portals.
Lol. Why stop there? Why not say they should be no more complex than an abacus?
How?
And assuming it is... running it without a sandbox is somehow better??
Can you please answer. X11 is far more complex than Wayland. Why do you prefer it if you like simplicity?
You don't use programs that... do things? Things like follow system theming, give notifications, open/save files, record your screen, open a file picker, etc? I don't think you're grasping what portals are.
Wayland is simpler than X11, by a long shot.
It won't ever, by choice. It's not meant to. X11 is filled with many mistakes that it should never have had.
The X11 developers say otherwise, and have embraced Wayland.
Christ. I don't. At all. You want simplicity and are now advocating for Nix and Guix, no Flatpaks, sticking with X11, no xdg-portals?
Do you have the definitions of "simple" and "complicated" mixed up in your mind?
No. AppImage is relatively simple. Flatpak is not. There's a clear difference between "new shiny" and "new".
Amiga 500 is quite functional as compared to abacus. Modern PCs not so much as compared to Amiga 500.
It's not far more complex as a protocol.
I don't, quick googling says this is something connected to giving permissions to Flatpaks or something, which I don't use.
ColibriOS is simpler than Genera.
As in?
So what? It's not a religion to embrace.
In what world is Guix more complex than Flatpaks?
See, you are trying to do these emotional hints at me saying something stupid, but this is really too much.
You keep saying that far more complex things are actually simpler. Where are you getting it from? AppImages are more complex than Flatpaks, X11 is otherworldly more complex than Wayland, xdg-portals are far simpler than the cluster fuck that is every Dev just creating their own solution, etc.
What the actual fuck? This https://www.x.org/releases/X11R7.7/doc/xproto/x11protocol.html is "otherworldly more complex" than this https://wayland.freedesktop.org/docs/html/ ? It's more complex exactly in the amount needed to make it more specific and with the client-server model.
This is bullshit. Something like AppImages can be done with bloody shell scripts.
Solution for what? Let's please verify that you even know what xdg-portals are used for, that is, that you know what you are talking about.
You keep ignoring actual questions as if you were above them, you are not.
From knowing what those things are. I just don't immediately remember any of the details, because there's too much information in our lives and Wayland, Flatpaks etc are far from the top of the list, and more than that because I expect you to argue in good faith which won't require putting facts under your nose.
Also you keep behaving as if someone owed you something in general or if they lost an argument. They don't.