Programs don't come up.

[RLynwood]

I just upgraded from 20.04 to 22.04 and am finding that a number of programs won't come up, primarily Firefox and Opera. There are others, but I don't remember which ones; perhaps solving these two will also solve or help solve the others.

[Schwarzer Kater]

How did you install Firefox and Opera in 20.04/22.04? What do apt policy firefox opera and snap list say?

During an upgrade between system versions additional repositories/PPAs (like the one from Opera) are normally disabled and you have to enable them again afterwards (but check if they are compatible with 22.04/the right ones for 22.04 first ! ).

Be aware that (K)Ubuntu installs Firefox as a snap package from 22.04 onwards…
You can revert that and go back to a binary instead, if you wish to do so - see for example:
https://www.kubuntuforums.net/forum/...-without-snapd

[RLynwood]

"apt policy firefox opera" says

Installed: 1:1snap1-0ubuntu2
Candidate: 1:1snap1-0ubuntu2
Version table:
*** 1:1snap1-0ubuntu2 500
500 http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu jammy/main amd64 Packages
100 /var/lib/dpkg/status
N: Unable to locate package opera


And "snap list" says

chromium 108.0.5359.124 2254 latest/stable canonical✓ -
chromium-ffmpeg 0.1 30 latest/stable canonical✓ -
core 16-2.57.6 14399 latest/stable canonical✓ core
core18 20221212 2667 latest/stable canonical✓ base
core20 20221123 1738 latest/stable canonical✓ base
core22 20221129 444 latest/stable canonical✓ base
cups 2.4.2-5 872 latest/stable openprinting✓ -
firefox 108.0.1-1 2211 latest/stable mozilla✓ -
gedit 42.2 664 latest/stable canonical✓ -
gnome-3-28-1804 3.28.0-19-g98f9e67.98f9e67 161 latest/stable canonical✓ -
gnome-3-38-2004 0+git.6f39565 119 latest/stable canonical✓ -
gnome-42-2204 0+git.c271a86 44 latest/stable canonical✓ -
gtk-common-themes 0.1-81-g442e511 1535 latest/stable canonical✓ -
kate 20.12.3 66 latest/stable kde✓ -
kde-frameworks-5-98-qt-5-15-6-core20 5.98.0 9 latest/stable kde✓ -
kde-frameworks-5-core18 5.61.0 32 latest/stable kde✓ -
kde-frameworks-5-qt-5-14-core18 5.68.0 4 latest/stable kde✓ -
kde-frameworks-5-qt-5-15-3-core20 5.87.0 8 latest/stable kde✓ -
kde-frameworks-5-qt-5-15-core20 5.79.0 14 latest/stable kde✓ -
kstars 3.6.1 121 latest/stable kde✓ -
notepad3 5.21.905.1 174 latest/stable mmtrt -
opera 94.0.4606.38 213 latest/stable opera-software✓ -
snapd 2.57.6 17883 latest/stable canonical✓ snapd
tradingview 1.0.17 28 latest/beta tradingview -
vuze-vs 5.7.6.0-snap1 3 latest/stable vasilisc -
wine-platform-6-stable 6.0.4 19 latest/stable mmtrt -
wine-platform-runtime v1.0 323 latest/stable mmtrt -

This should be enough for now. We can address your other very helpful information/suggestion next. Thanks.

[Schwarzer Kater]

So both Firefox and Opera are installed as snap packages (btw: I wonder why an old Kate is installed as snap - the binary should be included in the standard Kubuntu installation, version 21.12.3 - and version 22.04.3 if you have the Kubuntu backports enabled…).

Do all the other snap programs start without problems, e.g. Chromium, Gedit and KStars?

What does happen after a snap refresh in Konsole?

[RLynwood]

I can't believe my god-awful luck. I just spent quite a while explaining the whole situation. Then, when I went to post it, it said I'd been signed out, and, despite "saving" my entries as I went along, none of it is here when I logged back in. Further, when I tried to save all I'd written elsewhere, it didn't transfer (copy didn't work). Now I have to start all over.

None of the programs you suggested as examples of snap packages come up, and running 'snap refresh' changed nothing.

Menu had four Kate entries. Two of them would come up, the other two wouldn't. After surveying their details, I used Discover to delete its top two entries (deleting the top one deleted the second one, labeled KDE Plasma Widgets, also). The last one was the one with the proper Kate icon and said it was a snap in Applications (I think). That still works, but I haven't rebooted yet.

Menu has two Gedit entries, one labeled 'Gnome Text Editor' and has the proper Gedit icon, the other has the generic icon and is labeled Text Editor. Discover lists only one entry for Gedit, says it's a snap in Applications, and appears to be generic. I haven't deleted it, and neither of the menu's Gedit entries, both in Utilities, comes up.

That's all I'll say for now. I look forward to your continued help. Thanks.

[Snowhog]

when I went to post it, it said I'd been signed out,

When you log in here, make sure you click the Remember me check box. That will prevent this.

[Schwarzer Kater]

I think you will have to make same decisions first, before going on - because from my perspective there seems to be something seriously broken…

- Is it possible to back up your data/important settings/.dot files, do a "clean" install and copy the aforementioned back (depends a bit on opportunity and skill)?
Could be a "painful", but quicker solution…

- If not:
Do you wish to continue to use snaps and (re)install the programs as snaps?
or
Do you wish to get rid of snaps and (re)install the programs as binaries?

Because I think without having access to your system directly, from afar it seems to be a possible solutions to delete and (re)install some components/programs…

But perhaps somebody else has better ideas or more experience with this kind of behavior of snaps…

PS: What happens if you log in with another (newly created) user? Same, or does everything work as it should then?

[RLynwood]

I'll be happy to--if I could find it; I dont see a Remember me check box.

[RLynwood]

Thank you, Schwarzer Kater. I'm not sure what I'll do. My first thought is to reach out to the guy who helped me last weekend (we only removed some cached log files, freeing up enough space in my partition (he also advised me not to use partitions, and I won't) for me to be able to log in again. Then on Tuesday, I upgraded. I'll ask him about backing up my OS files and post then. But I think I won't be able to get help from him 'till next Saturday. Now, where's that 'Remember me' check box?

[Snowhog]

I dont see a Remember me check box.

Looks like this:

[RLynwood]

Thank you. Done.

[RLynwood]

What is/are the advantage(s) of snaps for me, a home, non-business user? I have a nine year old tower with an Intel i7-4790 processor (Haswell), 32 Gb RAM, & a 500 Gb SSD, and I store my data on a 4 Tb hdd. Shouldn't one go with one, binaries, or the other, snaps, across the board?

Also, has any of you experts heard of such instability in Kubuntu? I've had a number of similar experiences: some mouse movement or god knows what happens suddenly, and poof: Kubuntu is frozen and I can't log into it again until I determine the problem and fix it or I notice nothing until I reboot and can't get in.

Should I choose to start all over, what advice do you have about doing it in btrfs rather than ext4? And should I choose to use the encapsulated programs, what do you think of using Flatpack rather than Snaps? (My advisor friend uses and values Fedora/Gnome.)

Another huge problem in this upgrade is that it lost ALL of Brave's former tabs and history! I won't know if it's done the same thing with Firefox and Opera until I can get into them.

Why do I have to click the Remember me check box every time I long in? That's not remembering me.

[Schwarzer Kater]

What is/are the advantage(s) of snaps for me, a home, non-business user? I have a nine year old tower with an Intel i7-4790 processor (Haswell), 32 Gb RAM, & a 500 Gb SSD, and I store my data on a 4 Tb hdd. Shouldn't one go with one, binaries, or the other, snaps, across the board?
[…]

For a home, non-business user, the real advantage of snaps (or Flatpaks) would be that you can get more up-to-date versions of programs. KStars as a snap is at version 3.6.1 atm, if you install it from the (K)Ubuntu 22.04 repositories as a binary the version is at 3.5.7 - but you could also add a PPA for KStars to get the latest version as binary as well, if need be.
In my opinion the containerization aspect of snaps and Flatpaks is negligible for such a home, non-business use case.

Disadvantages of snaps and Flatpaks can be: for example poor integration within the rest of the system/optical inconsistencies, poor performance on older systems for various reasons, …

You can mix binaries, snaps and Flatpaks without problems.
Some people prefer to do so to always get the latest versions of programs for their non-rolling distributions (like (K)Ubuntu, Fedora or Debian - examples for a "rolling distribution" would be Arch or openSUSE Tumbleweed).
Some people do so to have multiple versions of programs on hand.

Your computer is indeed older, but quite powerfull with this processor, the amount of RAM and the SSD. So from a pure technical standpoint I would not generally advise against using snaps or Flatpaks - just a guess to give an example: Firefox binary would open on your computer in, lets say, 3-4 seconds. The first start of Firefox snap after (re)boot would take perhaps 5-8 seconds. I think this would be not that relevant for a home, non-business user.

Should I choose to start all over, what advice do you have about doing it in btrfs rather than ext4? And should I choose to use the encapsulated programs, what do you think of using Flatpack rather than Snaps? (My advisor friend uses and values Fedora/Gnome.)
[…]

ext4 is still the faster file system compared to btrfs.
I consider btrfs only useful for a home user if combined with something like a well configured Snapper providing automated snapshots, e.g. before and after an update and corresponding boot options in the GRUB menu. If you or "your guy" can do this: think about using btrfs (and see the openSUSE documentation for some valuable suggestions).

I would always prefer Flatpaks to snaps - but read the next paragraph, please.


Just to be fair and make my perspective on the snap/Flatpak subject in a private use case clear: I despise snaps and only use Flatpaks if I have to (or the operating system is Zorin OS ).
Servers and business use cases are another cup of tea…

[RLynwood]

This is merely a preliminary response. I'll respond to the rest after some consideratiion and discusion with my friend.
Knowing virtually nothing about these containerization programs, I'll ask why you dispise Snaps? My friend totally prefers Flatpack also. (I'm not taking the time right now to look those up for a full understanding.) Also, is there anyone else there who'll add anything especially useful to your response? Thanks to you all. This is terrific. I love "Linux" and these forums.

[Schwarzer Kater]

OT (!):

[…]I'll ask why you dispise Snaps?[…]

Well, perhaps I got a bit "carried away" concerning snaps to use the term "despise"… But I just don't like them. Why (partly opinionated, of course)?

• I don't like how snap is a packaging/distribution format that is still not ready for the end user imho and is forced upon us by Canonical in Ubuntu's and it's flavours' desktop versions at this point just to "battle" the Flatpak format.
• I don't like it if a program puts a visible directory in my home directory without asking me/giving me a choice (the visible snap directory in this case).
• I don't like how the developers of snap (or Canonical by putting it into their desktop systems) did not take into account that not everybody has a powerful or new computer. And I don't even think about "third world countries" - not few of my private customers and friends have less powerful, mostly older machines (and I use some myself) that don't handle the peculiarities of snap well and are (or would be if I hadn't purged and blocked snaps) in parts seriously slowed down by them. Hasn't Linux alwas been the perfect alternative for computers not powerful enough anymore for the current version of Windows?
• I don't like how snaps (and Flatpaks too) use much more disk space than "classical" package management does (the more snaps or Flatpaks you use the more this diminishes, to be fair).
• I don't like how badly theming/individualizing your system often works with snaps and how badly snaps sometimes are integrated in the GUI (this counts for Flatpaks too).
• I don't like the update mechanisms of snaps, disturbing your workflow or simply just being broken.
• I don't like how snaps populate your file system tree with their loops.

OK, these are the first things that come to my mind without thinking too much.

There are several advantages of snaps/Flatpaks, too - but this wasn't the question.

PS: And of course I know that desktop users are not that important for companies like Canonical.