Alex313031
Distribution via flatpaks/better support for distros outside of Debian-based ones
Is your feature request related to a problem? Please describe. The installation of Thorium outside of Debian (and its derivatives) is rather irritating. For example, to install on Arch Linux, you can either:
- Use the AUR for the SSE3 version, community maintained.
- Use the AppImage (not integrated with pacman, aur, etc and just is kinda a headache)
- Use debtap with the Debian files to create a makepkg to install. Same issues as above. I'm sure the installation on DNF distros is rather similar, but they already have an RPM, just not a dedicated repo for integration with dnf.
Describe the solution you'd like, including relevant patches or sources Distribution via Flatpak would fix the majority of those issues as Flatpak is distro-agnostic and supports immutable distros (such as SteamOS and Silverblue). Another option (but more annoying to maintain, and supports less distros) is just hosting either a dedicated RPM repo for DNF-distros, or a COPR. Same would go with Arch Linux with the AUR. Possibly use Nix as a middle ground?
Additional Notes I love Thorium and would still use it even if these issues are not "fixed". Thanks for your work!
I understand the desired goal, but would this not put maintenance strain on Alex? Or is there an automatic way to offer these? Usually it should be the job of the linux distribution to offer them, and not upstream devs to do so. That's why the above strikes me as somewhat strange.
I use a non-deb linux system. I just download the .deb file, which is an archive, and extract it, and then repackage it into a .tar.xz and it works just fine for me. So I don't understand why linux-distribution specific package formats have to be used in the first place. I think this proliferation of a gazillion same-but-separate things make this a nightmare to maintain.
I do not know the build process for Chromium, but I've seen other browsers automatically pack into flatpak and such. Also, perhaps a note on the README asking for help with the AUR, COPR, and Nix? Flatpaks also serve another purpose: security. It's all containerized. So, basically every linux distro will also work, even immutables. For the strain, I'm sure it will. You can probably move most of the packing/distribution junk to CI/CD. But I know I am willing to help out to reach this goal (though I know jackshit, I wanna learn lol) and I bet other community members do as well.