{"id":3906,"date":"2020-06-01T17:05:05","date_gmt":"2020-06-01T16:05:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.linuxmint.com\/?p=3906"},"modified":"2020-07-27T11:55:07","modified_gmt":"2020-07-27T10:55:07","slug":"monthly-news-may-2020","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.linuxmint.com\/?p=3906","title":{"rendered":"Monthly News – May 2020"},"content":{"rendered":"

Before we start the monthly news, I’d like to thank you for your donations and the support you’re giving us. I’d like to thank our partners and sponsors also and everyone who contributes to Linux Mint.<\/p>\n

Colors<\/strong><\/p>\n

Last month we gave a preview of some of the new colors in the Mint-Y theme. We thought these would be popular but the feedback wasn’t as positive as we expected. We got mixed reactions and although some people seemed to enjoy them, we also noticed as many people if not more didn’t. I’m glad we tried, and I’m glad this happened before BETA. We’ll take a conservative approach and fine-tune these colors with you during the BETA phase. Basically, we’ll revert or reduce the amount of changes for most colors before BETA, and we’ll set up a meta-issue on Github with one issue per color to let you take part in the process and give feedback on the screenshots and packages we publish.<\/p>\n

Snap<\/strong><\/p>\n

We also heard your queries on the topic of snapd. This is a topic which is important to us and we already explained our position last year<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\n

[…] as you install APT updates, Snap becomes a requirement for you to continue to use Chromium and installs itself behind your back. This breaks one of the major worries many people had when Snap was announced and a promise from its developers that it would never replace APT.<\/p>\n

A self-installing Snap Store which overwrites part of our APT package base is a complete NO NO. It\u2019s something we have to stop and it could mean the end of Chromium updates and access to the snap store in Linux Mint.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

A year later, in the Ubuntu 20.04 package base, the Chromium package is indeed empty and acting, without your consent, as a backdoor by connecting your computer to the Ubuntu Store. Applications in this store cannot be patched, or pinned. You can’t audit them, hold them, modify them or even point snap to a different store. You’ve as much empowerment with this as if you were using proprietary software, i.e. none. This is in effect similar to a commercial proprietary solution, but with two major differences: It runs as root, and it installs itself without asking you.<\/p>\n

First, I’m happy to confirm that Linux Mint 20, like previous Mint releases will not ship with any snaps or snapd installed. Second, to address this situation we’ll do exactly what we said we would:<\/p>\n