Gnome Developers Consider Dropping RPM Support
In a move that might shock a lot of users, the Gnome development team has proposed the idea of going straight up Flatpak.
We live in wild times, my friends. If the Gnome developers follow through with their proposed plans to drop RPM support, those times are going to get even wilder.
Before you lose your Linux-loving mind, this doesn’t mean that the Gnome desktop environment will only be available to install via Flatpak. However, it does mean that the development team is considering removing support for RPMs within Gnome Software.
That's a mighty big change, but it’s one that’s been written all over the walls for a while now. Many instances of Gnome Software (such as with Pop!_OS) already default to Flatpak installations, so it should come as no surprise that the next step in the evolution would be to make that the only option.
In one particular Fedora mailing list post, user tqcharm stated: “Since the consensus seems to be that RPMs should be at the end of the priority list, what about decoupling (removing) RPMs from Gnome Software completely?” The user continues to say, “This might seem to be a step back, but it would make Gnome Software more consistent between Workstation and Silverblue and support Fedora in its goal to make Flatpaks the primary packaging option.”
That consistency is important, especially if Fedora wants to strengthen its brand across all spins.
Red Hat engineer, Michael Catanzaro, affirmed tqcharm’s sentiment when he stated in this reply, “Removing RPM applications is my long-term goal, but I’m not sure how quickly we’ll be able to get there.”
There’s no definitive answer as to whether or not this will happen, but you can be sure that if removing RPM support does happen it could divide the Fedora community.
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