I clicked on the link. From what it says this is not a multi-arch solution, but, a multiple package solution, one for each arch.
I did state at some point that this package is one Deb which installs on 12, 14, 16, and soon 18, both 32-bit and 64-bit. The same Deb. It even aliens onto various RPM based distros.
It’s a sneaker-net thing. Machines vary widely but have one thing in common, no network connection of any kind.
that means you would need two snaps, one for 32 the other for 64 bit … they will run on ubuntu 14.04, 16.04, 18.04 (not on 12.04 though) as well as on arch, fedora, suse and a few others without specific adjustments.
(do you actually still have users running i386 machines ?)
if your snap does not have any binaries or libs included you can actually build an “architectures: all” snap that runs on all arches.
I’m closing this topic. The initial concerns have been addressed, and there’s too much flamebait.
There is no killer app. There is killer functionality very much needed.
preinst + postinst functionality
user account addition
For a kiosk like application I’ve been experimenting with migrating a .DEB to one or more snaps. With such an application you need the ability to create a non-priv user then to auto-launch an application for that user. This requires writing to the .config directory of said user, once the install creates the user. Normally, with a .DEB, you do stuff like this in the postinst proc because now you’ve unzipped everything AND you know the architecture.
preinst tends to be used for determining the architecture and which portions of content will be “activated” (for lack of a better term).
The current snap universe seems to be focused on the rather microscopic universe of a single pre-existing user install an app (like a text editor) from a store for themselves or perhaps all users. All of the requests I see for postgresql aliases seems to bear that out.
The ability of snap to completely replace Debian packages in every way, including letting 32-bit executables run on 64-bit hardware is high on the wish list of many.
since auto-launched applications always run as root there is no need for users in appliance images at all … (i have built a few appliances on UbuntuCore)
feel free to discuss this in some dedicated new thread though, this one is for “new packaging” suggestions and shouldnt really be abused for random discussions …
