 So I'm a couple days into my experiment with Debian and one of the things that I've kind of come across is that I don't usually know when to download a flat pack version of a piece of software and when to download the version available in the Debian repositories. This is a question that I haven't really come across before on such a broad scale simply because I'm usually on Archer for Dora where the vast majority of stuff is either always going to be in the repositories or I should just always prefer the flat pack. So when I was on Fedora, I always preferred the flat pack over anything in the Fedora repository simply because it seemed like that's the direction that Fedora was going in and they kind of got me hooked on flat packs. I was not using silver blue, but it feels like that's the kind of the direction that Fedora is going in. So I started then transitioning to all of my applications named flat pack and then I moved on to Arch Linux after my Redcore experience and because Arch Linux is Arch Linux and it has such a vast repository software, I started installing most of my software from the repositories. So my question that I want to talk about today is when should you prefer the flat pack over your distros packages or vice versa? When should you make that decision? And I think that there is no good answer to this question, unfortunately. The only answer that I've really been able to come up with is that it kind of depends on the package itself. So if you're looking for a top of the line, very recent version of a piece of software, flat pack is probably going to be the best option, especially if you're on a distribution like Debian where the package is kind of lagged behind by quite a bit. So if you're not needing the most recent version of a piece of software, then you could use the distros repositories. But if you need the most recent version, maybe flat pack is the best option for you. But it's not always the case. And most people I would say probably don't pay that much attention to version numbers when it comes to their software. Maybe they do if there's a piece of software that has a different feature that they need in a newer version, but that's fairly rare. Most people are just going to install a piece of software from the software store. And that's almost certainly going to be a choice that is dictated for them by the distro maintainers. So for example, if you download Silverblue, which is a Fedora project, and you download something from Genome Software inside of Silverblue, you're going to be getting a flat pack that is dictated by Fedora. And you don't really have a choice when it comes to Silverblue. But even if you install an application from Genome Software on regular Fedora, they have a default setting. I can't remember whether it's RPMs or flat packs in that situation, but they've made a choice for you. And the vast majority of people aren't going to know that that choice has been made. They're just going to see, Hey, my game is available in Genome Software, I can download it, press the download button and go play my game. I don't care where it comes from. The vast majority of people don't care where it comes from. And I think that's kind of where I'm at right now. And that makes me feel weird, right? It makes me feel weird because I do care where it comes from. And I think the point for me that I want to make in this video is that it shouldn't matter where it comes from, even though that decision still plays inside of my mind. So the reason why it matters to me is because I care about most recent software specifically when it comes to certain applications. So I want the most recent version of OBS. And I couldn't get that from the Debian repositories. So I had to download the flat pack version. I want the most recent version of audacity. And while it's close in the bookworm repository is not quite as up to date as on their art side. So I downloaded the flat pack of audacity. Same thing with Caden live, I wanted a more recent version than what's available in the Debian repositories. So I downloaded the flat pack, then there are certain applications where it doesn't really matter to me what version I get. Crusader is a good option for that. It doesn't get updated that often, surprisingly enough, given that it's a KDE application. But for the most part, I don't care what version is long as it works, right? Same thing for my preferred terminal application, KDE. I don't care what version I get as long as it works. So there are certain applications for me that I still care very much what version that I get. But for the most part, I'm the weird one. Now, it seems weird to make a video basically saying that I'm the weird one, but I am the weird one. And I'm interested to know in the comment section below, are you guys weird like me? Do you care where your software comes from? And the reason why I'm asking this question, the reason why I'm rambling on like this is because I'm wondering, do repositories even matter anymore? Now, obviously, they're going to matter to distro maintainers because they're the ones making the choice where the software comes from. But for the vast majority of normies out there, and I really want to be a normie some day, but I'm never going to be one, for the vast majority of normies out there, they just go to their software center and install a piece of software that way. If the software is not available, then they'll go seek out other sources. But usually they're probably just going to make the assumption that the piece of software doesn't exist on Linux. It's usually where that journey ends up, right? If they don't find it in the software center, they'll just continue on either finding an alternative to it or just assuming that it's not available. And that's what normies do. And that's the way Linux probably should work. It shouldn't matter where the software comes from. So my question of do repositories matter to everyday users, I don't think that they do. And I think that even for me, an abnormal person who has an abnormal amount of appreciation for where software comes from, I think that it's becoming even less important for me over time. Back when I was just a simple arch user, way back when I was obsessed with the AUR, I wanted everything to come from the AUR, you wouldn't even have caught me dead installing flatpack, right? I would never have considered installing flatpack unless I absolutely had to. And nowadays, I don't care where the software comes from unless I have this very specific reason for doing so. Like I talked about before, I need OBS, I need ADAS, I need K&Live, I need GIMP. Not so much GIMP because GIMP is never getting updated again. I'm convinced that the whole version 3.0 thing doesn't actually exist and will never come out. I'm at this point, I just have given up on GIMP. But the other three, I need the most recent version because a lot of my files are based on versions of those softwares that I was able to get on Arch and that has the most recent version, so I need the most recent version of those. So flatpack helps me when I'm on a distribution like Debbie and get those things. Outside of that, I've begun to care less where my software comes from. I think that's something that is going to happen more and more as we continue on using Linux and Linux continues to evolve into this more cohesive thing. It feels really weird to call Linux a cohesive thing because for many, many years obviously we've talked about how fragmented Linux is and obviously there are still going to be parts where Linux is fragmented. Different package managers that most people aren't going to see anyways, but that's one area, different desktop environments, things like that. But for the most part, once you've made the choice of your desktop environment, Linux becomes samey because what you're going to do as a normal person is open up Discover or open up them software or whatever, find your software through there and you're going to be good to go. So the bottom line for this video is that software repositories are becoming less and less relevant as we go along. And I'm still, there's a nerdy part of me that is sad about that fact because it was always kind of an entertaining journey to try to find your software and actually care about where your software comes from. But nowadays, as long as it's not snap, I don't care. I know that sounds weird because you obviously had to bring snap in somewhere. But you know, for the most part, I just don't care where my software comes from as long as it's not snap. So that is the end of this video. If you have thoughts on where your software comes from, leave those comments in the comment section below. I'd love to hear from you. You can follow me on master down or Odyssey. Those links will be in the video description. You can support me on Patreon at patreon.com slash bonus past links for liberapay and YouTube will be in the video description. If you'd prefer to support me there. Thanks to everybody who does support me on Patreon and YouTube, you guys are all absolutely amazing without you. The challenge from anywhere near where it is right now. So thank you guys will very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very much for your support. I truly do appreciate it. I continue to honestly, I don't do the whole very thing on purpose. It just, I just kind of like get stuck on that word, whatever. Anyways, thanks everybody for watching. I'll see you next time.