For example, I’m using Debian, and I think we could learn a thing or two from Mint about how to make it “friendlier” for new users. I often see Mint recommended to new users, but rarely Debian, which has a goal to be “the universal operating system”.
I also think we could learn website design from… looks at notes …everyone else.
This is extremely simple to fix with scripts that can be automatically created on install time. Here is a quick script I just wrote. It will search for first matching app and run it. Just save the script as flatrun, give it executable bit and put it into $PATH. Run it as like this: flatrun freetube
#!/usr/bin/env bash
# flatrun e
# flatrun freetube
if [ "${#}" -eq 0 ]; then
flatpak list --app --columns=name,application
else
app="$(
flatpak list --app --columns=name,application |
grep -i -F "${@}" |
awk -F'\t' '{print $2}'
)"
if [ -z "${app}" ]; then
flatpak list --app --columns=name,application
elif [[ "$(echo "${app}" | wc -l)" -gt 1 ]]; then
echo "${app}"
else
flatpak run "${app}"
fi
fi
Edit: Just updated the script to output the list of matching apps, if it matches more than one.
Yes and I did a similar script but “just create a script” is a really bad solution.
Apps should need to declare a shortname and flatpak should have a shortcut for those with a separated command like flatrun.
I personally don’t think that creating a script is a bad solution. The entire Linux eco system is based around composable components (especially when we talk about terminal commands). Most of the Flatpak applications are available through GUI menus (.desktop files) and that’s the focus of Flatpak. And I think it’s a design decision not to expose every application as a separate program in the $PATH by default. This way there is less of a chance to collide with anything random on the system, if they have the same name.
Having said this, I still agree it would be beneficial for most users if there was a way to automatically create scripts in a special bin folder, that is available in the $PATH. The problem is, what application name should it have? What about different versions of the same program? The entire Flatpak concept was not designed for this, so creating a script for your personal use is not a bad solution.
Repeating, apps should need to declare a shortname. I think my script currently has no mechanism for detecting duplicates
I think a good solution would to just have that script autogenerated by the flatpak, honestly.
