Snaps: Bloated and Outdated?

TL;DR

This paper empirically examines Snap packages in Ubuntu, revealing they are often bloated and outdated, contributing to understanding issues in software packaging systems.

Contribution

It provides empirical data on Snap package size and update frequency, highlighting current shortcomings in software packaging practices.

Findings

Snap packages are generally bloated in size.

Snap packages tend to be outdated.

Empirical evidence supports concerns about package management.

Abstract

Snap is an alternative software packaging system developed by Canonical and provided by default in the Ubuntu Linux distribution. Given the heterogeneity of various Linux distributions and their various releases, Snap allows an interoperable delivery of software directly to users. However, concerns and criticism have also been frequently expressed. Regarding this criticism, the paper shows that currently distributed snap packages are indeed on average bloated in terms of their sizes and outdated in terms updating frequencies. With these empirical observations, this short paper contributes to the research domain of software packaging, software packages, and package managers.