The developers of Linux Mint have decided to delve into the core elements of the system and have announced plans to create their own versions of certain components of the APT package management system, which is the foundation of Debian and Ubuntu.
Project leader Clement Lefebvre elaborated on the reasons for this move in the August update. According to him, many APT tools and libraries were developed over a decade ago and are no longer supported by their creators. Despite ongoing patches from Linux Mint, Ubuntu, and Debian, these tools have long become outdated in terms of both architecture and functionality.
Lefebvre: "Some of these APT tools and libraries haven't been updated in over ten years. We've patched them to keep them working, but their capabilities, translations, and overall architecture are stuck in the past. Each new version of Linux Mint reminds us of old problems that we can't resolve due to outdated code. Therefore, we've decided to take control over these components to eliminate minor bugs and make changes as necessary."
To address these issues, the Linux Mint team has combined several outdated utilities into new, more efficient solutions:
Gdebi and apturl have been merged into a new application called Captain.
Aptdaemon and mintcommon-aptdaemon have been consolidated into a library called Aptkit.
Now, all tools that previously relied on Aptdaemon, Synaptic, or apturl will operate through Aptkit and Captain. However, utilities using Packagekit can continue their work, as this project is actively supported and does not require immediate replacement.
Source: linux.org.ru
