378
Principal Skinner on Immutable Distros
(infosec.pub)
Post funny things about programming here! (Or just rant about your favourite programming language.)
Basically the idea is to separate your system packages and your applications.
The system packages are installed and updated "atomically" i.e. in transactions. If a transaction fails, results in a broken system, or you just don't like it, you can rollback anytime.
Applications on the other hand are usually installed in a containerized form. Basically, flatpak. You should avoid installing applications through the system package manager.
CLI apps is where it all gets interesting, and usually people use distrobox, docker/podman or toolbx to run stuff in containers. Although the universal blue project comes with brew prepackaged for when you want CLI apps installed system-wide without juggling containers.
The benefit is that your OS and your apps are separate. No dependencies breaking or conflicting. And if something does break, well just roll back.