2023.07.06 Ubuntu pushes snap deeper into its package requirements - GlenKPeterson/One-off_Examples GitHub Wiki

Yesterday, it looks like Ubuntu tried again to force snap onto my desktop by making it a dependency of ubuntu-desktop-minimal and ubuntu-desktop. Probably as a result of this: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/firefox/+bug/1962021

I have so many questions:

• Do I need the ubuntu-deskop and/or ubuntu-desktop-minimal packages?
• Can/should flatpak provide GNOME, and how does that fit into the rest of the OS?
• At what point do flatpak devotees switch to Debian or Fedora Silverblue or something else?

$ apt list --upgradable
Listing... Done
gnome-remote-desktop/jammy-updates 42.7-0ubuntu1 amd64 [upgradable from: 42.3-0ubuntu1]
libidn12/jammy-updates 1.38-4ubuntu1 amd64 [upgradable from: 1.38-4build1]
libinput-bin/jammy-updates 1.20.0-1ubuntu0.3 amd64 [upgradable from: 1.20.0-1ubuntu0.2]
libinput10/jammy-updates 1.20.0-1ubuntu0.3 amd64 [upgradable from: 1.20.0-1ubuntu0.2]
ubuntu-desktop-minimal/jammy-updates 1.481.1 amd64 [upgradable from: 1.481]
ubuntu-desktop/jammy-updates 1.481.1 amd64 [upgradable from: 1.481]
ubuntu-minimal/jammy-updates 1.481.1 amd64 [upgradable from: 1.481]
ubuntu-standard/jammy-updates 1.481.1 amd64 [upgradable from: 1.481]

$ sudo apt upgrade
...
The following NEW packages will be installed:
  firefox snapd
The following packages have been kept back:
  gnome-remote-desktop libinput-bin libinput10 ubuntu-desktop ubuntu-desktop-minimal ubuntu-minimal ubuntu-standard
The following packages will be upgraded:
  libidn12
1 upgraded, 2 newly installed, 0 to remove and 7 not upgraded.
Need to get 24.0 MB of archives.
After this operation, 103 MB of additional disk space will be used.
Do you want to continue? [Y/n] n
Abort.

$ apt-rdepends ubuntu-desktop-minimal
...
gnome-control-center
  Depends: libsnapd-glib1 (>= 1.58)
libgoa-backend-1.0-1
  Depends: libsnapd-glib1 (>= 1.43)
pulseaudio
  Depends: libsnapd-glib1 (>= 1.49)
update-manager
  Depends: gir1.2-snapd-1

$ apt-rdepends ubuntu-desktop
...
gnome-control-center
  Depends: libsnapd-glib1 (>= 1.58)
libgoa-backend-1.0-1
  Depends: libsnapd-glib1 (>= 1.43)
pulseaudio
  Depends: libsnapd-glib1 (>= 1.49)
update-manager
  Depends: gir1.2-snapd-1