Have just installed 17.1 r2 that upgraded to 17.2 as a VM. Looking for an APT package and everything is Flatpak. This is going against the grain for me and might be the end of my Zorin days completely.
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I noticed this, too. It seems like the Software Store defaults directly to Flatpak.
But it is not supposed to deny the existence of APT packages.
This one strongly bothers, me too. Flatpak being default on a beginners distro, in favor over the standard packaging, feels a lot like "get 'em while they are young."
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On PCLOS Debian the Browser Installer does not work for me but was able to install a browser via Synaptic which is obviously using APT. I think my advice would be to remove Software completely and concentrate on Synaptic like PCLOS does (or Apper).
I agree. Being restricted from to easy installation of APT browsers and other apps from Software Store is going to put me off as well.
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I'm sorry ... ? You wanna rephrase that?
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I've noticed this, but infrequently, and not consistently enough for me to say this is an intentional design goal. Sometimes I can find the apt package for something, other times I can't. It almost feels to me like it's a metadata issue or something being broken on the backend that they either haven't (or won't) fix.
If we were going to switch stores, would it be possible to switch over to mint's mintinstall? I've not tried to install this on another distro, but I'd be curious. The only reason I wouldn't love synaptic is that for a newer user, it's a little cumbersome and a bit archaic to figure out at first. Other than that, I wouldn't mind using it at all, but that's me.
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But that is not a new Behavior, isn't it? If I'm not wrong the Order is Flatpak, APT, Snap. But I would agree to change it to a default APT, Flatpak, Snap.
But You can on the Software Sites switch to Zorin APT. Yes, not the best Way but You can choose. At least if an APT Package is available.
@Ponce-De-Leon I looked at quite a few alternative Browsers in the Software Store. Using the down arrow offered no alternatives to the Flatpak version for each Web Browser. In respect of Synaptic I covered this in the Unofficial Manual for Zorin 17. In future I would (if I were still using Zorin which I won't be any time soon) remove Software completely, open up a Terminal and enter:
sudo apt-get install synaptic
followed by
sudo apt-get install apper
Sorted (but then Apper may only be able to not show any flatpak alternatives because of how the Zorin backend appears to be working! In fact, I am going to try that now in the VM.
Apper:
Just installed Zen Browser (App Image). No issues streaming Netflix or Disney+ but the latter does have some minor glitching.
Issue with Apper is that it needs root privileges which means it has to be launched via the Terminal (same in Q4OS) which was integrated in Devuan like Synaptic!
The Thing with the Browsers is: Firefox is availble because the Mozilla Repo is included. So, You can have the .deb Version. The others come as Flatpak (or as Snap I guess) because the Browers are not in the Ubuntu Repo's.
So, theoretically, You would have to add every Browser Developer Repo to the System to get the Browsers. For Developers Flatpak is attractive because it is a unified Format what is spreaded across all Distros. And independend of native Package Formats. So, the offer Flatpaks. Or You have to llok if You can add the Repo of the Developer if they have one.
Searching in Synaptic the only 'modern' browser apart from firefox is Chromium - and that is in snap format. All snap and flatpak removed. More choice in Synaptic on PCLOS Debian. So if I were using ZorinOS as my go to it would be using AppImage of Zen Browser. In Q4OS I don't get asked whether or not to run it every time I launch it, which is what happens in ZorinOS! 
It is time to move on (or backwards, depending on your point of view).
I've witnessed posts on here about bloatware of Flatpak, problems with Flatseal; so instead of making life easier for noobs it appears to be creating more issues than it solves. New isn't always best. (Bring back the Amiga!)
Just double-checked. I can launch Zen Browser App Image instantly in Q4OS.
The Issue with implementing Browsers in the Repo's - doesn't matter if in the Ubuntu Repo's or the Zorin one's - is, that this Packages need Maintenance. Every Time when an Update for a Browser comes, it must go fast in the Repo for updating it because for Security Reasons. And someone have to to care about that.
On Ubuntu I wouldn't count on that because they have Snap and sit on that. Chromium as Snap is a good Example. Firefox is, too beacue on Ubuntu directly, You don't have a Fiefox .deb Version. When You type sudo apt install firefox, it will install the Snap Package.
And on Zorin OS ... Well, I would count that the Zorin's will have the Time to maintain the Updates for the Browsers. I mean that is the reason why they added the Firefox Repo and now the Brave Repo. So, You can get the Browser on Zorin, but not from Zorin. It comes from the Browser Developer Repo's. What Zorin OS could theoretically do ist implementing all theses Browser Repo's to offer wider Range of choice what Browser do You want use. So, they wouldn't have to maintain it like now.
The package maintainers manage the Updates, not ZorinGroup nor Canonical (Ubuntu).
The package maintainer does all of this.
Needing to update and maintain is just part of maintenance: Using Flatpak is something they may choose; but it does not somehow enable providing maintenance. Otherwise, APT would not have worked for all those updates all those years.
Yes, Canonical did do a bait-and-switch with APT and Snap. This was in violation of a clear statement that they made, assuring users that they would not replace APT with Snap, then they quietly replaced APT with Snap.
However, that is just a redirect of sources and it applied to many packages, not just browsers or Firefox. At no point did Canonical take over the Maintenance of those packages; They redirected to the Source of the download.
It has never been a question of Zorin OS maintaining the browsers updates, nor do they do so, now. They do not do so now.
They direct to the Source.
The source is the maintainer: Mozilla for Firefox... and they provide the updates. Zoringroup has no involvement in that.
Defaulting to Flathub or to APT makes no difference in the above; creating a situation of chasing a Red Herring.
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It seems that I didn't explained well what my Point is. I wanted to say, that You need someone who cares about the Implementation of the Browsers in the Sources. They don't come from nowhere.
So, when various Browsers should be available, there would be the Question who makes that Work. And to avoid that, You could go a different Way and add already existing Sources from the Developers of the Browsers - like the Mozilla Repo or the Brave Repo and add that to the System and so You would have the Experience to install with apt install the Browser.
2 Likes
PCLOS Debian has major browsers available in its Synaptic Package Manager. Chromium is available as a .deb package not snap. Other web browsers (some are lightweight and not suitable for everything) include:
alice (WebKit or Gecko)
angelfish (Web Browser for Plasma Mobile)
basilisk-browser (pclos - as opposed to .deb)
bluefish
brave-browser (pclos)
chromium (.deb)
cog
dillo
elinks (text mode browser)
epiphany
falkon
firefox-esr (.deb)
google-chrome-stable (pclos)
icecat (pclos)
konqueror
librewolf (pclos)
lynx (text based web browser)
mercury-browser (out of date from creator of Thorium!)
midori (pclos)
netrik (text based web browser)
netsurf (only has Google search engiine, period!)
opera-stable (pclos)
palemoon (pclos)
qutebrowser
surf
thorium-browser (pclos)
vivaldi-stable (pclos)
wapua (Web browser for WAP WML pages)
waterfox (pclos)
zen-browser (pclos) - and it is current beta version so no need for AppImage in PCLOS Debian, unlike Q4OS.
Then it seems that there is someone who take care of it. The Question ist: are all these Browers up-to-date?
I'll get back to you on that one.
Oh, you don't have to check that. It was only a Point. I mean, because of Security there should be up-to-date. They would be useless if they would not.
[Warning: Do NOT visit Ask.com, Business.com or Dictionary.com - I did not intend the list to be interactive! With reference to netsurf available search engines.]
The results are here!:
alice (WebKit or Gecko) - issues:
perl: warning: Setting locale failed.
perl: warning: Please check that your locale settings:
LANGUAGE = "en_GB",
LC_ALL = "",
LC_MONETARY = "en_GB.UTF-8",
LC_MEASUREMENT = "en_150.UTF-8",
LC_TIME = "en_150.UTF-8",
LANG = "en_GB.UTF-8"
are supported and installed on your system.
perl: warning: Falling back to a fallback locale ("en_GB.UTF-8").
Any::Moose is deprecated. Please use Moo instead at /usr/share/perl5/App/Alice/MessageBuffer.pm line 3.
tcp_bind: Address already in use at /usr/share/perl5/Twiggy/Server.pm line 79.
angelfish (Web Browser for Plasma Mobile) version: 11.22 - limited to DuckDuckGo with a lot of privacy functions disabled by default, i.e., opt out not opt in used in Settings. And promoting DuckDuckGo A.I.
basilisk-browser (pclos - as opposed to .deb) version: 22.02.2025. Developed by the team behind Pale Moon. Doesn't support streaming movies. Like falkon, cannot display forums using Discourse.
bluefish My bad - a website designer from 2012, not a browser!
brave-browser (pclos) version: Version 1.76.74 Chromium: 134.0.6998.89 (Official Build) (64-bit) [Copyright 2025]. Rewards and Talk present at initial launch - have to disable.
chromium (.deb) version: Version 134.0.6998.35 (Official Build) built on Debian GNU/Linux 12 (bookworm) (64-bit)
cog [launched from Konsole] issues:
(cog:11912): Cog-DRM-WARNING **: 20:47:01.545: Renderer 'modeset' does not support rotation 0 (0 degree
s).
(cog:11912): GLib-GIO-WARNING **: 20:47:01.550: Your application does not implement g_application_activ
ate() and has no handlers connected to the 'activate' signal. It should do one of these.
Cog-Core-Message: 20:47:01.643: <file:///home/swarfendor437> Load started.
Cog-Core-Message: 20:47:01.710: <file:///home/swarfendor437> Loading...
(cog:11912): Cog-DRM-WARNING **: 20:47:01.916: failed to schedule a page flip: Permission denied
Cog-Core-Message: 20:47:01.923: <file:///home/swarfendor437> Loaded successfully.
dillo version: 3.05 (2015)
elinks (text mode browser) version 0.13.2. This is a text only browser that runs inside Konsole. It strips all images and just relays the text from a given web page.
epiphany version: 43.1-1. (Did not install as it wanted to drag in Evince!)
falkon version: 22.12.1-2 (out of date)
firefox-esr (.deb) version: 128.8.0esr~build1
google-chrome-stable (pclos) version 129.0.6668.100-1 pclos (number of the beast!)
icecat (pclos) version: 115.20.0esr - out of date! Not been updated since 2015. Default search engine DuckDuckGo.
konqueror version: 22.12.3 © 1999-2016. Dual function of Web Browser and File Manager/Explorer. Can cope with news site such as bbc.co.uk but not Discourse. Out of date.
librewolf (pclos) version: 136.0-2 so almost up-to-date. (Based on Firefox which is currently at 136.0-3 if I remember correctly).
lynx (text based web browser) version: 2.9.2 © 2024
mercury-browser (out of date from creator of Thorium!) version: 129.0.2-1pclos out of date.
midori (pclos) version: 11.5 [about states: Midori is up to date] Default search engine is AstianGO. Displays Zorin forum correctly. Doesn't play streaming content.
netrik (text based web browser) version: uknown. Does not support https or IPv6.
netsurf version: 3.10 (24th May 2020). Default search engine is Google but also has:
Yahoo
Bing
Omgili
BBC News
Ubuntu Packages
Creative Commons
Youtube
AOL
Baidu
Amazon
Ebay
IMDB
ESPN
Wikipedia
DuckDuckGo
Seeks
opera-stable (pclos) version: 116.0.5366.51 (notified new version 117.0.5406.142 is available (Chromium version: 131.0.6778.266. Was disconcerted on first launch as it asked "Update Opera with rest of system"! (Chinese spyware?). Cannot add new Search Engines. Default is Google with alternatives availabe being:
Yahoo!
DuckDuckGo
Amazon
Bing
Wikipedia
palemoon (pclos) version: 33.6.0.1 (GTK3) is what gets installed. When selecting Release Notes it refers to a newer version, v33.6.1 (2025-03-11):
"This is a security, bugfix and stability update.
Changes/fixes:
Simplified some WASM code generation in the IonJIT compiler.
Fixed a crash in loading external resource maps.
Disabled potentially unsafe attempts at recovering JIT operations.
Fixed some minor linking issues in about rights.
Updated the embedded emoji font to fix incorrect display of some of the wheelchair emoji.
Security issues addressed: CVE-2025-1934 (DiD).
Does not support streaming services.
Default search engine is DuckDuckGo but also includes alternatives of:
Mojeek
Yahoo
Bing
Ecosia
Ekoru
Twitter (!)
Wikipedia (en)
When trying to go to Netflix brought a message up saying I did not have permission to install latest version. Link to download page only offers tarballs.
qutebrowser version: hard to find but suggests from Donate /Change Log page:
v3.4.0 (2024-12-14) with v3.4.1 (unreleased). Search engine is DuckDuckGo - no other alternatives). Keyboard based browser.
surf version: 2.1+git20221015-4. Launch from Konsole. Issues:
(process:24740): Gtk-WARNING **: 22:18:45.746: Locale not supported by C library.
Using the fallback 'C' locale.
(process:24756): Gtk-WARNING **: 22:18:46.018: Locale not supported by C library.
Using the fallback 'C' locale.
thorium-browser (pclos) version: 128.0.6613.189-1pclos (from Synaptic Package Manager information. Did not install this from previous bad experience of dross left after uninstallation when testing previously!)
vivaldi-stable (pclos) version: 7.1.3570.50 (Stable channel) stable (64-bit).
User Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; Linux x86_64) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/132.0.0.0 Safari/537.36. © Vivaldi.com 2025
Default search engine is Startpage with Bing set for Image search.
Additional search engines include:
Yahoo!
DuckDuckGo
Yelp
Ecosia
Qwant
Wikipedia
Google
wapua (Web browser for WAP WML pages) details:
wApua is a web browser for WML (version 1.1 and 1.2) pages. It is primarily designed for debugging WML pages in comparsion to only browsing the WML pages on the web. Features: WBMP support, cache, simple HTTP authentication, tables, timer support, etc.
About wApua and Perl
About the name "wApua"
Author of wApua
Copyright -eh- left
Download wApua
WAP links
There also exists a HTML page about wApua.
Requests since 28-Aug-00: [Zero!]
waterfox (pclos) version: 6.6.6-1pclos. Unable to install due to hicolor icon clash with zen-browser!
zen-browser (pclos) version: 1.10b (Firefox 136.0.2) Fairly current but I believe Firefox is now at 136.0.3?
Wanted version/issues text to be in red like I saved in TextMaker Document. Oh well!
If you mean making the links interactive as in clickable (based on the "do not click these" I assume that is the case?), you can escape the dot separating the domain name. For example:
zorin\.com
Shows as: zorin.com. This won't work if you provide the "http://" prefix, though.
Zorin makes some weird choices.