How to Install and Use Snap Package Manager on Ubuntu 20.04
Snap also know as Snappy is an alternative package management tool and program package format developed by Canonical, the company behind Ubuntu Linux. Snap has been introduced in Ubuntu 16.04 LTS (Xenial Xerus) and is part of any Ubuntu version since then, it can be used across all Linux distributions. Snap packages can be installed via command line or can be downloaded from websites as .snap files. Snap package manager creates a separate folder for each package and does not interfere with the rest of the system.
In this tutorial, we will show you how to install and use the Snap package on Ubuntu 20.04.
Prerequisites
- A server running Ubuntu 20.04.
- A root password is configured the server.
Install Snap
By default, Snap is available in the Ubuntu default repository. You can install it with the following command:
apt-get install snapd -y
Once installed, verify the Snap version using the following command:
snap version
You should get the following output:
snap 2.48+20.04 snapd 2.48+20.04 series 16 ubuntu 20.04 kernel 5.4.0-29-generic
List Snap Packages
To list all packages available in the Snap package repository, run the following command:
snap find
You should see the following output:
No search term specified. Here are some interesting snaps: Name Version Publisher Notes Summary eks v1.18.9 canonical? classic Amazon EKS Distro (EKS-D) snap thunderbird 78.6.1 canonical? - Mozilla Thunderbird email application sc-controller 0.4.8 njmcphail - Driver, mapper and GUI for Steam Controller, DS4 and similar controllers. netbeans 12.2 apache-netbeans? classic Apache NetBeans IDE geforcenow 1.0.5 popey - GeForce NOW argos-translate 1.0.4 argosopentech - Offline neural machine translation app parsec v2.1.0 touilleman classic Secure cloud framework glow 1.3.0 tbmb - Render markdown on the CLI, with pizzazz! ???????? termius-app 7.4.1 termius? - Cross-platform SSH client camus 0.2.2 mrgnr - Peer-to-peer group video chat using WebRTC. freecad 0.18 vejmarie - This is the freecad 0.18 release supporting OCCT 7 / Netgen and many other features flameshot v0.8.5+git10.376a6f2 borgman-jeremy - Powerful yet simple to use screenshot software signal-desktop 1.39.6 snapcrafters - Signal Private Messenger for Windows, Mac, and Linux stellarium-daily v0.20.4 t4saha - Free, open source planetarium software shutter 0.94.3 popey - Feature-rich screenshot program video-downloader 0.6.8 unrud - Download videos from websites like YouTube and many others vimix 0.4 bruno-herbelin - Live video mixing alfacast 2.6 romanshpuntov - Multiplatform Broadcast Audio / Video Streamer & Viewer of Your Screen uno-calculator 1.2.4-uno.725 unoplatform - The Uno Calculator netcalc 3.2 krupier3301 - Network calculator opera 73.0.3856.344 opera-software? - Fast, secure, easy-to-use browser blender 2.91.2 blenderfoundation? classic Blender is the free and open source 3D creation suite. krop 0.6.0 gocarlos - A tool to crop PDF files icloud-for-linux 0.11 marcustomlinson - iCloud for Linux gitkraken 7.5.0 gitkraken? classic For repo management, in-app code editing & issue tracking. konversation 1.7.4 kde? - IRC client mattermost-desktop 4.6.1 snapcrafters - Open source, private cloud Slack-alternative forkstat V0.02.16 cking-kernel-tools - process fork/exec/exit monitoring tool vlc 3.0.12.1 videolan? - The ultimate media player
Find a Specific Package with Snap
You can also find a specific package from the Snap repository with the following command:
snap find package-name
For example, find a skype package with the following command:
snap find skype
You should get the following output:
Name Version Publisher Notes Summary skype 8.67.0.96 skype? classic One Skype for all your devices. New features. New look. All Skype. audio-recorder 3.0.5+rev1432+pkg-7b07 brlin - A free audio-recorder for Linux (EXTREMELY BUGGY) guvcview 2.0.6+pkg-f796 brlin - A simple v4l2 full-featured video grabber spreedme 0.29.5snap1 nextcloud? - Spreed.ME audio/video calls and conferences feature for the Nextcloud Snap ramboxpro 1.4.1 ramboxapp? - Rambox Pro fakecam 2.2.0 diddledan - Fakecam
Install a Package with Snap
You can install any package available in the Snap repository with the following command:
snap install package-name
For example, if you want to install VLC, run the following command:
snap install vlc
Once installed, you should get the following output:
vlc 3.0.12.1 from VideoLAN? installed
If you want to update your installed package, run the following command:
snap refresh package-name
Working with Snap
If you want to list all Snap packages, run the following command:
snap list
You should see the following output:
Name Version Rev Tracking Publisher Notes core 16-2.48.2 10583 latest/stable canonical? core core18 20201210 1944 latest/stable canonical? base skype 8.67.0.96 161 latest/stable skype? classic vlc 3.0.12.1 2103 latest/stable videolan? -
If you want to see recent changes made by Snap, run the following command:
snap changes
You should get the following output:
ID Status Spawn Ready Summary 1 Done today at 10:58 UTC today at 10:58 UTC Initialize system state 2 Done today at 11:14 UTC today at 11:15 UTC Install "skype" snap 3 Done today at 11:14 UTC today at 11:15 UTC Initialize device 4 Done today at 11:15 UTC today at 11:16 UTC Install "vlc" snap
If you want to see information about Snap package, run the following command:
snap info vlc
You should get detail information about VLC package in the following output:
name: vlc summary: The ultimate media player publisher: VideoLAN? store-url: https://snapcraft.io/vlc contact: https://www.videolan.org/support/ license: GPL-2.0+ description: | VLC is the VideoLAN project's media player. Completely open source and privacy-friendly, it plays every multimedia file and streams. It notably plays MKV, MP4, MPEG, MPEG-2, MPEG-4, DivX, MOV, WMV, QuickTime, WebM, FLAC, MP3, Ogg/Vorbis files, BluRays, DVDs, VCDs, podcasts, and multimedia streams from various network sources. It supports subtitles, closed captions and is translated in numerous languages. snap-id: RT9mcUhVsRYrDLG8qnvGiy26NKvv6Qkd channels: latest/stable: 3.0.12.1 2021-01-23 (2103) 309MB - latest/candidate: 3.0.12.1 2021-01-05 (2103) 309MB - latest/beta: 3.0.12.1-26-g4f8ca0de78 2021-01-20 (2140) 309MB - latest/edge: 4.0.0-dev-14637-g2893809229 2021-01-25 (2149) 359MB -
To remove a specific Snap package from your system, run the following command:
snap remove package-name
For example, to remove the VLC package run the following command:
snap remove vlc
All Snap files are stored in the /var/lib/snapd/snaps/ directory. You can see all of them with the following command:
ls /var/lib/snapd/snaps/
You should see the following output:
core_10583.snap core18_1944.snap partial skype_161.snap
Conclusion
In the above post, you learned how to install and manage Snap packages on Ubuntu. I hope this will helps you to manage the Snap package in your system.
