Is it possible to configure Discover to show all applications that are available via apt? There are many apps that are available on apt but not available on Discover, except in Flatpak form (I don't have Flatpak set as default source). For example, Steam and GIMP are available through apt but in the Discover store, only Flatpaks are available. i would like to be able to install apps like these via the Discover store rather than the command line. Is this possible?

Gimp is available in discover, both as apt as flatpak. In kubuntu, steam isn't available in synaptic itself. It's the steam installer. Quote from synaptic: This package enables Steam to be easily installed via an appstream client
on non-i386 systems as long as the i386 foreign architecture is configured.
Having ALL packages available in discover is simply nuts. Besides, synaptic offers a load of features that can't be implemented in discover.
https://imgur.com/a/dpW6A6H

Gimp is not available as apt in Discover. If I search GIMP, it only shows "Extra files for GIMP", and if I search GNU Image Manipulation Program it only shows the Flatpak. https://i.imgur.com/E8toRSK.png https://i.imgur.com/XnfWnFs.png

Also, I'm on KDE Neon

First check if you have the necessary discover packages installed. Then, check if the repos are checked in the discover settings. This one's kubuntu, but you get the idea.
https://imgur.com/a/2PnPNTE

it definitely is not showing in Neon, but i think this may be due to the possibly missing/outdated/something metadata for the Gimp package in Ubuntu 20.04. Gimp doesn't show in Discover in Kubuntu 20,04 for me, as well as Neon.

Not on neon myself but do you have all packagekit files installed?

dzon wrote:Not on neon myself but do you have all packagekit files installed?

I am sure I do, whatever is provided by a default Ubuntu 20.04/Neon system, which for Packagekit would be Focal's version 1.1.13
Gimp, for example, DOES show up in Discover in Kubuntu 20.04, AND both Neon and Kubuntu have the exact same packagekit packages installed (from the same repos)

Neon does have a more current version of appstream.

In Neon, the packagekit commandline ( pkcon ) also shows Gimp when searched, as does appstreamcli. The latest version of Discover isn't showing Gimp, on Neon, for some reason.


Puzzling, as I think that things were fine in this regard in the recent past, though I am not at all sure about that.

All of my sources are checked in settings https://i.imgur.com/YdlOPpz.png https://i.imgur.com/CoMeJSm.png I can't really use Discover to install anything because all it has is Flatpaks or KDE software. I can't use it to install/update Steam, GIMP, Firefox, Spotify, VLC, qBittorrent, Audacity, etc, unless I use the Flatpak. The only software available in non-flatpak/snap form is KDE software.

Hmm...I'd check for packagekit qt compatibility. Not sure what the name is in neon (packagekitqt5 maybe?). In Kubuntu you need the library libpackagekitqt5.

dzon wrote:Hmm...I'd check for packagekit qt compatibility. Not sure what the name is in neon (packagekitqt5 maybe?). In Kubuntu you need the library libpackagekitqt5.

As I mentioned (though incompletely), I have all that, the same exact libpackagekitqt5-1 package in both Kubuntu 20.04 and Neon. This appears to be the latest version of Packagekit-Qt
So the difference here is the version of Discover/Plasma, Packagekit, and Appstream.

Personally, I don't spend much time on this, normally, since, as a long-time Linux user I seldom actually use Discover, but do check it out to see if an issue is more widespread, or fixable.
But as this is quite specific to Neon, my educated guess is that this specific package is a direct import from Debian, and not actually packaged by Ubuntu (or Neon), unlike the rest of Packagekit. This may be an issue from libpackagekitqt5-1 being built against a different Qt version than what Neon has, maybe? I am doubting this, though.

But tl;dr this seems more of a Neon issue than a Discover one.

Yes, it was a somewhat strange request. I don't use discover either. But, it seems not a neon only issue. Came across that same issue on some fedora and manjaro posts. In either case, I'm at the end of a possible solution.

dzon wrote:Yes, it was a somewhat strange request. I don't use discover either. But, it seems not a neon only issue. Came across that same issue on some fedora and manjaro posts. In either case, I'm at the end of a possible solution.

Discover used to miss a lot of applications in the past, mainly due to poor or lacking appstream data, as well as general bugs in the application. This has greatly improved in the past year or 2, at least on debian-like systems.