In this guide, I’ll take you through the steps to install and use snapd service on Arch Linux / Manjaro and other Arch based Linux distributions. Snap is a software deployment and package management tool originally designed and built by Canonical which works across a range of Linux distributions.
The packages are called ‘snaps‘ and the tool for using them is ‘snapd‘. Snap enables you to run distro-agnostic upstream software packages on your system. Snap bundles most of the libraries and runtimes needed by the application and can be updated and reverted without affecting the rest of the system.
Install Snap on Arch Linux / Manjaro
To install Snapd on Arch Linux, you can use
sudo pacman -S snapd
For AUR, you need to have AUR helper installed. In this guide, I recommend yay which can easily be installed using:
Install yay AUR helper on Arch/Manjaro
Once yay is installed, use it to install Snap.
yay -S --noconfirm --needed snapd
You can do same installation with yaourt.
yaourt -S snapd
Start and enable snapd service.
sudo systemctl enable --now snapd.socket
Confirm service status.
$ systemctl status snapd.socket
● snapd.socket - Socket activation for snappy daemon
Loaded: loaded (/usr/lib/systemd/system/snapd.socket; enabled; vendor preset: disabled)
Active: active (listening) since Sat 2019-03-30 13:34:57 EAT; 1min 41s ago
Listen: /run/snapd.socket (Stream)
/run/snapd-snap.socket (Stream)
Tasks: 0 (limit: 4915)
Memory: 32.0K
CGroup: /system.slice/snapd.socket
Mar 30 13:34:57 arch.localhost systemd[1]: Starting Socket activation for snappy daemon.
Mar 30 13:34:57 arch.localhost systemd[1]: Listening on Socket activation for snappy daemon.
To enable classic snap support, create a symbolic link between /var/lib/snapd/snap and /snap:
sudo ln -s /var/lib/snapd/snap /snap
Since the binary file is located under,/snap/bin/ we need to add this to the $PATHvariable.
echo "export PATH=\$PATH:\/snap/bin/" | sudo tee -a /etc/profile
Source the file to get new PATH
source /etc/profile
Snapd is now ready for use. You interact with it using the snap command. See help page below:
snap --help
Test your system by installing the hello-world snap and make sure it runs correctly:
$ sudo snap install hello-world
2019-03-30T13:41:22+03:00 INFO Waiting for restart…
hello-world 6.3 from Canonical✓ installed
List installed snaps.
$ snap list
Name Version Rev Tracking Publisher Notes
core 16-2.38 6673 stable canonical✓ core
hello-world 6.3 27 stable canonical✓ -
Remove snap.
$ sudo snap remove hello-world
hello-world removed
Congratulations!. Snap has been installed successfully on your Arch/Manjaro. Check Snap documentation for more.
For other Linux distributions, check:
How To Install Snap on Ubuntu / Debian Linux
