Recommended Linux distribution or known pitfals with Linux

[hansnf]

Dear scratcher,

I am trying to install the GUI local on several Linux-based machines. All I need is to checkout, run npm install and npm start. However, I have different errors on different machines running either Ubuntu 20 or Ubuntu 24. It works, however, on my MacBook.
Is there a recommendated Linux distribution or are there known pitfalls with Ubuntu?

Kind regards

[pumpkinhasapatch]

Scratch does not have official builds for Linux based systems. Different Linux systems come with different library programs, which is why a program may work on one distribution and crash or have strange effects on another. The npm/node install seems to be for development purposes and not general use, and you are likely getting dependency/library errors from running it on Ubuntu.

I recommend looking into pre-built packages from TurboWarp Desktop. It is an actively maintained fork of Scratch and offers several types of Linux packages for almost every distro, though it has some advanced features not present in vanilla Scratch that may confuse younger users if you are installing this in a school.

I also found this Flathub wrapper based on the repository here. Flatpaks run in a sandboxed environment which can solve dependency and library errors, and work on any Linux distribution that has Flatpak install. This wrapper is outdated and missing some of Scratch's latest updates, but is still usable if you just need a working copy of Scratch.