One of the biggest new features in April’s launch of Ubuntu 16.04 was the introduction of support for a new way to install applications.

But the new feature, called Snappy, isn’t just for Ubuntu alone. Now, Canonical Ltd., the company behind Ubuntu, has said it’s collaborating with the developers of numerous other popular Linux distributions to make Snappy work natively, in Arch Linux and Debian Linux already, and in other distros later.

It’s probably a little premature to say that the Snap format is a “universal Linux package” as Canonical is already claiming, because it the developers of each distro still need to choose to support the new format. But widespread adoption of Snaps, which looks likely, would go a long way towards eliminating the fragmentation that’s endemic in Linux-based systems.

Ubuntu’s Snap packages were created to make it easy to install software. The ‘snap’ comes packaged with all of an application’s software dependencies, and it’s fairly secure too because applications are all sand-boxed from one another. Snaps can also help developers to update their apps more rapidly, because they can be updated automatically even before they hit each specific distro’s repository.

Snappy debuted in December 2014 as a new way to handle packages for small, embedded systems for Internet of things (IoT) applications. The Snappy packaging system was previewed in the Ubuntu Linux 15.04 release in April 2015, and by May 2015, Snappy had already found its way into networking switches and even IoT refrigerators and now Snappy is expanding even further.

Interestingly, Mark Shuttleworth, founder of Ubuntu Linux and Canonical, told eWeek he never expected that others would ask about porting Snaps to other Linux distributions. As such, Snappy’s emergence as a potential universal Linux package was totally unplanned, although Shuttleworth said he’s happy if it helps solve the fragmentation issues around Linux.

“I care quite a lot about fragmentation in the Linux ecosystem and how that holds back users from choosing the Linux distribution they want, and how software vendors can deliver software to a wide audience of Linux users,” Shuttleworth said.

Shuttleworth’s belief is that if Snappy packages catch on, the process of developing software for different Linux variants will be greatly simplified. Developers will only need to create a single installation package that can work across most Linux distributions. In addition, developers will only need to roll out an update once, and that will push new features and security fixes to all supported operating systems at the same time.

Canonical has lined up dozens of testimonials from developers that are already seeing the benefits of Snaps, such as Boudewijn Rempt, who leads the Krita Project.

“Maintaining .deb packages in a private repository was complex and time consuming, snaps are much easier to maintain, package and distribute,” Rempt said. “Putting the snap in the store was particularly simple, this is the most streamlined app store I have published software in.”

Before Snaps, every Linux distribution has its own special way of installing software. For example, Fedora uses .rpm files, while Ubuntu and Debian both use .deb files.

While Arch Linux and Debian are already supporting Snaps, distributions such as CentOS, ElementaryOS, Gentoo, Linux Mint, OpenSUSE, OpenWRT and Red Hat Enterprise Linux are all validating support and likely to join the party soon.