[Ayatana] What most people would find useful (was: Re: Updates on Login )
Joshua Blount wrote: It may be a good idea, as David suggested, to look past our personal user stories, and look for what most people would find useful. "Most useful" here is probably somewhat synonymous with "least surprising". If the target default Ubuntu end user comes from a Microsoft Windows background, then the Windows XP SP2 style is what that user is probably familiar with: (a) At installation or first use, there is a screen indicating that auto update will be enabled; (b) Daily automatic updates in the background at 3am; (c) The user can alter this, but very few do. I'm not sure that is going to win many hearts and minds, and clearly it is not innovative... but it is what many users have come to expect their computers to do, because bug #1 is not yet fixed! One problem is that this behaviour is not what current Ubuntu users expect, so some existing Ubuntu users (power users???) probably *will* be surprised, and (perhaps as evidenced by this discussion and the 300+ comments on a single bug) they are likely to be vocal about their unhappiness. Another problem is that automated updates by default are bad for some users -- those with slow or expensive Internet connections. If the primary issue being addressed is "many users rarely or never update their systems; how can we get more users to update more often", then an automated update by default is probably the most effective and most convenient solution. If we accept that, then how to best address the "slow or expensive Internet connection" issues for the minority becomes a secondary question. Important, but secondary. All the "update on login vs logoff vs pop-under vs where-do-we-put-the-icon" or "how exactly do we notify or prompt the user about updates" debate is *only* relevant for the users in this minority, if the default for the well-connected majority is a fully automated background update. (I don't know of statistics on the fraction of Ubuntu users with slow or expensive connections vs those with fast-enough and unlimited-enough ones -- does anyone have such info?). BOTTOM LINE: Default to fully automated updates, unless circumstances are exceptional. Further thoughts: Are there ways the system can try to determine "I'm on a slow connection" (ping latency to a Ubuntu server? Test throughput for a small file download?) and so defer an automated update in those circumstances? Or just let the user specify this per interface? I don't think there's a way to automatically determine "I'm on an expensive connection", so users would (presumably) need to provide info on that when a network connection is first configured. Would it make sense for users to specify whether or not a given network connection is "expensive" (and/or "slow"), so that an automated updater can "do the right thing"? Are there other network applications that would find knowing whether a given network connection was "slow" or "expensive" useful so they could adapt their behaviour (BitTorrent? Streaming audio/video players?) ? One last (perhaps weirder) thought: for those with mobile devices that generally have a slow/expensive wireless connection, having a home/office PC or NAS box act as a Ubuntu mirror, so updates from it are really fast when the mobile device is "home", might be worth exploring. For "notebook + smartphone + home media server" type households, this could be very convenient. Right now, local Ubuntu mirrors (or just Ubuntu *update* mirrors) at home or in the office are for the techie few only... is this something we could or should be looking to make significantly easier, to help with the whole update issue? Jonathan ___ Mailing list: https://launchpad.net/~ayatana Post to : ayatana@lists.launchpad.net Unsubscribe : https://launchpad.net/~ayatana More help : https://help.launchpad.net/ListHelp
Re: [Ayatana] What most people would find useful (was: Re: Updates on Login )
I'd add, rather than 're brand' the updates, some line of explanation in the update window or notification may enhance things quite a bit. In Windows people don't upgrade the system because they know it will make it slower, or will send their data to some anti-piracy database or stuff like that. A short sentence like "System updates will ensure best functioning of your system, correct existing problems, enhance your security and make your experience a lot better !" may help. As stupid as it may seem. Stefano ___ Mailing list: https://launchpad.net/~ayatana Post to : ayatana@lists.launchpad.net Unsubscribe : https://launchpad.net/~ayatana More help : https://help.launchpad.net/ListHelp
Re: [Ayatana] What most people would find useful (was: Re: Updates on Login )
This discussion has grown big enough for it to deserve several wiki pages about several points, so it'd be really great to stop splitting it and changing its name, cause i just can't follow anymore. PS : sorry for the offtopic :) ___ Mailing list: https://launchpad.net/~ayatana Post to : ayatana@lists.launchpad.net Unsubscribe : https://launchpad.net/~ayatana More help : https://help.launchpad.net/ListHelp
Re: [Ayatana] What most people would find useful (was: Re: Updates on Login )
On Thu, 18 Jun 2009 14:45:39 -0700 Jonathan Marsden wrote: >Joshua Blount wrote: > >> It may be a good idea, as David suggested, to look past our personal >> user stories, and look for what most people would find useful. > >"Most useful" here is probably somewhat synonymous with "least >surprising". If the target default Ubuntu end user comes from a >Microsoft Windows background, then the Windows XP SP2 style is what that >user is probably familiar with: (a) At installation or first use, there >is a screen indicating that auto update will be enabled; (b) Daily >automatic updates in the background at 3am; (c) The user can alter this, >but very few do. > >I'm not sure that is going to win many hearts and minds, and clearly it >is not innovative... but it is what many users have come to expect their >computers to do, because bug #1 is not yet fixed! > >One problem is that this behaviour is not what current Ubuntu users >expect, so some existing Ubuntu users (power users???) probably *will* >be surprised, and (perhaps as evidenced by this discussion and the 300+ >comments on a single bug) they are likely to be vocal about their >unhappiness. This is about how updates are presented and some orthogonal to when/if users should be asked. >Another problem is that automated updates by default are bad for some >users -- those with slow or expensive Internet connections. > >If the primary issue being addressed is "many users rarely or never >update their systems; how can we get more users to update more often", >then an automated update by default is probably the most effective and >most convenient solution. > >If we accept that, then how to best address the "slow or expensive >Internet connection" issues for the minority becomes a secondary >question. Important, but secondary. All the "update on login vs logoff >vs pop-under vs where-do-we-put-the-icon" or "how exactly do we notify >or prompt the user about updates" debate is *only* relevant for the >users in this minority, if the default for the well-connected majority >is a fully automated background update. (I don't know of statistics on >the fraction of Ubuntu users with slow or expensive connections vs those >with fast-enough and unlimited-enough ones -- does anyone have such info?). > >BOTTOM LINE: Default to fully automated updates, unless circumstances >are exceptional. > >Further thoughts: Are there ways the system can try to determine "I'm on >a slow connection" (ping latency to a Ubuntu server? Test throughput >for a small file download?) and so defer an automated update in those >circumstances? Or just let the user specify this per interface? I >don't think there's a way to automatically determine "I'm on an >expensive connection", so users would (presumably) need to provide info >on that when a network connection is first configured. > >Would it make sense for users to specify whether or not a given network >connection is "expensive" (and/or "slow"), so that an automated updater >can "do the right thing"? Are there other network applications that >would find knowing whether a given network connection was "slow" or >"expensive" useful so they could adapt their behaviour (BitTorrent? >Streaming audio/video players?) ? > >One last (perhaps weirder) thought: for those with mobile devices that >generally have a slow/expensive wireless connection, having a >home/office PC or NAS box act as a Ubuntu mirror, so updates from it are >really fast when the mobile device is "home", might be worth exploring. > For "notebook + smartphone + home media server" type households, this >could be very convenient. Right now, local Ubuntu mirrors (or just >Ubuntu *update* mirrors) at home or in the office are for the techie few >only... is this something we could or should be looking to make >significantly easier, to help with the whole update issue? Every time you update a working system there is a risk. For myself, I don't apply anything except critical security updates when I'm travelling. I think the biggest problem with automatic updates is that it puts systems at some non-zero risk for the sake of fixing something that probably isn't relevant to their systems. Non-security updates only help people who were experiencing that particular problem. Most security issues only relate to local security problems and tend to be much less relevant on single user systems. Other issues may be quite severe, but still unsuitable for automatic updates because of unavoidable side effects. An example of this is last year's openssl bug. If that had been delivered automatically, it would have caused people to be locked out of systems. If we want to deliver updates automatically (I think this merits serious consideration), then we will need a new scheme to mark updates as appropriate for automatic delivery. These would also probably need some additional QA to reduce the risk for users installing the update with no
Re: [Ayatana] What most people would find useful (was: Re: Updates on Login )
> I think the biggest problem with automatic updates is that it puts systems > at some non-zero risk for the sake of fixing something that probably isn't > relevant to their systems. Wonderful point. I don't upgrade my system at all while I'm traveling. Stefano ___ Mailing list: https://launchpad.net/~ayatana Post to : ayatana@lists.launchpad.net Unsubscribe : https://launchpad.net/~ayatana More help : https://help.launchpad.net/ListHelp
Re: [Ayatana] What most people would find useful (was: Re: Updates on Login )
Il giorno gio, 18/06/2009 alle 18.25 -0400, Scott Kitterman ha scritto: > These would also probably need some > additional QA to reduce the risk for users installing the update with > no > chance to consider if it would be a good update for them. I will trust no human on that :) If you have a way to prove that I can get rid of an unwanted side effect it's ok. E.g: just find a way (unionfs??) to install the upgrades *and* allow me to boot a system *without* them. It may be difficult or easy but provable safety is the only way to go. For security upgrades, that do not typically induce file format change (like e.g. major updates of evolution), using an unionfs with the updates seems viable. That'd open the way to automatic security upgrades and stop the whole thing. For bug fixes, it may even be "every six months". That way, perhaps, it would not become an option to release things broken. Vincenzo ___ Mailing list: https://launchpad.net/~ayatana Post to : ayatana@lists.launchpad.net Unsubscribe : https://launchpad.net/~ayatana More help : https://help.launchpad.net/ListHelp
Re: [Ayatana] What most people would find useful (was: Re: Updates on Login )
On Thu, Jun 18, 2009 at 11:45 PM, Jonathan Marsden wrote: > Further thoughts: Are there ways the system can try to determine "I'm on a > slow connection" (ping latency to a Ubuntu server? Test throughput for a > small file download?) and so defer an automated update in those > circumstances? Or just let the user specify this per interface? It could just start downloading the first update and if download speed is below a certain threshold, try resuming at a later time (after some specified interval). Wouter ___ Mailing list: https://launchpad.net/~ayatana Post to : ayatana@lists.launchpad.net Unsubscribe : https://launchpad.net/~ayatana More help : https://help.launchpad.net/ListHelp
