Re: Bug#758116: Allow to select Blends selection during installation - just "DE", "Web server", "Mail server" is NOT enough
Hi Christian,
I agree that the best compromise would probably be to have a separate
page "Debian Pure Blends". But someone should implement this -- any
volunteers? I myself don't have enough Perl knowledge to do this.
However, I don't understand your rationale here:
Am 18.05.2016 um 07:25 schrieb Christian Perrier:
> At first, I'm not happy with the idea of Pure Blends tasks mixing up
> with standard tasks. I fully respect the work done by the variou
> sblends teams, but having our usual longstanding "standard" tasks
> kinda lost in the middle of "strange" and obscure tasks which the
> average user has no idea about what they're about...is a no-no for
> me.
The "standard" task is IMO one of the concepts in this step that
actually *nobody* understands: I myself don't know what it means, and
all the people I asked (when I presented the current scheme of
installing the blends) have no idea what happens if they (de)select this.
The help text in the tasks file (which is anyway not displayed in
tasksel) does not help: f.e. if I want to use Debian for web browsing
and e-mail, shall I install it? If I am a Java developer? The "standard"
task itself is "obscure"; IMO even more than an "DebiChem" task (where
already the name suggests that you don't need it if you are not
interested in chemistry).
> I still remember Joey's objections about *not* having users forced
> to choose between desktop environments....because, contrary to what
> the average geek thinks, most people have no idea about what is a
> desktop environment. So, just imagine if we present them with
> "Hamradio", "NeuroDebian", "Debian Med" and such a list of unsorted
> strange things.
So, if the average user doesn't have a glue about a Desktop environment,
why is it offered in the installation by default? You seem to contradict
to your own arguments here.
In my opinion, the situation for the Debian Pure Blends is better here
than for the Desktop environments: If a user doesn't know what the
Blends mean, he just ignores it and doesn't install anything from it.
This will cause no harm -- he will just not get something he anyway
doesn't know about. But if a user doesn't understand what a "Desktop
environment" is and therefore decides to not install it, he may left
with an installation that he did not expect, and may have no chance to
correct this without external help. Therefore it may be better to hide
the desktop environment choice as well.
> That leaves us with the idea of a "Debian Blends" choice in the
> standard task menu, which would lead to a dedicated "blends" menu. I
> think this is the best compromise to do, provided we find a good name
> for the menu entry : "Debian Blends" or "Debian pure Blends" is a
> great name for the project in its entirety...but probably not for the
> menu entry. Again, because it means nothing to Joe User.
>
> So, with something like "Special-purpose packages" or "Specialized
> installations" or whatever along those lines, *then* a menu with the
> Blends list (unsorted) and the possibility of going back just in
> case people see the list and think "heck, I have no idea about what
> this stuff is about"....then I'd say this is the way to go.
>
I personally don't have problems with changing this; however this would
open again the discussion about the names -- IMO we should be consistent
here. We can't call them "Specialized Installations" in the installer,
but "Debian Pure Blends" on the web page. Renaming would have a tail of
renaming it everywhere.
So, I would propose to explain the name and the concept in the
installer. There is already some text in the debian-blends-tasks.desc
that would help to explain it -- it should just be displayed. Again, it
would help much if tasksel would be able to display the help texts that
are already there, and IMO if the programming efforts are limited, we
would gain more in implementing help texts instead of separating the
blends from the desktop environments.
Best regards
Ole
Reply to: