Re: Why does Ubuntu have all the ideas?
I cannot 100% agree with You, althought Your point is for sure partially
valid.
I really don't believe that Debian can equal itself with Ubuntu in terms
of user friendliness. There is so much to say about that, that I hardly
can remember the very concrete cases, so please don't attack me on that
basis. I use Debian for 4 years now and my impression about it is valid,
because is based on facing and (if lucky) fixing problems. Many of them
I have happily forgotten right after fixing, but the allround impression
about Debian's user friendliness remains.
1, Ubuntu places the care about the average-Joe-user at first place at
worst. Debian dosen't.
1a, Often it seems that ideological problems put anything else aside. I
don't tell the ideology is not valid; I just tell that often this is in
the state "Users, wait until we solve this ideologically, it may take
some years". Well, user dosen't have the years and need things working,
so he either does it himself (if he is sortof admin) by downloading,
compiling etc, or says "Things don't work in Debian and it's too
difficult to solve it. I'll better stick with XYZ".
Others care about ideology too, but by the time MAKE THE THINGS WORK
SOMEHOW as painless as possible for the end user, until the ideologists
say their last word.
Simple examples: Mplayer, codecs, M$ True Type fonts, Java, flash.
1b, If things don't work, it's sometimes hard to get them working
either. Example: Bug 372719. The OOo 2.0 keeps crashing for 2 months
thank to KNOWN bug in security upgrade. Now tell somebody, that Debian
is as good _for_average_Joe_user_ as Ubuntu. Or that Debian cares about
average_Joe_user at least as much as Ubuntu does.
Of course that there always will be bugs. It's normal in evoluting
project; We are mankind and always do mistakes. However, facing them and
solving (or not solving) makes a picture about our priorities and goals.
In case of Debian, average-Joe-user for sure is not a priority; jokes aside.
1c, Other cases are when something CAN be done in Debian, and even
documentation exists, but it is quite complicated and time consuming,
and truly should be much easier. Mostly the installer's playground to
make life easier and set up things. For example, to automatically
install national fonts and translation packages if the user already
entered his location and national data.
I use K3B and has been ready to contribute the Slovak translation. Only
on K3B's site I realised that translation exists. Then I have found the
k3b-l18n package, and whoila, K3B is localised.
And so on.
2, The current software gets into main distribution too slowly, too too
slowly. Yes, of course, stability, security..
Think about, say, Mozilla Firefox. We keep in repository some 1.0.3
version? (I don't really know, I prefer using current stable release,
this time 1.5.0.6)
I doubt that mozilla.org supports either way that ancient version. Is it
even possible to keep track with _all_ security and stability updates
and backport them to that version? I really doubt.
I can imagine, that the Debian's 1.0.3 version is no way more secure nor
stable than standard 1.5.0.6.
We should, for certain kinds of software, shorten the release cycle to,
say, 6 months. Debian can afford the luxury of keeping the basic system
infrastructure for 18 months, however the desktop software grows very
fast, user's often depend on its functionality (OpenOffice.org import
capabilities to mention some), and it's nearly impossible to maintain
that old software in meaningful way. And who will ever use that ancient
versions at the end.. Especially painful in the end time of release's
lifecycle.
3, Desktop functionality
Just try to compare, what do we offer with standard Debian desktop and
how much of that really works at the end, and how much does Ubuntu
offer. Try to do some real-world testing; ask the average-Joe-user. Just
put him in front of standard Debian 3.1 Sarge desktop after
installation, and Ubuntu 6.06 desktop right after installation, without
any admin's actions. Let him perform his routine tasks: setting up the
mailbox, Internet, printer, browse, play a flash game, write a document
and print it, play a video or music. Try it Yourself and try to avoid
any non-straightforward actions. Avoid "cheating" by using
administrator's skills. Try to use only "what the desktop offers", don't
even open the console. You will be surprised.
Conclusion:
Debian lacks in the means of propagation, yes.
Debian much more lacks the focus on average desktop user.
Maybe, Etch will bring some fresh air in here. However, we cannot
compare the testing versions:
First, many things can change until it becomes stable. Remember the
Vista and advertised features in the past :o)
Second, Etch is hardly installable for average-Joe-user and I doubt it
is useful enough in its current state. To be more polite, let's say,
that Joe should have been very lucky if he was able to just download
iso's, install the system, and it worked out of box. (I tryed to, will
try again, but wasn't successfull enough, so I can doubt that Joe will
perform better)
Third, average-Joe-user will not reach for "testing" version. He wants
to use his computer, not "do some testing". He will choose the "stable"
version.
Peter
Rudy Godoy wrote / napísal(a):
> tell that we can't? nothing. All what they advertise we do offer. But we
> are not good on advertise our OS.
>
> We need to tell people: Debian is fine for you because it allows you to
> get your work done and be productive, whether you are an artist,
> corporate employee, student, doctor, etc.
> No, I still believe we need more people and relations with press, and
> not only the technical ones, we should advertise more our work and
> good experiences like donzka, LinEx, and the others. Not only tell
> ourselves: we know we are doing things better. We should tell it to
> others too!
>
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