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Re: Why?



Paul E Condon wrote:
On Fri, Jul 14, 2006 at 10:40:07AM +0200, Johannes Wiedersich wrote:
Paul E Condon wrote:
But some posters to this thread seem to be unaware that selecting
"Desk top" during install of Debian causes -both- kde -and- gnome to
be installed. So, I believe almost all of those newbies about whom we
are genuinely concerned already have both on their computer.  And
-both- gdm -and- kdm can be told to start up either kdm or gnome.
(xdm doesn't seem to have this feature.)
Yes, but still I believe the question should be asked. Newbies don't know there is a choice and find themselves in default gnome before they have a chance to decide. Experts have to know that they manually have to select kde before they log in.

I don't remember how often I sat in front of a newly installed computer, thoughtlessly entering username and password, accidentially starting gnome, switching to the console, removing all the autogenerated gnome config files, selecting kde or xfce and logging in again....

It certainly isn't an unnecessary question to be asked on installation!

Strictly speaking, it is unnecessary. The installation gets done successfully
without it being asked. A more appropriate question might be, it is useful?

Agreed.

For a real newbie, the idea that there different competing user interfaces is
a real mind bender. For a person like you who knows about it and knows what he wants, the question would be a useful reminder to choose now what you will otherwise choose later.

Well, when I switched our workstation park from suse to debian I wasn't in a position to know how to change that default to kde, so that our users would 'automatically' find their familiar desktop. It would have helped me to have that question asked.

There could be a short dialogue stating the main differences between -say gnome, kde, icewm- and offering a default selection. Experts with many systems to install to will skip that question by preseeding.

That's just my opinion.

Johannes



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