The Ubuntu Desktop Consumer Product
It’s Thanks Giving day here in the USA and what better day than to ask a question about consumerism: Is the direction of Ubuntu gearing it’s self for simple consumer grade computing?
Disclosure: I’ve always held out hope of getting inkscape included by default in Ubuntu.
A clue is in the recent planned removal of Gimp from the Lucid CD, if you look at the size of gimp and all it’s dependencies on the CD, you find lots of fat, so it’s not a surprise that it’s under pressure to be removed. Although devels explaining the removal with hand waving that F-Spot is to be the replacement was surely a bad political misstep, even if it’s probably a reasonable technical move.
The problem for me is a lack of regard for what I like to call: “The involved user”, people who are not just consuming data from their computers but are involved and get the feeling that their involvement is welcomed by default. This has always been something that distinguished FreeDesktops like Ubuntu, they contained not just programs for viewing interesting things, but all the tools required to also make a great deal of them.
This is what Walter Bender of Sugar labs would call “Making the mountains of learning available and visible to clime for everyone, even if only a few end up doing so”. That’s why we bother to make careful selections on what goes on the CD, those applications are the chosen few that will shape and mould the users understanding of the capabilities and user expectations of the system.
The mountain that is the drawing arts was just painted pink and a Someone Else’s Problem field was set up, rendering the entire artistic field invisible to new users. How do new users discover that they can make artworks with their computers? No solutions have yet been devised to solve this discovery problem. I’d like to point out that even windows has MS Paint, people who want to paint have a clear simple method for doing so on their computers and then they figure out that there must be better tools and are motivated to find them.
I think this simplified direction stems from a perception that Ubuntu should not be “for human beings”, but for the lowest common human possible (“Linux for Neanderthals” anyone?). This is at best a caricature that the devels have set up in their minds, imaginary people that we convince ourselves must be served in order to fix bug #1. These are the common people who only ever retouch the red eye in their photographs and never do anything creative like stick the head of their aunt onto the body of an donkey as an April Fools joke. These are the people who are not and will never be interested in a computer more functional than a television, and more fool those that present these users with any sort of creative outlet.
What makes this journey down to common denominator interesting is that this simple user case is and will be solved by other products. ChromeOS, Android and iPhone and is already looking to take the market of all those people who just want to go online and never want to do anything useful, and they’ll probably be doing it better than Ubuntu. Does Ubuntu really want to strip anything interesting and unique away from it’s default selection, so the only thing we’re left with is a rather bland bare bones base that we will always have to install extra programs on top of?
Surely the art of the computer is not just to provide a google-box for the sofa generation, but to furnish people with the tools and just as importantly the visibility that these tools exist and are available to everyone. Perhaps the problem I have with the direction being taken is not anything technical, but is a lot more to do with the myopia that surrounds a certain expectation about what the council estate users will want from their computers.
Perhaps in the end, if we can’t have tools like Inkscape, Audacity, Gimp and OpenOffice installed by default, then perhaps we should have a good mechanism that clearly shows their availability and install them through it, it was talked about at the session that we should have the software center provide this featured app list, perhaps that will work. And for poorly connected nations such as those in Africa, perhaps we should master a second CD to send to them. One that contains all the debs that complete their systems and give them creative tools as well, instead of struggling to decide what to include on a single CD and causing headaches for anyone not on the list of designated target consumers.
Tags: consumerism, critism, gimp, lucid, review, Ubuntu
The decision wasn’t to replace gimp with f-spot. We plan to add basic edit operations to f-spot for photos not in your library. There are plans for a software center feature that will include recommended applications, favorites, etc. Gimp will surely make that list and I think getting inkscape on that list would also be great.
Perhaps there should be a LiveCD and an install DVD like other distros use. The LiveCD would primarily be used to ensure hardware compatibility and the DVD for the full I am ready to use this install.
Maybe a second CD would be really better than removing stuff. In the end the usefulness of Ubuntu should not be limited by the size of a CD: if a drawing/painting app is considered important and all other apps are considered important as well, then it seems wrong to conclude with “well we just have to remove an important application” – it’s not a real solution.
That said, maybe for a start there could be a second list of “suggested applications”, including Gimp and Inkscape and other apps that didn’t fit on the main CD. Then the main CD could be targeted at “installing a system with desktop environment, browser, email, and drivers”; and the second list could be turned into a CD targeted at “extending a base Ubuntu installation to offer selected high-quality, useful applications for many different tasks”.
Personally I’d then only download the main CD and then install the second list with apt; but it would be a huge advantage if there _was_ such a list, so you could install a nice system without manually having to decide which apps are high-quality and useful.
It was always a big paradox that the “Where will you go today”, “What will you make next” and “Take control of your stuff” advertising from the major commercial forces always promised the ability to be creative, but never delivered. The limited, deliberately impaired and “taster” artistic software has soured many people’s experience – that applies to drawing, painting, music and video creation.
How many people who buy a PC intending to be creative actually end up editing video, composing music and painting? In my experience, most never get beyond consuming entertainment, whatever their aspirations.
Linux has always promised and delivered fully functional tools without dead-ends. Your Gimp for fixing red-eye was the same as an artist’s Gimp, not “Gold Premium Exclusive” entry-level rubbish. Your entry-level Ardour, Rosegarden or KDEnlive are the full Monty. There is no attempt to patronise the bulk of the user-base with shallow-learning-curve, low-achieving crapware that leads to dissapointment.
I would not like to see “easy” software guiding new users into bad habits of data mismanagement.
I completely and utterly disagree with this blog in every regard.
Your comments regarding ‘Linux for Neanderthals’ are particularly disappointing as they harken back the dark ages of Linux when everyday users were shunned. Why exactly do you love and promote Ubuntu if you think an average computer user is a ‘Neanderthal’? Do you not realise that Ubuntu’s whole philosophy is to make Linux palpable for exactly the kinds of users who find Gimp too complicated?
Secondly,
If you watch the video of the meeting regarding GIMP they discuss the aspect of how will people ‘discover’ these tools, and they discussed the solution, which IMO is much better than having it in the live CD. Namely they will advertise the GIMP in the software centre.
This is ultimately the solution for a lot of software which is great but for whatever reason shouldn’t be on the disc. If you could go into the Software Centre and see a really nicely put together art and design section that showed you Inkscape, Gimp and Blender etc, and this section put them all in context of what they were for and what they all did, and had links to tutorials for them as well as simply the install button, can you not see how that is a better solution in the long run?
Granted, the Software centre is not yet an all singing and dancing awesome platform that has all these features, but at very least it will have an editors pick type section by 10.04, and guess what will be included in it? Gimp (and probably Inkscape too!)
There’s already the DVD image, which contains a lot more packages than the CD.
The way things are going, the ‘poorly connected’ will not be Africa, it will be rural USA.
While I am an advocate for removing Evolution, (I’m not saying that Thunderbird or gmail are ‘better’ just that both solve the essential problem that Evolution was supposed to, and from what I’ve been able to tell never has) the basic problem is that someone has decided that the CD is the largest distribution unit that will be used.
I realize that CD’s are available with the vast majority of computers on the market today, just as Floppies were 15 years ago, but we are already seeing a move away with Netbooks that don’t have a CD or DVD drive at all.
At the moment, I don’t know of a Netbook that does not have an SD-Card or USB port though, and from the perspective of computers going forward a combined SD-Card/USB drive like those offered by sandisk would provide far more capacity, durability, and could be used either ‘live’ all the time, or as an install platform.
Yes, the media is more expensive at the moment, but that was true of CDs in the era of Floppy disks as well. Perhaps not for mass printed disks, but definitely for blank media.
And at the moment, you would have to look pretty hard to find a computer that can’t be booted from either SD or USB.
I only ever use gimp when I’m developing software. It’s a specialist app (kinda like photoshop, or a CAD tool). It takes a lot of time to learn, and lots of googling to use properly. Every time I have to use it, I cringe.
As long as gimp is easy to discover and install then removing it is fine. If we added a hook to gimp’s installation to show a tutorial video or document, then I think it would be a net win for Ubuntu.
The discussion of what to install in its place (ie, an easy-to-use photo manager) is a bigger question.
I think the whole discussion is crazy. Why not have a “live DVD”? Why would you limit yourself to the size of a CD? One of the reasons I use Opensuse is because of the DVD installer. I can add external repos along with the software on the DVD, add/remove what I want, and have exactly what I need after the install is finished. A very small percentage of users actually keep the default app selection anyway.
There are several good ideas in this thread and I will add one more.
Why not provide a 700 MB livecd image as is done now. Additionally provide an expanded edition with more apps. This could be about 950 MB and would fit on a 1 GB USBflash drive. As flash drives drop in price CD’s will be obsolete anyway in a few years.
Echoing what someone else said above, but with adding my own twist into the mix, I suggest the following:
1) Make a “Core CD” for installation and Live CD options.
2) Make a “Suggested Applications” CD
3) Make a DVD which includes all of 1 & 2 with the options of installing just 1, just 2, or both at once. (1 first, then 2)
Older systems without DVD drives can use the CDs, newer systems can use the DVDs, and both CD ISOs and the DVD ISO can be downloaded like the current ISOs are.
Ubuntu has something like 25,000 programs you can install, so making an all-inclusive installation is impossible and redundant. Leave Gimp in, add Inkscape, etc. No, we don’t need 10 graphics apps in Ubuntu, and again, that’s what the Software Center / Add/Remove is for. The key is not which packages to really install, but rather which packages to inform people about. It’s more about education than installation because you can install a GREAT software on a PC, but if the person doesn’t know how to use it (or that it even exists), then what’s the point of it being installed?
I think to choose which apps should be installed should be based on ease of use, flexibility, compatibility, etc For example, for an office suite, OpenOffice.org is a no-brainer. It’s all you need. It works. It’s flexible and easy to use, compatible with OO on all PCs and even with the mainstream Microsoft Office. Done deal.
Let’s not get into a giant debate fueld by emotions over which applicatiosn to install. Look at it objectively from a functionality point of view and what will serve the most people, without dumbing it down. This is where the educational part is key. “Ok. here is program X that does THIS, it will work, it’s blah blah blah and here is program Y which etc etc etc”". Let people un/install what they want, but educate them so they know what do un/install, how to use it, not use it, and why.
Software is always secondary to knowledge.
About the discoverability of apps, you could take inspiration from how kubuntu included firefox.
Firefox is too large to include by default, but a menu entry is created nevertheless. If the user clicks this, it will prompt to install firefox.
You could include a large section of default applications that are not installed in the menu: gimp “photo editor”, kdenlive “video sequencer”, audacity “audio editor”, …
Neanderthal, it’s a caricature, an illustration of the idea that common users are common in mind.
I teach Ubuntu to users all the time, I know the people who Ubuntu is serving on the ground. I’m not ignorant of them or arrogant enough to assume that they all must learn everything. But my users would like to know that things exist.
Not a bad idea, but I would find that annoying. It would give the less-technical people a perception that “you have to download everything” or that Ubuntu is somehow “not complete” or “has all those extra steps just to get it to work” etc. I know what you mean; and no way is a perfect fit for everyone, but you need to try and reach the masses (to a point) without too much hassle.
The people who treat their PC the same as they do a microwave, is probably not the user for Linux.
The alternate CD already has a lot of extras as well.
Getting rid of the Alternate CD through shipit was a horrible idea anyway. (Whether it was a conscious decision or just “hey, we have a single CD thats live and an installer!)
Shipit was supposed to help people who don’t have access to the internet/etc, by continuing to ship them the Desktop CD over and over again, they can’t upgrade. They’re stuck reinstalling every 6mo/2yr.
Wow – Linux for Neanderthals. I’m glad this started as a nice, genial conversation starter.
Why is it that we get so personally involved in arguments that are, push come to shove, not the end of the world?
I think the Software Center is _THE_ solution to these types of problems. No CD (or USB key or DVD) is going to have the software that everyone is going to want, nor should it. Linux users have different interests and I think it’s fair to say that many of these users don’t give a hoot about editing a photo or painting with their laptop.
The Gimp is not a widely used application. It is widely used by people interested in creating digital pictures. This is a minority of users, even in a community as creative as the Linux community. I think the Ubuntu Devs are right, it’s not a necessary component of the base system. I would be furious if they removed it from the repository, but I’m not going to get worked up about it being removed from the CD.
In contrast to you, I am very attracted to the idea of a core system that gives _me_ the opportunity to build the system that _I_ want. My father would be more interested in genealogy software than the Gimp, but the core system should not include genealogy software. Most users won’t want it.
I think the default installation should be small and, as much as possible, guarantee that the new users can easily connect to the wider world. Linux really should capitalize on the success of the iPhone and make it easy to install software. Compared to the narrow selection of apps for the iPhone – Linux really does have “an app for that”.
The success of the iPhone, Crackberry, etc. proves that users ARE capable of finding applications that are useful and interesting to them. They start with a simple, core system and they build a system that meets their needs.
The Software Centre is the solution. While the iPhone proves that users are capable of building a system they like, we do need to do all that we can to make it easier to find the best software. Synaptic and KPackagekit aren’t the solutions. I hope the Software Center is. Then we can all have our own Linux and we won’t have to argue about which app goes onto the CD.
why not include paint.Net? http://code.google.com/p/paint-mono/
Suicide.
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