Canonical (does not) begin tracking Ubuntu Installations

[Tommy Trussell]

On Sun, Aug 15, 2010 at 5:29 AM, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 15 August 2010 11:16, Paul Sladen <ubuntu at paul.sladen.org> wrote:
>
>> If you do not yet have a future OEM pre-install, but would /still/ like to
>> contribute some useful (anonymous) data to Debian/Ubuntu please consider
>> enabling 'popcon' (Populartity Contest) and submitting a result to the
>> hardware-database (hwdb).
>> Popcon helps determine which software packages to concentrate on, and hwdb
>> helps to determine with hardware drivers to lobby for/work on.
>
> Oh yes, I forgot the hardware checker!
>
> Users should be asked expressly to opt-in to phone-home things like
> this that directly help them. Not hard to explain why they should in a
> sentence.

Just so there is no confusion to anyone following this discussion --

The Ubuntu popularity-contest (aka "popcon") package, if activated,
sends a weekly anonymous report to a database whose output is visible
at http://popcon.ubuntu.com/ This report tells the database which
packages are installed and which ones have actually used on the
system, but the only inference you can make of the hardware is which
package architecture is installed -- i386, amd64, powerpc, etc.

The checkbox application (called "System Testing" on the menu) is a
python app that you choose to run from a menu (not automatically).
Checkbox runs some basic hardware tests, and at the end will offer to
file a unique report in launchpad. You can see the hwdb IDs (but not
the contents) of the latest reports at http://hwdb.ubuntu.com/ and if
a person gives checkbox their email address (registered in launchpad)
when that person files the checkbox reports, you can see that person's
actual submissions to the database at (replace the middle part):
   https://launchpad.net/~launchad-name-here/+hwdb-submissions

I believe the hwdb-client package was demoted several years back. It
may still be around, but won't be a part of any new Ubuntu installs.