[Ubuntu-ch] Linux Install Event Experience

[Wolf Geldmacher]

On Tue, 3 Nov 2009, Theo Schmidt wrote:

> Stephen Piana schrieb:
> ...
> > I see, now I understand the problem pertaining to new users using the
> > swiss remix distro they have too many options to choose from in the
> > login area...
>
> Not really. If they start the live system and do nothing they will get Gnome
> with German language and keyboard. They have the option of changing these
> immediately after booting using using the F-keys described then. If they are
> quick, they would have 10 seconds to change the language and desktop when the
> login screen appears some minutes later, but sometimes it doesn't show and most
> people are too slow to react quickly enough the first time. They can get the
> login back from Gnome by logging off and then (quickly) choosing "change
> session" and/or "change language", retyping "ubuntu" and <return> for password.
> There is also a question for making the selections the default ones. It's
> difficult enough that new users probably can't do it unless having read the
> documentation. Therefore most new users will get Gnome in German, or the other
> language chosen at boot time. Thus the options are there, but not easily used.
>
> After installing, it is similar and I guess most people won't even realise that
> they could switch to KDE4 or XFCE, but they will have most programs available,
> e.g. Marble even with Gnome. (Marble is popular enough that there is a live
> system just for starting this, with Swiss Remix you have this built in!)
>
> The main confusion results because different programs (e.g. file managers) start
> different other programs when clicking on files, but those who study the choices
> using right-click "open with..." will soon get unconfused.
Right on!

Also (as I found out the other day) removing "unwanted" stuff is far from
easy: Assume I want to go back to a gnome only (or at least gnome mostly)
desktop I can't just remove [kx]ubuntu-desktop - this will leave a lot of
KDE/XFCE stuff behind. There are ways described in the Ubuntu Wiki that do
work, but those are not for the fainthearted.

Frequently you can't just remove one component that annoys a user either -
which is due to the package consistency checks and actually is a Good Thing -
but doesn't help the user.

@Dani:
Maybe in addition to being able to *add* selected groups of packages from
the swissremix ppa, there should also be an option to *remove* selected
groups of packages again.

Cheers,
Wolf