12.04 LTS: 64-bit desktop by default?

[Stuart Langridge]

On 18/04/12 14:58, Martin Pitt wrote:
> Stuart Langridge [2012-04-18 13:17 +0100]:
>> instead of primarily thinking of the DVD move as being about "add
>> more packages" (and thus losing the discipline that the restricted
>> CD size brings), think of it as being about "support more machines",
>> so there is One True Ubuntu DVD regardless of which architecture
>> you're on and there's not a choice between i386 and amd64, between
>> different languages, and so on?
> I can't say I like this much. Instead of penalizing some 20% of users
> who downloaded the wrong image, this would penalize 100% of users by
> always having to download both effectively, knowing that 50% of it is
> a definitive waste.
I think you're under-weighting the cost of the confusion that there is 
in being presented with a choice of images and having no idea how to 
make that choice. Speaking purely for myself here, I was mildly confused 
about whether I should get the amd64 or i386 image, and finding out 
which to get was a little hard; I can only imagine what it's like for 
people who have no idea what "amd64" or "i386" even means, but I suspect 
that they'd feel more disoriented than I did. That feeling of 
disorientation is something that I think it'd be good to avoid, because 
it's a hurdle to jump over before you've even installed Ubuntu which is 
likely to make at least some people decide to not do it because they're 
confused and are asked a question that they have no idea how to answer. 
(Historically, we've been able to say "if you have no idea what this 
question even means, pick i386", but one of the purposes of this 
conversation is to decide whether that general guideline ought to be 
changed, I think?)

Agreed that everyone now has to download a larger image, but the image 
size hasn't changed (significantly) since the warty release, and the 
speed of the average internet connection and size of the average hard 
disc surely have increased in that time, suggesting that maybe it's not 
as bad to penalise a user with a larger download as it was back in 2004?

sil