Ubuntu is under attack

[Mike Bird]

On Mon, 2005-12-19 at 08:12, Eric Dunbar wrote:
> Expecting "my KDE to have the full power and options the developers
> gave it" runs counter to the goal of "a clear focus on the user and
> usability".

This blinkered vision is a fundamental misinterpretation of Ubuntu's
stated goals.  Making Ubuntu Just Work out of the box means what it
says, not "provide a bunch of eye candy and the software for
a twenty kilo IPod".  It means in part that users don't have to lose
a few months work before finding out that critical emails are being
callously destroyed.  There are all kinds of legal liabilities
there that Canonical isn't going to be able to disclaim, even for
a free-as-in-beer product.

> What may be usable for you is what makes computers unusable or less
> useful to the bulk of computer users -- DOS and other CLUIs were great
> in the eyes of some (not-so-sane IMNSHO), yet DOS and all such CLUIs
> required people to the be the tools of the computer, and not the other
> way around where the computer itself was the tool.

I've helped hundreds of newbies.  Some prefer starting things from
menus.  Some prefer clicking through file folders.  Some prefer
right clicking in the desktop and "Create New Foo".  When someone
invents another great paradigm, there will be new users that prefer
that mode too.  People are not all like you.  Why should they be?

Software freedoms include zero cost, the freedom to edit and
recompile, and freedom from religious bigots who insist that
system emails be suppressed and that files can only be opened
from Nautilus.

> PS It would not be a Bad Thing (tm) to ask a GNOME user whether they
> really want to browse outside of "~/" (let alone /usr). There's no
> reason that a person using a computer as a tool should be going
> outside of "~/" so it's probably good practice to caution them against
> going there, unless they have a REASON to be there.

Hmmm, as I write this an unsophisticated user walked into the room.
(Hello my love.)  She's a teacher, journalist, and photographer.
None of her class materials, articles or photographs are in her
home folder.  Nor is the place where the digital camera's memory
stick appears in the filesystem.  Why should the Thought Police dictate
how she uses her computer?

--Mike Bird