newbie user/root dycotomy

[Chuck Vose]

Why sudo nautilus is a no-no:
root can do anything, and while nautilus isn't prone to some of the
things like `chown -R root:root *` it is vulnerable to the "I don't
know what this file is but it's big" syndrome and other such silly
ideas. The problem is really more along the lines that, since nautilus
is rather largish, it tends to stay open for long periods of time. The
whole reason sudo is a one shot thing is because people tend to make
mistakes given enough time; shortening the time is one proven way of
preventing this and nautilus undoes this progress.

Being up-to-date:
Having 1.45 when 1.44 is in the ubuntu repos is not that big of a
deal. The truth is that many people have access to the repos and
through the collective wisdom of these maintainers they've decided
that 1.45 hasn't proven itself or there's still problems. Downloading
the newest deb files will probably fix an error that only happens on
the fourth day of the month in the hungarian version of the program.

When it comes down to it, be happy with apt has: upgrading to unstable
versions and versions unaccepted in the repos usually will cause you
more pain than it's worth.

-Chuck