[Mageia-discuss] Suggestions

Marc Paré marc at marcpare.com
Thu Oct 28 03:42:14 CEST 2010


Le 2010-10-27 21:13, andre999 a écrit :

>> To focus on package descriptions, which really
>> *are* of interest only to more advanced users (very few newbies know
>> enough about Linux to care about minimalist installs), completely misses
>> the point that there is a lot of other information about what's going on
>> in the install that *would* be of interest to newbies.
> It depends what you put in the package descriptions. Something like "You
> really should install this" is totally meaningless to almost everyone.
> A good description is not necessarily highly technical. It is really the
> application packages that a newbie would want to select, dependancies
> will be automatically selected, as in now the case. If a summary
> description is clear, that could be sufficient.
> But I tend to think that a full description should be used for
> application packages.

I agree, the descriptions should be void of personal comments and almost 
technical in style but the use of vocabulary should be such that the 
vocabulary is easily understood by users.


>> In the same spirit, we could have a set of package-related ISOs, and one
>> or more documentation ISOs. If a non-network user wants extended help
>> and package descriptions in translated format, he obtains these ISOs.
>> If not, he doesn't. At the start of the install, the user gets a prompt
>> with checkboxes for each of the possible ISOs, and can indicate which
>> are available. For any that aren't, the install doesn't even try to use
>> what's on them. If the install detects enough available unused disk
>> space, then the first use of any ISO can copy some or all of the ISO to
>> hard disk for the duration of the install. Any prompt for an ISO has a
>> way for the user to say he really doesn't have that one, in which case
>> it is not prompted for again. All this should minimize the amount of
>> disk-swapping.

I like the idea of more documentation, but I don't really think that 
users would really read extended documentation. I think that if they 
wanted more then they would look for the website for more description of 
the software.

> Lots of disks, but minimal disk-swapping ?
> Why not a single DVD, and no disk-swapping ?
>> That answers the objections of those who don't want to have to download
>> many ISOs to do an install, and also addresses the needs of non-network
>> users (e.g. small schools) who want a full-featured set of install media
>> that can be reused repeatedly for friendly installs without network
>> access. It also minimizes disk-swapping, unless the system is really
>> tight on space, in which case the install is at least still possible,
>> albeit with some disk swapping (assuming the user wants to use multiple
>> ISOs).
> Note that schools would generally have the bandwidth to download a DVD.
> So little or no need for disk swapping.

If your are talking about primary / secondary schools, then, here in 
Canada, the downloading is normally locked down and there is usually not 
enough disk space accorded to the students.

>
> The problem with all this is it makes things more complicated. For
> Mageia. For new users. But maybe not so much for experienced users with
> a large bandwidth. But are these the users we are addressing ?
>
>> As always, network users could opt to download dynamically anything they
>> didn't have ISO media for, with the same provision for caching, if space
>> allowed.
>
> Localising the package descriptions shouldn't take a lot of space,
> compared with localising the software included.
> I really don't understand the real advantage of separating the package
> description from the package. To save 1% of ISO space ? At what price
> complexity ?
>
> my 2 cents :)
>
> - André
>

I agree, it should be kept as compact as possible so that the people 
writing up the descriptions and the packagers don't get caught up in 
scheduling conflicts due to the size of description and translations.

Marc



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