Ubuntu and its community

[Sebastian Rösgen]

Hello,

while I have followed the development of the power user community with 
enthusiasm, I want to raise your awareness of a discussion repeating 
itself month for month within the general Ubuntu community. Though, the 
term "discussion" is perhaps not the right word. Perhaps "illness" or 
"disease" fits better.

Currently bug No. 733349 (https://bugs.launchpad.net/unity/+bug/733349) 
shows the symptoms of this illness. Many users vote for a change in the 
behaviour of the Unity Launche. But seemingly the discussion is not 
taking place on equal ground. No matter the arguments that the community 
members bring up to discuss the errors/mistakes in the current behaviour 
of the Launcher the official developers of Canonical still answer with 
the 'slogan' that there cannot be any change due to "design decisions".

Additionally a patch was offered by a user and this patch is seemingly 
good enough that it will get packaged and downloadable via PPA.

I now ask myself if this is the right way? 91 users want a change of the 
behaviour but it is not even considered to make the behaviour of the 
Launcher more configurable. A PPA is a joke. The user who wrote the 
patch could also have created the PPA himself.

Then this leads to the problem I currently have with the idea of a power 
user community.

A simplified version of Ubuntu Tweak should become a standard tool in 
the default installation of Ubuntu. At least some aspects of the system 
should be configurable by default. Imagine a Windows user who wants to 
change the location of the Windows Panel in Windows 8 or 9 and finds out 
that the new policy tells him that he has to download extra software to 
make the repositioning of the panel possible. Tell him that the panel 
now automatically auto hides and to change this behaviour he has to 
download a second program to change this behaviour as well.
That is what is currently happening to Ubuntu. The idea of the Power 
User Community is wonderful. But it fires the wrong signals. Perhaps you 
should all read the bug reports and the discussion about the bug to 
understand entirely what I mean.

During the last month I installed Ubuntu 11.04 on many PCs and many 
users asked the same thing: "can I change this". It does not matter what 
"this" meant in the given context. What is important that I nearly never 
encountered somebody who was entirely happy with the desktop (and 
desktop behaviour) which is presented to the user. All of them liked the 
launcher, but many of the users get confused by the behaviour described 
in bug 733349. Why is there a launcher icon which you sometimes can 
click without anything happening? This is a good question, at least to 
me. Others want the launcher at the bottom or the right side of the 
screen. Then all are astounded that I have to install a huge cluttered 
program called CCSM to configure one simple feature of the system (i.e. 
the behaviour when the launcher hides and when not).
I always answer that "they are working on this". Even when this means 
that I can only hope that I will be able to configure these things via 
Ubuntu Tewak or whatever else later on. I like Ubuntu and therefore I 
defend it. But I can only defend it to a certain degree. I do not want 
to explain anymore why "this feature" or "that feature" is not working 
correctly or as expected. At the moment I only say wait please for the 
LTS version. And the funny thing is that I explained so often what an 
LTS version is that every user knows immediately what I mean.
But I sincerely hope that some of the issues will really be fixed when 
the LTS version is released. When I initially said so I really was 
convinced that over the course of time even the most blinkered developer 
will become aware of the fact that "a design decision" is not 
everything. But I start to lose this hope.

The way how they dealt with the patch for bug 733349 exemplifies the 
problem. Ubuntu tweak (or rather a trimmed down version suited to normal 
users' needs) should become standard to ubuntu. And the given patch of 
733349 should be configurable with this version of Ubuntu tweak. Do I 
want to use the new behaviour or the default behaviour which is dictated 
to us by design decision. I have no problem with design decisions as 
long as there is an alternative option to configure the system.

A further problem with design decisions is that Ubuntu or rather Mark 
Shuttleworth and his design team have not always made good decisions at 
all. Remeber the Windicators? Well, where are they. When the 
close/minimize/maximize buttons were moved to the left there was a big 
outcry. And then there was this (interesting) vision of the Windicators. 
Many people thought about it and the uproar ceased. The buttons were not 
moved out of a decision to make Ubuntu more "Macish" but instead because 
there was a real thoughtful idea in the background. Well, again my 
question. Where are now these Windicators. For these Windicators the 
change was made but I still can not see them. I do not even see any test 
versions. But the changes have been made.

I sometimes get the impressions that Ubuntu tries desperately to become 
so innovative and new that this became an obsession. In German we say 
"du sollst das Rad nicht neu erfinden" which translates to "you should 
not reinvent the wheel". Some features have been around in the computer 
world for many years now: and they work. Other have been around and 
these features should be changed. But if nearly one hundred users 
complain about something one should think about the complaints. 
Especially if it is something like Launchpad where the few who have 
accounts speak for the many they represent.

So think about this. The Poweruser community should take Ubuntu Tweak, 
simplify it and then do everything in their power to make this 
simplified version a part of the normal control center in Ubuntu. And it 
should be a replacement for CCSM and that ugly option which decides when 
the launcher reveals that is currently in the control center (i.e. 
"system settings" at the moment). And Jono, I do not want to be too 
bold, but I would really beg you to fight for this Ubuntu Tweak version 
to be implemented as a default in Ubuntu. It is really needed. People 
everywhere are discontent with certain aspects of Ubuntu Unity.
I think that the default configuration of Ubuntu with Unity will bring 
you many new users. But as long as you (Canonical) will not offer an 
easy and fast way to configure the system, you will lose many old users. 
Making Ubuntu Tweak a default in Ubuntu will show the users, the more 
experienced users, the long time fans, the enthusiasts, that Canonical 
respects their wishes. Making it default is the way to show that Ubuntu 
really should be a system for everyone and not just a few. And believe 
me, these options to configure the system will even be interesting for 
many who want to switch from windows to some other system.

Ok. This Was a long post and I hope that at least a few will read it 
entirely. Thank you!

Yours
Sebastian