[packagekit] Status of the APT backend

[Sebastian Heinlein]

Am Mittwoch, den 20.02.2008, 20:31 +0100 schrieb Josselin Mouette:
> Synaptic isn’t suited for new users because of its UI which is too
> complex, not because of its features. Furthermore, everything is run
> as
> root, which works but has many flaws. Fixing it would mean:
>       * re-thinking the UI to be simpler;
>       * integrating update-manager’s functionality;

Simplifying the user interface can be made best by making the
application context sensitive.

Updating the system is a different use case as installing or removing an
application. So I don't see the need to combine these items in one user
interface. It would be nice to even separate the installing and removing
of applications. Novell did a nice job by allowing to remove
applications with a right click on the menu item. But this is too hard
to discover.

The user interface has been rethinked already. The outcome is
gnome-app-install and update-manager.

I don't see a reason to provide a graphical user interface for average
people that deals with packages and not with applications. Situations in
which average people are confronted with packages should be avoided at
all, e.g. howtos should use nice one-click-install buttons on the web
site (apt-url). Dealing with packages definitely belongs to the power
user area.

>       * properly separating the UI and the APT backend.
> So that would mean, basically, redeveloping PackageKit. 
> 
> I don’t understand why PackageKit wouldn’t be suitable to replace it.
> If
> it can search packages, install and remove them, upgrade packages or
> the
> distribution as a whole, there is no reason why it couldn’t do the
> job.

The question is if would you like to use packagekit as a central
software installation daemon. And still rely on apt based applications
for queueing actions.

Cheers,

Sebastian

-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: not available
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 189 bytes
Desc: Dies ist ein digital signierter Nachrichtenteil
URL: <http://lists.freedesktop.org/archives/packagekit/attachments/20080221/61110105/attachment-0004.pgp>