I must say, I appreciate the attention to make things not only simpler but less breakable lately. First we had APT being patched to stop users removing essential packages, now the KDE Discover software manager gets a similar upgrade.
Developer Nate Graham has written up another great "This week in KDE" blog post, going over changes and improvements coming to the next release of Plasma and the various applications. One small change really caught my eye though! Discover now has a new way to ensure you keep a working system, with an updated mechanism to detect important packages getting removed and give you a friendly warning on it free of too much technical jargon.
Picture Source - Nate Graham
Graham's comment underneath "Hopefully this is Linus-Sebastian-proof", heh. I hope many more application developers are looking at the way Discover and APT are evolving to ensure things are a bit more idiot-proof.
Another change to make things look a bit friendlier in Discover is that previously, if you had issues upgrading, it would instantly shove a load of technical details in your face. To normal consumers, that's clearly not going to do much to help and could probably scare them away. Now, instead, it will provide a very clear and friendly message, with the option to get more details to report the issue.
Picture Source - Nate Graham
Plenty more upgrades to Plasma are in the works too, like the newer KWin Overview effect gaining the ability to display search results from KRunner, which brings it another step closer to the GNOME Activities Overview feature, which I did always find thoroughly useful.
There's plenty more fixes in the full post.
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
Some you may have missed, popular articles from the last month:
The comments on this article are closed.
slaapliedje Nov 22, 2021
Quoting: Purple Library GuyI really don't understand what all this argument is about. Like, there are people actively upset about it being more difficult for the attempt to install a package using apt to result in the system getting hosed. Like they're actively mad because in order to do that they will now have to check the apt man page or something and add a "let it hose my system" option when they do the command, instead of just typing "Do what I say" when apt tells them they're about to hose their system.Here is the way I look at it.
These are the same people who say nobody should be using the command line unless they have some idea what they're doing . . . which I would normally figure at a minimum would involve having given the man page a once-over before starting to use a command, which would mean those approved-of people would be in a position to know they needed to add "--let-it-hose-my-system" or whatever to the command if they want to let it hose their system, so the change isn't really a barrier.
These are also the same people who say Linus was an idiot to type "Do what I say" in the first place. So they're saying that the new fix isn't going to stop anyone, who isn't the kind of idiot they don't want using Linux, from doing anything, ever. And yet it's terrible.
Really, WTF?! This is incredibly silly, even if you're going to be a "Linux should only be for techies who want to learn by breakage" gatekeeper. There is no use case where a Linux techie learning how to use the system should have as their objective to make their system become headless by trying to install a wrongly packaged package. If you want to delete the GUI or some other important part of the system, there are various ways to do it and that isn't one of them. This isn't a case where you've got a command some people will want to use to do a certain kind of thing and it is now harder for them, this is literally a thing nobody should ever do and it is now harder for them, and this is a problem because . . . a good operating system should have a nice supply of gotchas, so the users get hair on their chests? What?!
'Yes, do as I say' requires you copying that exact wording to proceed.
With them changing apt to except a --nuke-me option, some asshat will now put that in a wiki of 'how to do things on the command line' and someone will just copy and paste the command and nuke their system and say Linux sucks. Which is more or less already what Linus did, he copy / pasted a command, didn't read what the repercussions were, and just told it to 'do as I say'. The fact that apt has worked this way for at least a decade, and then someone comes along and ignores the warning then is shocked it nuked the GUI... I think points more to Linus being dangerous to himself and others, than it does Apt being broken.
1 Likes, Who?
Holzkohlen Nov 22, 2021
Quoting: FrawoAnd in the next thread we as Linux users are crying again for market share and more attention in general... how does that fit?
That's exactly it. You can't have the "Year of the linux desktop" and also complain about some noobie safeguards. No one is forcing them to use discover and I bet they were never going to anyways. Some just like to complain.
0 Likes
gradyvuckovic Nov 22, 2021
Quoting: NociferJust a lucky guess here, but you sound like a web designer or at least an experienced UX guy. Kudos to you, we desperately need more UX guys in the open source part of the world.
Correct, graphic designer / web developer mainly in my work. =)
0 Likes
Another video is interesting :-) (they have it on floatplane, free access on youtube later)
I hope that nvidia react same way as APT devolepers :-D And try fix what he criticize :-D
In another point, some script which he used has already been updated and now has instruction how run script :-)
I hope that nvidia react same way as APT devolepers :-D And try fix what he criticize :-D
In another point, some script which he used has already been updated and now has instruction how run script :-)
0 Likes
Quoting: AussieEeveeIs it necessary to be a Linux elitist?
Yes, the warning was tiny. Two lines, to be exact... In among a dozen lines of white noise. A novice user is not going to read all that white noise.
Linus being an influencer doesn't make his problem invalid either. This was a legitimate problem, and I'm glad to see they fixed it.
I don't consider myself to be a Linux elitist. However, I do have a problem with characterizing the apt-get installation that Linus encountered this way. When you are using a text based tool, then you have to expect the output to be text. There is not going to be some fancier way of telling you what's going on when you type something in. The warning was repeated. What was going to happen was specifically laid out. Linus had to override a safety protocol to do what he did.
The only part about what happened that gives any excuse to what Linus did is that he had apparently never run apt-get successfully before, so he had little information about what was normal behavior. The odds of this happening to someone the first time they run apt-get are incredibly low, so he got very unlucky.
Of course there were a number of things that he did badly to get to where he ended up.
His first mistake was that when he tried to install Steam from the GUI and it didn't work, he had a choice of coming to the conclusion that either the package was broken or that the system was broken. He decided it must be the system, which is the less logical conclusion.
So once he decided the system was broken, he tried installing the package using the more technical of the command line interfaces. What would apt have done if he had tried to use it? I'm not entirely certain, but he chose apt-get instead, which will tell you very specifically what's going on and then will do exactly what you tell it.
You say there were a dozen lines of "white noise." I entirely disagree. There was no "white noise" whatsoever. apt-get told exactly what was happening. There were lists involved, and you don't have to read every item on a list to get the idea, but that's not the same thing as "white noise."
I can remember when I first started using apt-get in 1999. If I went to install a package, then I didn't expect there to be a list of packages that would be uninstalled. If there was even one package listed to be uninstalled, I wanted to know what it was before I would proceed with the installation. If I saw a list of 88 packages to be uninstalled (it told him how many), there is no way I would just proceed with an installation.
I don't think it's unreasonable to expect to have to read text when you are using a text-based program. Does that make me elitist?
Now, to someone who was even slightly experienced using apt-get, it would have been painfully obvious that what Linus had to type in to proceed was overriding a safety protocol. Since he had apparently never installed even one package that way, he had some excuse for not realizing this (though to be honest, I can't imagine a time I wouldn't have realized that having to type in a whole sentence with an exclamation point at the end was overriding a safety protocol).
Last edited by CFWhitman on 24 November 2021 at 2:10 pm UTC
0 Likes
PoliticsOfStarving Nov 23, 2021
I think since of the defensiveness people have around these charges is just how knee jerk they are.
We wait sometimes 9 months long for certain bug fixes -_-
We make feature requests in the hope we'll see new features added in the next few years.
We patiently wait for Wayland to mature...
But then a Windows-centric YouTube celebrity had a relatively minor problem compared to what we're used to, and we start to see just how quickly things can change for us.
Add to this:
That person is not even a Linux user.
They're not going to be a Linux user.
To a lot of us the problem could have been easily avoided in the first place. (The "problem" wasn't a problem, so to speak).
The arguments or responses I'm seeing made in here is very much understandable given the circumstances.
It's a matter of principle which gets people backs up.
We wait sometimes 9 months long for certain bug fixes -_-
We make feature requests in the hope we'll see new features added in the next few years.
We patiently wait for Wayland to mature...
But then a Windows-centric YouTube celebrity had a relatively minor problem compared to what we're used to, and we start to see just how quickly things can change for us.
Add to this:
That person is not even a Linux user.
They're not going to be a Linux user.
To a lot of us the problem could have been easily avoided in the first place. (The "problem" wasn't a problem, so to speak).
The arguments or responses I'm seeing made in here is very much understandable given the circumstances.
It's a matter of principle which gets people backs up.
0 Likes
Quoting: PoliticsOfStarvingI think since of the defensiveness people have around these charges is just how knee jerk they are.
We wait sometimes 9 months long for certain bug fixes -_-
We make feature requests in the hope we'll see new features added in the next few years.
We patiently wait for Wayland to mature...
But then a Windows-centric YouTube celebrity had a relatively minor problem compared to what we're used to, and we start to see just how quickly things can change for us.
Add to this:
That person is not even a Linux user.
They're not going to be a Linux user.
To a lot of us the problem could have been easily avoided in the first place. (The "problem" wasn't a problem, so to speak).
The arguments or responses I'm seeing made in here is very much understandable given the circumstances.
It's a matter of principle which gets people backs up.
For Luke he may stay on linux for work. He has been on mint before and left because have some problems which has been resolved...
0 Likes
slaapliedje Nov 23, 2021
sudo apt update
Hit:1 http://deb.debian.org/debian bullseye InRelease
Get:2 http://deb.debian.org/debian bullseye-updates InRelease [39.4 kB]
Get:3 http://security.debian.org/debian-security bullseye-security InRelease [44.1 kB]
Get:4 http://ftp.debian.org/debian bullseye-backports InRelease [43.7 kB]
Get:5 http://security.debian.org/debian-security bullseye-security/main amd64 Packages [94.0 kB]
Get:6 http://security.debian.org/debian-security bullseye-security/main Translation-en [59.6 kB]
Get:7 http://ftp.debian.org/debian bullseye-backports/main amd64 Packages.diff/Index [63.3 kB]
Get:8 http://ftp.debian.org/debian bullseye-backports/main Translation-en.diff/Index [27.4 kB]
Get:9 http://ftp.debian.org/debian bullseye-backports/main all Contents (deb).diff/Index [63.6 kB]
Get:10 http://ftp.debian.org/debian bullseye-backports/main amd64 Contents (deb).diff/Index [35.3 kB]
Get:11 http://ftp.debian.org/debian bullseye-backports/contrib amd64 Packages.diff/Index [4,995 B]
Get:12 http://ftp.debian.org/debian bullseye-backports/main amd64 Packages T-2021-11-22-2006.12-F-2021-11-12-2001.29.pdiff [24.2 kB]
Get:12 http://ftp.debian.org/debian bullseye-backports/main amd64 Packages T-2021-11-22-2006.12-F-2021-11-12-2001.29.pdiff [24.2 kB]
Get:13 http://ftp.debian.org/debian bullseye-backports/main Translation-en T-2021-11-22-1406.11-F-2021-11-13-2001.35.pdiff [15.0 kB]
Get:13 http://ftp.debian.org/debian bullseye-backports/main Translation-en T-2021-11-22-1406.11-F-2021-11-13-2001.35.pdiff [15.0 kB]
Get:14 http://ftp.debian.org/debian bullseye-backports/main all Contents (deb) T-2021-11-22-2006.12-F-2021-11-13-1401.28.pdiff [298 kB]
Get:14 http://ftp.debian.org/debian bullseye-backports/main all Contents (deb) T-2021-11-22-2006.12-F-2021-11-13-1401.28.pdiff [298 kB]
Get:15 http://ftp.debian.org/debian bullseye-backports/main amd64 Contents (deb) T-2021-11-22-2006.12-F-2021-11-13-2001.35.pdiff [12.5 kB]
Get:15 http://ftp.debian.org/debian bullseye-backports/main amd64 Contents (deb) T-2021-11-22-2006.12-F-2021-11-13-2001.35.pdiff [12.5 kB]
Get:16 http://ftp.debian.org/debian bullseye-backports/contrib amd64 Packages T-2021-11-15-2014.49-F-2021-11-15-2014.49.pdiff [257 B]
Get:16 http://ftp.debian.org/debian bullseye-backports/contrib amd64 Packages T-2021-11-15-2014.49-F-2021-11-15-2014.49.pdiff [257 B]
Get:17 http://ftp.debian.org/debian bullseye-backports/main amd64 Packages [138 kB]
Get:18 http://ftp.debian.org/debian bullseye-backports/main Translation-en [102 kB]
Fetched 1,066 kB in 25s (42.5 kB/s)
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree... Done
Reading state information... Done
36 packages can be upgraded. Run 'apt list --upgradable' to see them.sudo apt upgrade ─╯
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree... Done
Reading state information... Done
Calculating upgrade... Done
The following packages will be upgraded:
bind9-dnsutils bind9-host bind9-libs dnsutils ffmpeg ffmpeg-doc gir1.2-javascriptcoregtk-4.0 gir1.2-webkit2-4.0
libavcodec58 libavdevice58 libavfilter7 libavformat58 libavresample4 libavutil56 libjavascriptcoregtk-4.0-18 libldb2
libpostproc55 libpq5 libsmbclient libswresample3 libswscale5 libwbclient0 libwebkit2gtk-4.0-37 node-tar openjdk-11-demo
openjdk-11-doc openjdk-11-jdk openjdk-11-jdk-headless openjdk-11-jre openjdk-11-jre-headless openjdk-11-source
python3-ldb redis-server redis-tools samba-libs tzdata
36 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 0 to remove and 0 not upgraded.
Need to get 373 MB of archives.
After this operation, 1,827 kB of additional disk space will be used.
Do you want to continue? [Y/n]Not sure exactly how this is a 'wall of text'. Now if he'd done apt update;apt upgrade like any web site should show for installing Steam, it wouldn't have been a problem. With an 'upgrade' it'll only say 'Kept back' or 'Upgraded'. If he did a dist-upgrade, or an install with conflicts, it'll warn about any removals and ask. In this particular instance it really did give a warning that he was about to bork his system. People have argued about 'potentially harmful' not being strong enough wording. But it's accurate. It only is potentially harmful to the system, he could hae recovered. It wasn't like it was 'oh my god, if you do this, you're going to have to boot from a live system and repair or start a new install!'
Anyhow I mostly posted this to show you can shorten your commands to just 'apt' instead of 'apt-get' :)
0 Likes
Quoting: Purple Library GuyI started somewhere around the turn of the millennium--not sure which side, might have been '99 or so. My first distro was Red Hat.
Hey thanks for that rundown! And I see nothing in this story that indicates that your kind is what I had in mind when I said "not for everyone". Quite the contrary. You've had issues and overcame them. Of course, it always sucks when something breaks - and especially when you have no idea why. It's like that for everyone.
But you've overcome the obstacles and I am pretty sure you also have learnt from it. And you kept going. That's what a Linux user IS, in my book.
The only point you might disagree with me on here, is that I think it's a GOOD thing to have a system as open as Linux. I will defend the right of this OS, of all the alternatives out there, to be a bit different. To demand - even expect - something of the user. Not in regards to the amount of knowledge - but the willingness to obtain that knowledge.
Like you have, by sticking to your gun.
1 Likes, Who?
Quoting: BeamboomBut it's not '99 any more. If I started today, I wouldn't have had to do any of that stuff. And I wouldn't have done it, because I only did it because I had to. I wasn't on a voyage of discovery, I was just trying to un-break stuff.Quoting: Purple Library GuyI started somewhere around the turn of the millennium--not sure which side, might have been '99 or so. My first distro was Red Hat.
Hey thanks for that rundown! And I see nothing in this story that indicates that your kind is what I had in mind when I said "not for everyone". Quite the contrary. You've had issues and overcame them. Of course, it always sucks when something breaks - and especially when you have no idea why. It's like that for everyone.
But you've overcome the obstacles and I am pretty sure you also have learnt from it. And you kept going. That's what a Linux user IS, in my book.
The only point you might disagree with me on here, is that I think it's a GOOD thing to have a system as open as Linux. I will defend the right of this OS, of all the alternatives out there, to be a bit different. To demand - even expect - something of the user. Not in regards to the amount of knowledge - but the willingness to obtain that knowledge.
Like you have, by sticking to your gun.
Not saying I gained zero knowledge. But on average, I'd rather have been gaining other knowledge instead. I'm an artsie--by preference, not because of aptitude. I was actually a seriously massive math whiz in my youth, without even trying; showed pretty good aptitude for programming too. But I went into English Lit and so forth because that's what I like.
Last edited by Purple Library Guy on 23 November 2021 at 8:50 pm UTC
2 Likes, Who?
Patreon
PayPal
See more from me