Linux Challenge actually helps Linux with a lasting impact: Debian and Pop_OS updating 'apt' package manager to make it more fail-safe for users

[leadeater]

15 hours ago, SlidewaysZ said:

Yeah we don't want average Joe using Linux because a million guides for Linux have been made and remade and as obvious by this situation new people can't even bother reading a warning much less a guide. This isn't rocket science it's just lazy users thinking they are building a rocket but they never even read the instructions!

It's not a case of not reading the warning, this issue is multiple factors including but not all being the following. First the user is only installing Steam therefore there is zero expectation that this could possibly lead to what happened to Linus, this is legitimately impossible on any other OS installing trusted software that is not malware, it's never ever going to happen. Second "I just want this bloody application to install, yes, whatever just bloody do it, this is stupid. Oh great now my system is fucked, Linux is just as broken as everyone says it is". This is equivalent to road rage, guess what, if something/someone is being a pain in the ass people might well do something because of it and it's not stupidity that is the reason. Some might say it's adjacent or related, myself included, but it's not actually stupidity.

 

It's got nothing to do with "rocket science" and everything to do with what is realistically reasonable and expected for only installing a basic application. I don't expect my car to explode because I don't put my foot on the break before pressing the ignition start button, I would expect that on a rocket or race car or anything else that legitimately requires a correct and safe starting process that is not and should not be automated by a single button press.

 

APT and CLI aside the Pop!_OS package manager really needed better error handling and error message with some kind of explanation of what the problem actually is, why and suggestion about what to do about it, even if that is a link to support page. Being thrown an incomprehensible error without a single suggestion about what to do about it or a support link just isn't good. Windows is very often just as bad in this regard too, like in general many software is because it's the sort of thing left to last and given low priority.

[Forbidden Wafer]

44 minutes ago, BlueChinchillaEatingDorito said:

 

 

I'm struggling to find how you can possibly screw this up. Now this is a good user experience. People just want shit that works. 

Exactly. It's the best packaging style I've ever seen as an end-user. It's just a freaking folder, some special sauce in the filesystem and done. 

[Lightwreather]

13 minutes ago, Forbidden Wafer said:

Exactly. It's the best packaging style I've ever seen as an end-user. It's just a freaking folder, some special sauce in the filesystem and done. 

iirc, there is one distro that does this, but it is pretty niche.

But I agree, macOS package management is pretty neat

[BlueChinchillaEatingDorito]

59 minutes ago, leadeater said:

APT and CLI aside the Pop!_OS package manager really needed better error handling and error message with some kind of explanation of what the problem actually is, why and suggestion about what to do about it, even if that is a link to support page. Being thrown an incomprehensible error without a single suggestion about what to do about it or a support link just isn't good. Windows is very often just as bad in this regard too, like in general many software is because it's the sort of thing left to last and given low priority.

Unfortunately this is only something technical people will start seeing after taking at least one User Experience course. That being said, even if Developers and UI designers are aware of this, as you mentioned it's given a low priority because good error handling doesn't sell products.

 

https://www.nngroup.com/videos/usability-heuristic-recognize-errors/

 

And what do you know, error prevention is another usability heuristic. Who would've thought? /s

 

https://www.nngroup.com/videos/usability-heuristic-error-prevention/

[leadeater]

3 minutes ago, BlueChinchillaEatingDorito said:

That being said, even if Developers and UI designers are aware of this, as you mentioned it's given a low priority because good error handling doesn't sell products.

It's also really hard because there's 'a million ways' things can go wrong and handling all of those elegantly is time consuming and actually hard.

[wanderingfool2]

13 hours ago, SlidewaysZ said:

Its WARNING YOU DONT DO THIS! How hard is it to realize hey maybe just maybe I shouldn't press the button after multiple warnings. 

I went and looked, the actual word "warning" is about 14 lines up.  Yes, it does say you are about to do something harmful in 2 lines above...but I mean come on, they need to have better warning systems than that if the goal is to attract more casual users.  It's messages like that that give Linux the bad name of being not beginner friendly.

 

I've also gotten warning messages in Ubuntu before, that I've had to say yes to (because I needed that program).  The fact is, when you install and are presented with a wall of text, and a prompt, the user is likely to not read all million pages, but only focus on the last few lines...at which point it seems like a we're not sure if what you are about to do is bad or not.  If it's important enough that they thought they had to program in "Yes, do as I say" as a command; then they better well not use the word "potentially harmful".  Use the word "harmful" and leave out the potentially...or better yet, say "You are about to remove your desktop"

 

This is a failure in design by PopOS.  Yes there was failures on an user interaction, but the mentality of the community is also creating a toxic environment by treating what I bet a lot of first time users would do as if they were stupid. 

[Mihle]

15 minutes ago, wanderingfool2 said:

I went and looked, the actual word "warning" is about 14 lines up.  Yes, it does say you are about to do something harmful in 2 lines above...but I mean come on, they need to have better warning systems than that if the goal is to attract more casual users.  It's messages like that that give Linux the bad name of being not beginner friendly.

 

I've also gotten warning messages in Ubuntu before, that I've had to say yes to (because I needed that program).  The fact is, when you install and are presented with a wall of text, and a prompt, the user is likely to not read all million pages, but only focus on the last few lines...at which point it seems like a we're not sure if what you are about to do is bad or not.  If it's important enough that they thought they had to program in "Yes, do as I say" as a command; then they better well not use the word "potentially harmful".  Use the word "harmful" and leave out the potentially...or better yet, say "You are about to remove your desktop"

 

This is a failure in design by PopOS.  Yes there was failures on an user interaction, but the mentality of the community is also creating a toxic environment by treating what I bet a lot of first time users would do as if they were stupid. 

Yeah, it should have been at least one line on one or two likes up, that if possible was a different colour text or something than the rest so it grabbed attention, that was something like "High risk of breaking your system, don't do if you don't know what you are doing!".

[jagdtigger]

4 hours ago, leadeater said:

It's not a case of not reading the warning

Warning two lines above, has to type in "Yes, do as i say!". Two red flags in a row but user still hits enter, yes the package was buggy but in the end what broke the system is purely user error/ignorance.

[Master Disaster]

32 minutes ago, jagdtigger said:

Warning two lines above, has to type in "Yes, do as i say!". Two red flags in a row but user still hits enter, yes the package was buggy but in the end what broke the system is purely user error/ignorance.

Like i said earlier, "Yes, do as I say!" is only a red flag if you're familiar with apt, for the novice users this behaviour could be standard operating procedure for all they know.

 

You're projecting your own preconceptions onto others.

[Master Disaster]

1 hour ago, wanderingfool2 said:

I went and looked, the actual word "warning" is about 14 lines up.  Yes, it does say you are about to do something harmful in 2 lines above...but I mean come on, they need to have better warning systems than that if the goal is to attract more casual users.  It's messages like that that give Linux the bad name of being not beginner friendly.

 

I've also gotten warning messages in Ubuntu before, that I've had to say yes to (because I needed that program).  The fact is, when you install and are presented with a wall of text, and a prompt, the user is likely to not read all million pages, but only focus on the last few lines...at which point it seems like a we're not sure if what you are about to do is bad or not.  If it's important enough that they thought they had to program in "Yes, do as I say" as a command; then they better well not use the word "potentially harmful".  Use the word "harmful" and leave out the potentially...or better yet, say "You are about to remove your desktop"

 

This is a failure in design by PopOS.  Yes there was failures on an user interaction, but the mentality of the community is also creating a toxic environment by treating what I bet a lot of first time users would do as if they were stupid. 

As pointed out by many other people, just a simple red highlight on the warning would be enough to make most people question what they are doing.

 

Also this isn't a pop issue, this is an apt issue.

 

Fully agreed on the last part, we got victim blaming and the usual litany of elitist comments from users who feel like having to type a single extra flag to achieve something they probably will never need to do anyway is somehow a huge inconvenience to them personally.

 

Dumb people be dumb right, why should we have to design our software to accommodate the dumb ass newbies....

Shameful

[Video Beagle]

19 hours ago, LAwLz said:

But it's not like it was a simple "yes/no" option when Linus installed it.

The installer refused to let him continue because it could break his DE, so he looked up instructions how to force install it, ran a program as root, ignored the warning and typed in a safety phrase character by character, acknowledging that essential packages such as his desktop environment would be uninstalled if he continued and he should be absolutely sure that he knew what he was doing.

That does color things a differnt way.

[Video Beagle]

5 hours ago, BlueChinchillaEatingDorito said:

I'm struggling to find how you can possibly screw this up. Now this is a good user experience. People just want shit that works. 

...you'd be surprise....and frustrated if you're the family member on the phone explaining it and disk images for the 100th time.....sigh

[Master Disaster]

4 minutes ago, Video Beagle said:

That does color things a differnt way.

To be clear, I don't think anyone here is saying Linus isn't, at least partially, at fault for what happened however the fact remains, what he did was a totally normal and understandable thing that any new user would probably do and the package manager allowed him to destroy his entire DE.

 

However you cut it, that's bad design. I don't think a single person from this thread who has been defending what happened here would do the same if MS shipped a bug in Windows where the user trying to uninstall something nuked the entire install. In fact I'm pretty sure most of them would be leading the mob.

[leadeater]

1 hour ago, jagdtigger said:

Warning two lines above, has to type in "Yes, do as i say!". Two red flags in a row but user still hits enter, yes the package was buggy but in the end what broke the system is purely user error/ignorance.

How about apply the entire sentence and not stop, it's NOT about not reading warnings it's the context of what is being done by the user and what would be expected. The last words that will get read are the most important. Not 2 lines up, not 14 lines up and not at all when all you're doing is installing Steam and it is illogical that such an act could cause complete removal of the Desktop UI.

 

Does that honestly sound like a regular and expected outcome to just some person, new to Linux?

 

"All I wanted to do was open the door of my fridge but because I didn't use the pull handle and just pulled on the door the door feel off".

"You're not supposed to just pull on the door that's why there is a door release handle, it's so obvious!"

"Well yes I agree now after the fact but I just didn't expect the door to literally fall off?!?"

[Master Disaster]

3 minutes ago, leadeater said:

How about apply the entire sentence and not stop, it's NOT about not reading warnings it's the context of what is being done by the user and what would be expected. The last words that will get read are the most important. Not 2 lines up, not 14 lines up and not at all when all you're doing is installing Steam and it is illogical that such an act could cause complete removal of the Desktop UI.

 

Does that honestly sound like a regular and expected outcome to just some person, new to Linux?

 

"All I wanted to do was open the door of my fridge but because I didn't use the pull handle and just pulled on the door the door feel off".

"You're not supposed to just pull on the door that's why there is a door release handle, it's so obvious!"

"Well yes I agree now after the fact but I just didn't expect the door to literally fall off?!?"

Or to put it in a way that everyone understands, prevention is better than cure.

[Video Beagle]

7 minutes ago, Master Disaster said:

To be clear, I don't think anyone here is saying Linus isn't, at least partially, at fault for what happened however the fact remains, what he did was a totally normal and understandable thing that any new user would probably do and the package manager allowed him to destroy his entire DE.

 

However you cut it, that's bad design. I don't think a single person from this thread who has been defending what happened here would do the same if MS shipped a bug in Windows where the user trying to uninstall something nuked the entire install. In fact I'm pretty sure most of them would be leading the mob.

Oh, I think some extra barriers...ESPECIALLY FOR POP which my understanding is made to be very beginner friendly...should be there....but, watching the new WAN show, I was reminded today how Linus screw ups are rarely Linus's fault. @LAwLz description does cast it less as "any beginner could do this" into "bullheadedly drove off the map, ignored several signs that the bridge was out, and then blamed his car for getting stuck in a ditch."

 

Humorously, he points out exactly why Apple has stuff locked down the way it does. (Which, if you know what you're doing, isn't locked down at all...but the dangerous stuff is kept well away from where careless fingers can find it).

[Master Disaster]

Just now, Video Beagle said:

Oh, I think some extra barriers...ESPECIALLY FOR POP which my understanding is made to be very beginner friendly...should be there....but, watching the new WAN show, I was reminded today how Linus screw ups are rarely Linus's fault. @LAwLz description does cast it less as "any beginner could do this" into "bullheadedly drove off the map, ignored several signs that the bridge was out, and then blamed his car for getting stuck in a ditch."

In this analogy, the signs would have to have been covered by bushes, tress, spayed over by local yobs or otherwise obscured. And no, he didn't drive off the map, he turned to the open source public variant of the map that is known to be wrong in many places but is often used by people when the official maps don't cover the area.

[Lightwreather]

6 minutes ago, Master Disaster said:

In fact I'm pretty sure most of them would be leading the mob.

This is funier with context

[leadeater]

2 hours ago, wanderingfool2 said:

If it's important enough that they thought they had to program in "Yes, do as I say" as a command; then they better well not use the word "potentially harmful".  Use the word "harmful" and leave out the potentially...or better yet, say "You are about to remove your desktop"

To be fair this is APT and your DE isn't the only essential system package(s) you could end up trying to remove so unless there is specific error handling in Pop's APT for their DE to warn you with that kind of wording then it necessitates more generic wording.

 

Wording along the lines of "This action is about to remove essential system packages, this should never be done and will cause harm to your system", and make it red I'd say is more likely to stop people pushing on past, but that's just my opinion.

 

Also I don't believe making changes to APT is the best place to address this, Pop's Package Manager is.

[Master Disaster]

I think the final nail in the coffin is the fact that the debian developers acknowledged this as an issue that needs addressing. If the people who literally wrote the software think something is probably not great and should be fixed then I'm going to suggest they are probably correct.

[LAwLz]

1 hour ago, Master Disaster said:

In this analogy, the signs would have to have been covered by bushes, tress, spayed over by local yobs or otherwise obscured. And no, he didn't drive off the map, he turned to the open source public variant of the map that is known to be wrong in many places but is often used by people when the official maps don't cover the area.

No it wasn't.

If we're going with the fridge analogy this is what happened.

 

1) Linus buys a new fridge. (installs Linux).

2) The door on the fridge is stuck because is got damaged in shipping. (The Pop!_Shop won't let him install Steam because it is incorrectly packaged).

3) Linus goes on Google and searches for "how to get fridge door unstuck". (He searches for how to force install Steam).

4) Linus gets the advice of using a crowbar to bend the door open. (the advice to force install it through the terminal).

5) Linus drives to buy a crowbar, and the person in the cashier specifically tells him he has to sign a ~100 word long contract to buy the crowbar, and the contract states "This tool can break stuff. DO NOT USE THIS ON A DOOR UNLESS YOU KNOW EXACTLY WHAT YOU ARE DOING". (The warning that appears in the terminal).

6) Linus signs without reading it (doesn't read the warning and types in the conformation passphrase).

7) Linus drives home and uses the crowbar on the fridge, the door falls off.

8 ) A bunch of people say fridges are terrible for not having permanently attached doors and that crowbars are dangerous.

9) Now the manufacturer of the crowbar have come out and said they will make sure crowbars are more difficult to use in order to prevent people from ripping door handles off their fridges.

1) People with root cellars are saying that this is evidence that fridges are complicated, and nobody should own a crowbar.

[Kisai]

6 hours ago, J-from-Nucleon said:

iirc, there is one distro that does this, but it is pretty niche.

But I agree, macOS package management is pretty neat

MacOS has the best direct way of installing software because the programs as distributed are equivilent to just downloading a zip file.

 

So on MacOS it goes

1. Click on the thing you want to download from the website

it downloads

2. double-click it, or click it from the download list

it opens a window with the "click and drag to install"

the "target" in those packages are always the "user" applications, never the OS. It's basically impossible to screw up

3. look in the MacOS applications folder and there it is. 

 

Now if you open up a command line and go to the applications folder, you will find out that that application is in fact a directory itself, and EVERYTHING for the program is inside it. None of this "user directory"/"/usr/home/bin" hell that cli packages deal with.

 

Basically it's not "installed", it's a "pre-installed package" and all you're doing is opening the envelope when you install it. This is also why you can delete programs cleanly from MacOS, because everything is packaged this way. Don't want it, drag the icon to the trash, and everything is gone. No need to hunt down the user settings left behind.

 

 

That said... This method is not how the App store, MacPorts or Homebrew work. The equivalent of Apt/Yum on MacOS is Homebrew.

 

 

[Paul Thexton]

I understand why so many people are concentrating on the end result of Linus not paying attention to the errors and ultimately removing his desktop. FWIW I absolutely agree that the full error text should have been read before proceeding but I’m experienced enough to know for certain that what Linus did is in no way a rarity. 
 

The fundamental problem is still this. He wanted to play a game on Steam (totally not unreasonable), he couldn’t get Steam installed. 
 

That is the succinct problem statement. The issue with Pop is now fixed, but has it been fixed with safeguards put in place to prevent similar things happening again? That’s what I’m most interested in, if the answer is yes then a solid 9/10 to the Pop maintainers. If the answer is no then it’s a 5/10 from me purely by virtue of fixing it reasonably quickly. 

[Paul Thexton]

2 minutes ago, Kisai said:

MacOS has the best direct way of installing software because the programs as distributed are equivilent to just downloading a zip file.

I’m a long term Mac user and tbh my biggest gripe about the software ecosystem is actually that Apple say in order to remove an installed app you simply drag it to Trash.
 

That isn’t quite true, many apps will write settings files and potentially install privileged helper tools (for things like auto update), kernel or system extensions, etc all of which are left lying around on the system with the drag it to trash approach. 
 

Apple’s advise to developers in this scenario is to provide uninstall apps/scripts, but honestly I’d much prefer it if Apple allowed apps to register knowledge of persisted data out of the app bundle to the system so that a universal uninstaller could exist allowing users to *know* that that buggy software with the problematic kernel/system extension is now *completely* gone. 

[cj09beira]

this is why one shouldn't use a bleeding edge distro like pop_os for general users, they would have been much better off with ubuntu, specially one of the lts releases.

 

I have also once bricked my system due to an error while upgrading ubuntu (installed a wrong source by mistake), which actually made me appreciate linux even more, as being able to sudo in from a ubuntu live stick was pretty impressive, and i managed to salvage the OS completely