blog/data/2011-07-29-debian-desktop.txt

   1 Title: What is missing in the Debian desktop, or why my parents use Kubuntu
   2 Tags: english, debian, multimedia, web, h264
   3 Date: 2011-07-29 08:10
   4
   5 <p>While at Debconf11, I have several times during discussions
   6 mentioned the issues I believe should be improved in Debian for its
   7 desktop to be useful for more people.  The use case for this is my
   8 parents, which are currently running Kubuntu which solve the
   9 issues.</p>
  10
  11 <p>I suspect these four missing features are not very hard to
  12 implement.  After all, they are present in Ubuntu, so if we wanted to
  13 do this in Debian we would have a source.</p>
  14
  15 <ol>
  16
  17 <li><strong>Simple GUI based upgrade of packages.</strong> When there
  18 are new packages available for upgrades, a icon in the KDE status bar
  19 indicate this, and clicking on it will activate the simple upgrade
  20 tool to handle it.  I have no problem guiding both of my parents
  21 through the process over the phone.  If a kernel reboot is required,
  22 this too is indicated by the status bars and the upgrade tool.  Last
  23 time I checked, nothing with the same features was working in KDE in
  24 Debian.</li>
  25
  26 <li><strong>Simple handling of missing Firefox browser
  27 plugins.</strong> When the browser encounter a MIME type it do not
  28 currently have a handler for, it will ask the user if the system
  29 should search for a package that would add support for this MIME type,
  30 and if the user say yes, the APT sources will be searched for packages
  31 advertising the MIME type in their control file (visible in the
  32 Packages file in the APT archive).  If one or more packages are found,
  33 it is a simple click of the mouse to add support for the missing mime
  34 type.  If the package require the user to accept some non-free
  35 license, this is explained to the user.  The entire process make it
  36 more clear to the user why something do not work in the browser, and
  37 make the chances higher for the user to blame the web page authors and
  38 not the browser for any missing features.</li>
  39
  40 <li><strong>Simple handling of missing multimedia codec/format
  41 handlers.</strong> When the media players encounter a format or codec
  42 it is not supporting, a dialog pop up asking the user if the system
  43 should search for a package that would add support for it.  This
  44 happen with things like MP3, Windows Media or H.264.  The selection
  45 and installation procedure is very similar to the Firefox browser
  46 plugin handling.  This is as far as I know implemented using a
  47 gstreamer hook.  The end result is that the user easily get access to
  48 the codecs that are present from the APT archives available, while
  49 explaining more on why a given format is unsupported by Ubuntu.</li>
  50
  51 <li><strong>Better browser handling of some MIME types.</strong> When
  52 displaying a text/plain file in my Debian browser, it will propose to
  53 start emacs to show it.  If I remember correctly, when doing the same
  54 in Kunbutu it show the file as a text file in the browser.  At least I
  55 know Opera will show text files within the browser.  I much prefer the
  56 latter behaviour.</li>
  57
  58 </ol>
  59
  60 <p>There are other nice features as well, like the simplified suite
  61 upgrader, but given that I am the one mostly doing the dist-upgrade,
  62 it do not matter much.</p>
  63
  64 <p>I really hope we could get these features in place for the next
  65 Debian release.  It would require the coordinated effort of several
  66 maintainers, but would make the end user experience a lot better.</p>