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+Title: What is missing in the Debian desktop, or why my parents use Kubuntu
+Tags: english, debian, multimedia, web
+Date: 2011-07-29 00:10
+
+<p>While at Debconf11, I have several times during discussions
+mentioned the issues I believe should be improved in Debian for its
+desktop to be useful for more people.  The use case for this is my
+parents, which are currently running Kubuntu which solve the
+issues.</p>
+
+<p>I suspect the four missing features are not very hard to implement.
+After all, they are present in Ubuntu, so if we wanted to do this in
+Debian we would have a source.</p>
+
+<ol>
+
+<li><strong>Simple GUI based upgrade of packages.</strong> When there
+are new packages available for upgrades, a icon in the KDE status bar
+indicate this, and clicking on it will activate the simple upgrade
+tool to handle it.  I have no problem guiding both of my parents
+through the process over the phone.  If a kernel reboot is required,
+this too is indicated by the status bars and the upgrade tool.  Last
+time I checked, nothing with the same features was working in KDE in
+Debian.</li>
+
+<li><strong>Simple handling of missing Firefox browser
+plugins.</strong> When the browser encounter a MIME type it do not
+currently have a handler for, it will ask the user if the system
+should search for a package that would add support for this MIME type,
+and if the user say yes, the APT sources will be searched for packages
+adverticing the MIME type in their control file (visible in the
+Packages file in the APT archive).  If one or more packages are found,
+it is a simple click of the mouse to add support for the missing mime
+type.  If the package require the user to accept some non-free
+license, this is explained to the user.  The entire process make it
+more clear to the user why something do not work in the browser, and
+make the chances higher for the user to blame the web page authors and
+not the browser for any missing features.</li>
+
+<li><strong>Simple handling of missing multimedia codec/format
+handlers.</strong> When the media players encounter a format or codec
+it is not supporting, a dialog pop up asking the user if the system
+should search for a package that would add support for it.  This
+happen with things like MP3, Windows Media or H.264.  The selection
+and installation procedure is very similar to the Firefox browser
+plugin handling.  This is as far as I know implemented using a
+gstreamer hook.  The end result is that the user easily get access to
+the codecs that are present from the APT archives available, while
+explaining more on why a given format is unsupported by Ubuntu.</li>
+
+<li><strong>Better browser handling of some MIME types.</strong> When
+displaying a text/plain file in my Debian browser, it will propose to
+start emacs to show it.  If I remember correctly, when doing the same
+in Kunbutu it show the file as a text file in the browser.  I much
+prefer the latter behavour.</li>
+
+</ol> 
+
+<p>There are other nice features as well, like the simplified suite
+upgrader, but given that I am the one mostly doing the dist-upgrade,
+it do not matter much.</p>
+
+<p>I really hope we could get these features in place for the next
+Debian release.  It would require the coordinated effort of several
+maintainers, but would make the end user experience a lot better.</p>