Re: [Tails-dev] next big features: status update

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Autor: anonym
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A: The Tails public development discussion list
Assumpte: Re: [Tails-dev] next big features: status update
03/13/2012 12:14 PM, intrigeri:
> anonym wrote (09 Mar 2012 14:41:04 GMT) :
>> Even though the above steps certainly isn't something we want to
>> support I hope it all can help you identify the original source of
>> the error. (As a side effect it seems like the above steps (1-8)
>> make Tails on the USB drive unbootable.)
>
> "Missing OS", right?


Yes.

> I would not be surprised if GParted played badly with the GPT
> attributes. E.g. to display the attributes of /dev/sdc1, run:
>
>   $ sgdisk /dev/sdc --attributes=1:show                                  


That particular command gave me nothing. Both changing to /dev/sdc1 and
removing "=1" reported an invalid GPT with overlapping partition tables etc.

>>> Given these disadvantages, and the limited benefit (better supporting
>>> 2 GB media), I'm not in favour of adding such widgets at all.
>
>> I just fear that we're setting the requirements for Tails too high,
>> effectively alienating poor people, and unnecessarily preventing
>> fully adequate devices from being usable with Tails.
>
> I hear this fear, I agree this would be a shame to do what you fear,
> and I don't think anyone is proposing to do any such thing.
>
> I want to point out this part of the discussion started from your
> initial report that installing Tails with liveusb-creator onto a 1.88
> GiB stick would leave "only 424 MiB for TailsData". In my
> understanding, this may be considered as wasting space, but seriously,
> this does not prevent the stick from being usable with Tails.


Yeah, "usable" was a bad choice of word. What I'm getting at is the
potential to utilize the media to its fullest. Personally I get very
frustrated when using tools where the developers have made a these type
of "balancing choices" for me without any option to override it and
adjust it according to my wishes.

> Please remember that our current, pre-USB-installer, instructions to
> install Tails on this very same USB stick would leave no room at all
> for persistence; this has been true since the beginning of Tails.
> What is currently being proposed for Tails 0.11 is *way better* for
> 2GB USB stick owners than anything we have shipped until now.


Of course, but since this is our (I assume) final solution to the
problem I still feel entitled to talk about situations where things
improved but (IMHO) not enough. After all you said you're "not in favour
of adding such widgets at all", which I interpreted as a final decision
on this issue from your part.

> So I say let's release this, and if we want to discuss further
> possible improvements, let's please make it clear we're discussing
> further possible improvements (that can surely wait for after 0.11),
> and not "alienating vs. not-alienating".


Right. Everything except bugs reported by me should be considered like
potential future improvements. I completely agree that the current plans
will result in something that is ready for 0.11.

>>> And anyway, I don't think anyone wants to add any additional
>>> feature to our liveusb-creator codebase; remember we want to rebase
>>> our work on top of another codebase at some point.
>
>> IMHO, if this is an issue for us when adding a feature we want, then
>> we may want to reconsider our whole approach, possibly by
>> maintaining a fork (gasp! :)).
>
> I think you're either missing some information, or you misunderstood
> what I meant with "we want to rebase our work on top of another
> codebase at some point". Let me clarify.
>

[...snip...]
>
> I hope it helped clarify things :)


Thanks! It did. Sorry for my ignorance.

>> Here's some more, unrelated suggestions:
>
>> * In the liveusb-creator, please add the name of the USB drives'
>> models to the list of USB devices one can install Tails to.
>> tails-persistence-setup currently lists the name, but IMHO it's
>> more important for the installer to do so since that's were the
>> real risk of selecting the wrong device is.
>
> Much agreed, this is in the TODO already:
> https://tails.boum.org/todo/usb_install_and_upgrade/todo/


I had some how missed this page. Again, sorry.

>> * When persistence has been successfully setup, prompt the user with
>> an OK-pop-up containing the success message (and OK -> exit
>> application) instead of changing the window to contain the success
>> message and asking users to close it themselves. That seems more
>> streamlined to me.
>
> GNOME GUI's currently evolve towards using much less modal dialog
> windows, and I think it's a really good move (no idea about what other
> environments do). Keeping one's attention focused on the same single
> window all along a wizard-like process seems easier to me than finding
> the last window that popped-up in front of my other windows.
>
> Maybe I should add that the whole tails-persistence-setup "setup
> wizard" aspect will be clearer once the "configure which bits are
> persistence" step is fully implemented and follows the "bootstrap"
> one, in the same way, in the same window. So I'd like to postpone
> discussing this further until you've seen the whole thing, OK?


Ah, definitely. From now on I'll focus solely on bug hunting.

>> Otherwise, at least add a close/exit button.
>
> GNOME GUI's currently evolve towards removing close / quit buttons, on
> the basis that it's a duplicate of the one provided by the window
> manager, and an entirely useless one as long as the application
> gracefully supports being closed this way. I buy these arguments,
> I like less cluttered GUI's, that's why this step has no
> close/exit button.


While the argument may be sound, it's still surprises me to the point
were it seems sloppy (e.g. the developer was just lazy and didn't add
such a control) and not a deliberate design choice. I assume many other
non-Gnome
users may feel the same. But seriously, I don't really care.

Cheers!