Re: [Tails-testers] 4.20 rc1

anonym,

you wrote:
> alienpup:
> > Hello all,
> >
> > I realize it's rather late in the game, but...
> >
> > In my opinion, the new Tails Connection Dialog comes at significant cost to user experience. I fully understand the importance of guiding new users through the connection process (and options), but after half a dozen Tails boots, the dialog becomes as much a hindrance as a help.
> >
> > A good compromise could be to initially present the current connection dialog, with the option of defaulting back to the Greeter's "Network" configuration tool. As Greeter settings can now be "sticky", experienced Tails users could then avoid the connection dialog altogether.
>
> Thanks for your feedback! We are planning to add a Persistent Tor
> settings feature which should fix your issue. Just not in Tails 4.20,
> but hopefully in Tails 4.22. :)

Great news.

> > If significant changes to the connection dialog are no longer an option,
>
> While we are closed for significant changes for the 4.20 release, we
> could (and I expect, will) introduce them later. :)

I greatly appreciate the Tails project's willingness to listen and discuss "on the fly", while releasing updates almost monthly. You people are amazing!

> > I would suggest that the dialog open defaulted to "Connect Automatically". This small change would make things easier for experienced users.
>
> The problem with that is that a user that wants needs to hide their Tor
> usage is just a Enter key press away from announcing to the world they
> are using Tor. I managed to trigger that several times while testing
> this work (usually because I often immediately start a terminal and
> start typing into it, and then just need bad timing when you press
> Enter) so it seems like something that could bite real users too.

I agree. Tails should default to the most secure settings and options whenever possible. It should also boot and shutdown as quickly as possible with the least user interaction. Tails is very good in both regards, however overall, today's Tails feels to me more cumbersome than I recall versions 2-3 did.

> However, when the Tor Connection window appears you can just press
> Space (or Left/Right/Up arrow key) to select the first = "Connect
> Automatically" option, and then you just have to Enter to accept. I
> hope that's not too bad until the Persistent Tor settings feature is
> released!

Thanks for the tip. I don't however see any visual cues indicating that the dialog is the current focus or what a space bar press will do. If this is a Gnome issue, is there a workaround?

regards,
alienpup