Packaging Linux for New Users: Some Considerations

julian516

For some time when someone has asked me for a Linux version to audition I have suggested Linux Mint. But I do not run it routinely myself and so I thought it might be a good thing to return to it and see if my advice was still sound. And that caused me to wonder I ought to take a look at several other distributions that might be on the “newbie” list.

What makes a good distribution for a Linux explorer? While we all have our preferences we often are unclear about what qualities are essential in a distribution aimed at people new to Linux. So that is what I am going to talk about here and I look forward to your comments.

The Distribution Website (SpiffyDistro.why)

Let's start with the distribution website, which ought to be hospitable to new people. That means it explains the downloading and burning process that produces a livecd. Windows (at least through XP) includes no native ability to burn iso files so a link to a freeware Windows cd burner is going to be a good thing. A clear explanation of the difference between copying an iso file and burning one is another important thing.

We'll assume the livecd does a good job of representing the desktop, but one thing is essential; even if it means leaving some applications off the livecd that disk needs to be configured with a sufficient number of wireless drivers to accommodate at least the most common Intel and Broadcom cards. Laptops are out-selling desktops and mobile devices are wireless. For an Explorer “no wireless” may equal “no sale.”

Installation Handbook

We also need an “Installation Handbook” on the livecd desktop. Most people never have installed an operating system, so installation is a high anxiety idea that warrants a good clear explanation of what is about to happen. Because it is slightly more complex than installation to a fresh drive, the focus probably needs to be on the more common “dual boot” scenario. We do need to assure our Explorer that he or she will not lose the Windows (or for that matter, Mac) system on which they currently rely. Finally we ought to explain the choice as to how GRUB will be installed so that the choice will be understood when it is encountered during the install process. Come to think of it, we probably need to explain what GRUB is and what it does! I used to think it was just an ugly little bug in my lawn.

Time out for Rule One: NEVER ask new people to make technical choices during the install process that there is no compelling reason to think they will understand! Doing so fairly well defines “new user hostile.” (As in the button which asks for a response to an installation choice between partition-based and LVM based installation. LV whoooooo?) If the choice is not explained in the livecd Installation Handbook put it on the “Advanced” menu new people are unlikely to need.

The Installer and The Installation Process

So our Explorer takes the plunge and starts the livecd installer. If the installer does not see an Internet connection it ought to offer to start one.

Rule Two: Try very hard to avoid having our new user back out of the install process when they learn that they should have done something before starting it. Each time they back out lessens the chance that they will try again.

The default installation ought to be a dual-boot with a previously installed operating system. Second choice ought to be installation to a fresh drive. Third choice ought to be an “advanced” or “custom” button for those persons who will do (and who know how to do) more customized installations, perhaps to previously prepared locations on their drives. Finally the installer should offer a choice as to where GRUB (I'll assume GRUB) stage 1 is placed. The default ought to be the MBR, passing back to /boot/grub, but the alternative of placing GRUB in the root partition of the new installation ought to be offered. (And explained of course in the Installation Handbook)

Rule Three: Never start any aspect of the installation without a summary page that clearly lines out what the installer is about to do if the “Go” button is pressed.

There needs to be an easy capacity for editing choices made earlier (Oops, I've got the wrong time zone!), or for backing up, perhaps to the Partition routine. Allowing users to do this goes a long way to reducing anxiety. There is nothing quite like a partitioner that spins up with a “Don't Bother Me Now!” notice immediately upon clicking on “next”. Oh, you didn't mean that? Caught you!

Ah well, so gears turn, drives spin and lights – light up of course.

First thing you know there we are at our NewUserDistro desktop! And right there it has a full User Manual right on the Desktop, either loaded from the livecd or downloaded automatically as part of the installation. Models for same? Take a close look at Simply Mepis or sidux, both of which have first-rate manuals. These take a lot of time to produce and we ought to applaud the people who make the effort! Sorry Team, but if you do not have one you are not done yet.

And let's immediately walk through whatever configuration steps might remain including any work that must be done with users and passwords.

OK, RULE 4 LISTEN UP RIGHT HERE (or “raht cheeer” as we say locally)!

You WILL NOT default your distribution to a no-password required “convenience.” you just will NOT do that! If you do it will be a very cold day before I hand your livecd to anybody.

Corollary for your further entertainment: Please do insist upon a separate password for the Root user. No “sudo” business, thank you. At least make the password thieves work a bit.

You carry critically important corporate files on an unsecured laptop? Egad …........ I think Homeland Security has a special line for you. It's that long one over there.

Does a Linux distro optimized for New Users have to load multi-media codecs automatically as part of the installation process? No, it need not and in the United States it cannot if it is to comply with relevant law regarding copyrighted intellectual property. But people do want to watch movies, play games, listen to music, etc. So a “new user friendly” distribution is going to explain clearly in the User Manual how to do this and perhaps take new users directly out to Fluendo or ???? to facilitate the installation process. Most people have Real Lives (really!) and they do not want to spend a weekend on The Great Hunt. So let's make this easy?

Similarly a our NewUserDistro does not have to load multitudinous language packs by default, but it certainly should make provision for various languages during the installation process. Linux is global and easy access to a variety of languages and keyboards is essential. Fortunately most distributions do this.

And let's do make it easy for our New User to get to the SpiffyDistro Forum and we'll hope it has a “New User” section designed to help people get started. Bonus points in this category if it does.

Finally Rule 5: Test your livecd-installation process with a group of potential new users and get the bugs out! Suffice it to say I have encountered a number of “How Did They Do That?” candidates as I have examined various distributions, several of which were otherwise really quite good. Please do fix these, we want you to succeed and grow!!

I probably have forgotten some essential thing or two, but this will start the conversation? Did I miss something? Am I just wrong-headed? Love to hear from you!

Once we have our criteria straight I might offer my own assessment of “Best Distros for New People.” But we first need to say what we think makes a good distribution. Your view?

_________________
Ubuntu 9.10
Mandriva 2024 KDE
siduxKDE/antiX

tlmiller · Posted: Fri Feb 12, 2024 11:17 pm Post subject:

Rule 4 will lose you a TON of users UNLESS you CLEARLY tell them how to set that up. They've been spoon fed default installs that didn't require passwords for so long, some people will install, get tired of it, and will go back to their "I don't need to remember my password" Windows.

As far as sudo, I can deal with having sudo, but I can see why people don't want to have an extra password to remember. In todays society, everything has passwords, forcing yet another password (so now you have multiple passwords on a single box, just to do something simple like install patches) is just asking for yet another thing that they can forget, and have them abandon it because it's too hard. Newb friendly distro's should be just that, newb friendly, with the ABILITY to be hardened when the user wants to go the next step. You make it too complex, and newbs will use it for a day or 2 and simply say "it's too much trouble".

_________________
Debian Squeeze, Arch, Kubuntu mostly. Some Mandriva. Some Windows.
Desktops: shadowdragon, medusa
Laptops: bluedrake, banelord, sandwyrm, aardvark.

melloe · Posted: Sat Feb 13, 2024 4:18 am Post subject:

We ran a computer club, as well as the electronics shop I ran, and tested distros with the main thrust of getting people into Linux. A hard sell when we first started. As much a I have issues with the bumtu's on several points, he knew what he was doing, and that was the beginning of a new wave of people who tried Linux. His advertising and free disks did not hurt, but the ease of password set up was the key. So I have to agree with tlmiller on this one about passwords. As much as I detest the sudo thing personally, it works for NooBs.

I just did a couple of test installs, ( which is basically what I do ) and more and more distros that would like to appeal to NooBs offer an easy password route on install. One might say a sad state of affairs security wise, but good news for NooBs. Some of have the option one way, some the other, but allow a one password set up with password free auto log on in some cases. ( Maybe TOO far in that direction )

I don't do laptops, ( could not pay me enough to look at that little screen and deal with all that silly crap..don't do them, and stopped working on them some time back. at the shop.....other than family nmembers ~ sigh ) and my associate did not do PC's normally, so we did not always agree about whether a distro was ready. Good point, and sad point, as there are TOO many different wireless solutions out there.

I don't know of any otherwise good NooB distro that is 100% with this one.
Competition in the market place will do that. And it is probably going to get worse before it gets better. Good point that needs to be driven home with mfr's and Distros. One thing that held back Linux adoption in the modem world was the "winmodem", and needing a solution for Linux. Let us keep on the mfr's as a community not to let the wireless thing hurt Linux. Knew I hated laptops for a reason <G><

At this point in time, Linux has a better record of out of the box wired and wireless drivers available then any windows install I have seen, but every wireless and wired device comes with a set of windows drivers for windows current operating systems. People are used to having to add drivers for wired or wireless devices if they ever did an install, but many now entering the Linux World have never had to do that as they were OEM folks. Bless their hearts, they made me a living for a long time doing the stuff we now want them to do on their own with Linux.

When we see more shops with signs, we install Linux for you, we will know Linux has arrived. Don't expect that any time soon, as it is biting the hand that feeds the shop...cleaning up MS messes.

As a side note, I have done only two windows only installs on builds that went out the door in the last couple of years. The rest were multiboots,, or Linux only. Those two were both for extended family members or friends~ sigh

_________________
mell0: 1. Kubuntu, XP, Sabayon 2. Mandriva,Mint, Mephis
Thor: 1. VISTA, Fedora 2. Chakra, Debian
Sam:XP, SuSE Zues: win7, SuSE testing

VHockey86 · Posted: Sat Feb 13, 2024 4:37 am Post subject:

melloe · Posted: Sat Feb 13, 2024 7:25 am Post subject:

VHockey86

julian516 · Posted: Sat Feb 13, 2024 4:34 pm Post subject:

Interesting! I did not expect Rule 4 to raise the dust. And timiller makes some good points indeed.

Here's my thought: The key to Linux malware defense (and hence avoidance of the AV Tax and all the operational nonsense that goes with it.) is to make it difficult for Bad Guys to get into the operating system and modify it. So if we are going to operate open systems back into the clutches of Norton et al we go. I surely don't want to go there! And I do not want new Linux people to be there. So I would like to see a Root Password as the default installation. t seems to me that installations that provide it set up easily, but perhaps I underestimate the problem?

Re laptops the password problem is even more severe given the likelihood that a laptop used for professional purposes will carry essential data and they are so prone to theft. We have all read those stories about how a gazillion credit card identities or classified documents got loose because somebody had them on an open laptop. Just not a good thing.

I run Ubuntu and I get along with sudo, but I do think the more secure su + root password is a notch better. Login as root? If a person routinely does this it is just not good. Better to take the option away, I think.

Now on a single user desktop at home (or a laptop that stays home) we might run an open system, so we make that an option. But the user has to self-consciously choose it with some awareness of the potential dangers. (How about a red field, leering pirate, deep dismal Hollywood music??)

melloe is right about one thing -- give me this big 24 inch monitor every time!! Love this thing, I have to admit. No netbooks here!

Question: Everybody's OK with the idea that we do not load USA-copyright protected codecs by default as a few distros do?

_________________
Ubuntu 9.10
Mandriva 2024 KDE
siduxKDE/antiX

tlmiller · Posted: Sat Feb 13, 2024 7:53 pm Post subject:

The codecs I'm fine with, but distro's should tell you easily how to get them in case they're legal where you live (or you just don't care that the government is full of morons that make it illegal to watch something you own).

For corporate laptops, yes, there should not be sudo access. But then, corporate laptops aren't going to run noob distro's unless the company is a fly by night company full of complete imbeciles. No company gives their users root access that has 1/2 a brain cell. So sudo shouldn't be an issue in corporate sector as it shouldn't be used. AT ALL, in that space. For noob users, sudo is a great way to allow them to do everything with only remembering their own local password, and nothing else. Which like VHockey said, on home systems, ECSPECIALLY single user home systems, the most important data is already in /home, so once it's compromised, who cares about the rest of the system?

_________________
Debian Squeeze, Arch, Kubuntu mostly. Some Mandriva. Some Windows.
Desktops: shadowdragon, medusa
Laptops: bluedrake, banelord, sandwyrm, aardvark.

julian516 · Posted: Sat Feb 13, 2024 10:23 pm Post subject:

Your first observation re codecs seems to me reasonable. Linux distributions are international and so your suggestion is a fair compromise. As for the "stupid law" rationale, well, we all have our list of stupid laws! In this case I quite agree with you, but the stupid law is what the stupid law is. So the viable compromise is as you explain it.

As to passwords: I think we are talking here about what the default choice is as the system is installed. I have no quarrel at all with VHockey if he elects to run that way. And on a single-user-at-home system it can make sense. So being Masters of Our Own Fates he & we ought to be able to elect to do that.

My concern is the default posture. I would prefer a new user at least learn the Root user concept and the logic for it before they overturn it. There are circumstances where doing so really is not a good idea.

As for corporations (or government agencies) not being silly enough ---- hmmmmm ... rather begs a key question I suspect!

Laughing

_________________
Ubuntu 9.10
Mandriva 2024 KDE
siduxKDE/antiX

mmmna · . . . . Joined: 21 Apr 2024 Posts: 7224

Wonderful length, looks like a good amount of work has been put into it.... I'll have to read it later tonight.... came here to do something else, and I tend to forget little things when I jump on such a read as this!

BRB.

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-Kubuntu 10.04 LTS Beta2 on Celeron D desktop
-PCLinuxOS 2024 LXDE on EeePC 900A with Atom n270 (modded with 32G SATA drive and 2G ram).

crouse · Site Admin Joined: 17 Apr 2024 Posts: 11833 Location: Iowa

I hate sudo, makes computers more insecure by having the same password do root jobs.
Root should have it's own password. I've always thought of sudo=lazy lol..... I'm sure sudo has it's good points, like limiting users to just certain features that root might have, but giving full root access (which is what 90% of people do) with sudo, defeats it's purpose i think. sudo has it's place, but using it because a newbie is to lazy to learn to do it the right way is in no way helping them imho.

In other words, if your giving full root access to the box with sudo, your not using sudo for what it was intended. You might as well make the root password the same as yours.

As for "who cares for the rest of the system" ..... uh, I do.
Hackers just LOVE getting root on an unsecure linux box, allows just boatloads of fun, send spam by the thousands, install your own ftp/web/email servers blah blah blah...the list goes on and on. More importantly YOU should care, a good hacker isn't going to let you know you've been hacked, and well.....gee thanks for putting that tax return pdf in your docs directory ... I've been waiting for that Razz

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Archie/Jughead - Arch Linux 32-bit -- Kernel 2.6.33.4-1
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masinick · Posted: Mon Feb 15, 2024 10:59 pm Post subject:

Bill, I think you did a great job to get this whole thing started. When you set up your criteria, I think there were probably a few implicit assumptions that, if made explicit, would clarify when to take a particular approach.

I think, from my perspective, that we are somewhere in betweeen this kind of thinking: for new users, shall we simply make the thing so ridiculously easy that just about anyone can install it (even if they do not understand it), should we press for understanding, risking alienating those people from using the software, or should we strike a balance somewhere in between? I think that Ubuntu and Mint get about as close as you can get with the current level of development in systems to make them as easy as possible. In some ways, Ubuntu may be easier than Mint, though others would argue the other way. I say that because Mint provides more choices, and for beginners, choices can lead to confusion.

SimplyMEPIS is pretty simple in most ways, but on the topic of passwords, MEPIS does require the use of root passwords, so for some, that may be an issue. I personally find that to be a matter of education, and MEPIS does really well with the educational piece with a great Wiki site and excellent support provided by community members, so at least for me, I like that kind of balance. Perhaps a scared beginner would shy away from it; do we really want such types to be running that kind of system? For such users, if we REALLY want to do it at all, perhaps something very Windows-like is appropriate. I tend to ask "Why bother?" in that case.

On the other hand, the Android smartphones and the emergence of ChromeOS, and a few of the others that are trying to JUMP ahead of ChromeOS are stretching the interfaces we use, and in my opinion, that is the direction that new computing needs to take. A completely new user interface form factor is at least a decade overdue from my perspective, but the iPhone, iPod craze, and now the Smart Phone craze seems to be pushing us in that direction, and maybe the next generation of that stuff will give us something to really think about.

_________________
Brian Masinick
Distros: SimplyMEPIS
sidux - no CAPS!, antiX, Debian

tlmiller · Posted: Tue Feb 16, 2024 12:47 am Post subject:

When catering to new users who haven't ever used linux before, I think it should take the approach exactly like Ubuntu & Windows takes. Make it easy. You can make it secure later, but for now, make it easy. Sudo should, IMO, be the default on newb distros. There shouldn't be a billion choices, give them 1 or 2 default choices, and when they start learning, they have the option of adding more and customizing. But a newb distro should be catered to someone who knows nothing. Those who argue for more are looking at what THEY want in a system. We're not newbs anymore. No, I don't use a system configured like that either. But for newbs, I very well think it should be. One of the reasons Windows has rebuked every approach from Linux at making headway in the desktop is because people want non-newb friendly defaults. Guess what, newbs want easy, once they learn, then they want customizable, but at first, they only care about easy. You make them jump through hoops and learn everything just to do ANYTHING, they're going back to paying for a Windows license, and all that does, is hurts the Linux community when they tell their friends "Yeah, I tried that linux stuff, but it makes you set like 500 passwords just to do something simple like install software"

Yes, it hurts security, but a newb is going to hurt the security of his system regardless of if you make it easy or hard. At least if you make it easy he might stick with it long enough to learn better practices.

_________________
Debian Squeeze, Arch, Kubuntu mostly. Some Mandriva. Some Windows.
Desktops: shadowdragon, medusa
Laptops: bluedrake, banelord, sandwyrm, aardvark.

masinick · Posted: Tue Feb 16, 2024 12:57 am Post subject:

Good points, Tim. In that regard, whether we personally like Ubuntu or not, we should give it many points for helping people get a solid start with Linux, and the distro ratings certainly indicate that it has done that, and Dell seemed to think so, too, offering it as its first desktop pre-installed Linux system.

_________________
Brian Masinick
Distros: SimplyMEPIS
sidux - no CAPS!, antiX, Debian

mmmna · . . . . Joined: 21 Apr 2024 Posts: 7224

mmmna · . . . . Joined: 21 Apr 2024 Posts: 7224

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