Monday 19 May 2014

Re: errors.ubuntu.com and upgrade crashes

On Mon, May 19, 2014 at 06:42:52AM +1200, Robert Collins wrote:
> It might be better to flip the logic around and assume most user
> applications are brittle - refuse to update unless all the user
> applications running have marked themselves as being update
> ready/update aware.

This puts the user in the position of having to close all "brittle"
applications before an update can proceed. I see a couple of potential
issues with this:

1) How many users won't bother, and therefore won't get updates?

2) How will users identify and close the necessary applications? What
are the chances that some application somewhere will somehow be stuck,
and thus updates will never proceed?

I remember a dialog telling me what windows I must close in order to be
able to log out (or to force close them). This might work, but I think
that some users will fear closing them through a "force" option, and
thus will never update.