#57: Seeking Council feedback/input on draft third party software policy
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Reporter: pfrields | Owner:
Status: new | Priority: normal
Component: General | Resolution:
Keywords: workstation |
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Comment (by aday):
This is a selective reply. If I haven't responded to an issue it is either
fine or doesn't require follow up.
But first, a general request: please make an effort to keep the amount of
Fedora specific links and text to an absolute minimum. They result in a
heavy maintenance and testing burden.
Replying to [comment:19 mattdm]:
...
> > * My impression is that you are mandating the use of confirmation
dialogs as a part of this policy. I wouldn't be doing my job if I didn't
point out that these are generally considered to be rather poor UX, not
just because they are an inconvenience for users, but also because they
are often skipped over without being paid attention to (precisely because
they are an inconvenience, I think). Generally speaking I would encourage
clear, prominent and easy to understand information about software rather
than putting barriers in the way (as Paul has already argued).
>
> I don't know why you have that impression. I said "I'd really like the
designers to think about truly advancing this goal through UX design -
something beyond annoying pop-up dialogs." I absolutely agree with you
here.
I did work on a set of confirmation dialogs in the past, which I was led
to believe was a Fedora requirement - I was probably thinking of that.
Great if those aren't required!
> > Why the sole focus on search? What about other ways that software can
be presented and discovered? In general it would be better if the
mechanisms through which software might be present weren't specified at
all.
>
> The emphasis on search is because that's the software and shell
interface I've been looking at, but I definitely agree with you here too:
this should apply to all presentation, not just search.
It would be good if the policy could be updated to reflect this.
> > The part about endorsement of non-free software is unclear. Is the
requirement that Fedora's position on free versus non-free software be
communicated to users as an explicit policy statement? Or is it the case
that the UI should communicate that free/open software is preferable to
non-free software in a more general sense, and therefore communicate
Fedora's policy in a non-explicit, implied manner? For what it's worth, my
personal preference is the latter option: it is more effective than an
official pronouncement and can be done in a way that more effectively
promotes free/open software.
>
> It's currently Fedora's position that we don't present any non-free
software at all. We're talking about changing that, which is a big move. I
think that if we do make such a change, an explicit statement is
important. I'm concerned that a "non-explicit, implied manner" to one
person may be "oh, I didn't notice that at all" to... most people.
Additionally, there is significant value in Fedora being seen as taking a
stance here.
>
> Again, I don't want a big horrible dialog box, but the position should
be unmistakable.
>
> Without committing to a specific implementation, can you give an example
of what a non-explicit, implied manner might look like, and particularly
how it might more effectively promote free/open software?
We've been working on improving the UI for this recently. The details page
for each app now shows a prominent colour coded badge that indicates
whether an app is free or proprietary. If you click on the badge, a
popover is shown which explains what "free" or "proprietary" means, as
well as details like which licenses are used. The explanation text is
value driven but also tries to be informative. It's clear that free
software is being presented positively and proprietary software
negatively.
The user is always exposed to the badges prior to installing an app.
Now, you could add some "Fedora officially disapproves of proprietary
software" text but I'd recommend against doing that. Telling your users
off for something they're doing is one of the worst things you can do from
a branding/user experience point of view. Much better to sell the benefits
of free software and explain the issues with proprietary software in a way
that doesn't imply a judgement on the user.
> > What is "Fedora-prepared educational information"? What is its
purpose? Why does it have to be Fedora-prepared? Why are you specifying
that it should be linked to, rather than being presented in some other
way? (Apologies if I've missed the answers to these questions somewhere.)
>
> It should be Fedora-prepared because Fedora's particular stance and
voice on free and open source software is not necessarily 100% the same as
that of organizations. While we respect and value the FSF, OSI, SPI,
GNOME, and other organizations, we don't have exactly the same positions
and might explain things in a different way. The use of SPDX resources for
license tags is an example; they mean something different than Fedora does
when we use "License: MIT".
I really have to question whether this is necessary. We already provide a
simple explanation in the UI. It might not communicate the Fedora world
view in all its nuanced subtly, but I would be *really* surprised if there
is any appetite amongst users to read detailed licensing information and
adding these links will be a lot of work.
> > I'm generally unconvinced by the idea of prioritising apps in search
results based on whether they are free or not. In terms of the Software
app, I doubt very much that the position of an app in the results will
influence user behaviour or communicate anything worthwhile: we don't have
many apps and the lists on-target search results are never than long. I
mean, how many web browsers do you expect to show up?! And again, a more
abstract statement would be desirable from my point of view, like "when
presenting equivalent software options, an effort should be made to ensure
that free/open software alternatives are given prominence alongside non-
free options". This captures the intent behind the policy and ensures that
it will be implemented across whatever UI comes up, rather than being
restricted to a particular part of the UI.
>
> Right now, I count 11 results for "web browser" in Software. Not all of
them are "good" results.
Right, you only get 2 or 3 actual browsers. The order of these isn't going
to make any difference to how the user perceives the options.
> I like your general approach here, but I'd like:
>
> * something wider than "equivalent" (because I don't want to get into
"oh, Firefox isn't equivalent to Chrome because it doesn't include
$somefeature")
> * something stronger than "an effort should be made" (because "an
effort" could be anything, and I don't want to get into quibbling over
whether some token reference counts)
> * "over" instead of "alongside". That's kind of the point.
Feel free to reword as you see fit, but I would prefer a bit of room for
manoeuvre - in most contexts minor ordering differences aren't going to
make a meaningful difference and it's more work for us to implement this.
I accept that you wouldn't want big banners for non-free apps and little
tiles for free ones, of course. Maybe something like:
"when presenting software that has the same functionality, non-free
alternatives should not be given a non-trivial degree of prominence over
free/open software options" ?
> > I don't understand the final sentence. It seems to say that users are
required to explicitly enable non-free software before it is made visible
to them, but then it goes on to state "the interface can indicate that
these non-free results are available upon action". Are you suggesting that
the UI should indicate that there are hidden results, somehow? Again,
please state your requirements in abstract terms if possible.
>
> My proposal is that by default, non-free software must not be shown, but
when presenting software options, it is okay to indicate that non-free
software ''could'' be shown by changing those options — and again, with
some faith that you can come up with an elegant way to do this.
> Previously, I gave an example ''"Other results appear in the [nonfree]
tag, which is currently filtered out. Click to reset this filter. Fedora
does not endorse non-free software. Learn more about [free software and
open source software and why this matters....]"''. This is obviously
implementation, but I hope it's illustrative. Or, if someone searches for
particular software and there is an exact match by name, that could show
up as ''"{Chrome} appears in the [nonfree] tag, which is ... (then same as
above)"''.
Please remember that software can be presented in multiple ways - in
search results in the shell, when browsing using the Software app, when an
app is requested to open a particular file type, when an app requests a
particular codec, and who knows what other ways. We can't go embedding
this choice into every one of those situations.
With that in mind, this "action" would probably have to be presented as an
option to enable non-free software as a part of the initial setup process.
Again, please try and keep your UI prescriptions to a minimum: the policy
could simply state "non-free software must be explicitly enabled by a user
before it is made visible in any UI". That's short and clear, and leaves
us to figure out the details.
--
Ticket URL: <https://fedorahosted.org/council/ticket/57#comment:22>
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