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0 pointsfesja13y ago0 comments

From my days in Ubuntu... I remember that when I was installing some programs, it was asking me for dependencies. That's not user friendly.

The App Store is user-friendly. Do you want that program? Download it! No worries of dependencies. So it doesn't matter if it's proprietary or not. It's a matter of user experience and wanting to make it easy for non-techies. They have improved a lot but it's sad they weren't the first to make that change.

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7 comments · 4 top-level

glesica13y ago· 3 in thread

Huh? Longtime Ubuntu user here, I have no idea what you're talking about... Desktop Linux has plenty of problems, no need to invent new ones to complain about. Unless you were installing programs manually you shouldn't need to worry at all about dependencies on Ubuntu (or Debian).

gcr13y ago

How else does one install programs other than manually? You can't magically wish for Chrome to appear on ubuntu, you have to either use Synaptic, apt-get, or the software center (on recent ubuntii). All of these at least prompt you about dependencies.

takluyver13y ago

'Manually' probably means not using a package manager - either with the configure/make dance, or with a binary installer like Google Earth used for a long time. In those cases, you still need to sort out dependencies manually.

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joneil13y ago

Ubuntu Software Center doesn't prompt about dependencies... it just goes ahead and installs them. At least that's the default behaviour on 12.04 on my two machines.

mekoka13y ago

I've been using it for 5 years. When I install a program via apt-get, it does ask for my permission to install certain dependencies. At which point I just have to say yes or no and it will proceed or abort. I don't see how that's a problem.

notatoad13y ago

i don't believe ubuntu has ever required users to worry about dependencies. that was solved in apt before ubuntu came into existence.

if you used synaptic to install programs, it highlighted dependencies in the GUI, but that was really just irrelevant information - there was no user interaction required other than clicking the install button on the thing you wanted.

bad_user13y ago

On Ubuntu to install a third-party app, like Chrome or Skype, you just double-click the dpk, a wizard pops up, you click Install, and all dependencies are taken care of.

The process is much better than on OSX. Think about how no app installs Growl automatically.

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