Re-visiting update control on the desktop

lfdominguez · August 1, 2021, 11:36pm

Because this is what I say… Canonical must listen the community, because if you dont listen your community, you’re Microsoft, so i think Canonical is converting into Micrononical

galgalesh · August 2, 2021, 4:28pm

These kind of statements add nothing to the discussion and convince no-one. It only adds noise which drowns out the valid concerns and the discussion about how to fix it.

lfdominguez · August 2, 2021, 4:43pm

Really, really… I have yet to read any real technical impediments that developers are relying on to not enable that functionality. All I read is whether it is better for the user or not, please not all users are dumb and there are many who manage technical services and not having that option is like telling them “You don’t know what you are doing let us deal with it”.
Solutions?? yes are tons of them… why the installer of the operating system allow the user to format the disk if “the user dont known about it”??? pleaaaaase, in the moment that you are a base for doing “things” that “is ready for production” you must listen the users… not are 3 or 4 users, are a lot more that currenty are production managers of servers…

galgalesh · August 2, 2021, 4:49pm

I, like most people in this thread, am not a Canonical employee and have no power about whether or not update control gets changed. We’re on the same side. I’m trying to tell you this kind of approach is very unlikely to result in anything useful.

I am trying to make sure the thread doesn’t spiral down into a reddit-like group of people shouting in a void where any useful discussion is drowned out.

lfdominguez · August 2, 2021, 5:24pm

but that’s the thing… many people give to the devs real facts where auto-refresh breaks things, but the devs doesnt give to us a real technical problem to avoid the include of that option to snapd… is a simple option, where the default is true, a normal user will not touch that… but some that need it, then touch it…
So ok, if the user touch that and forgot to update is a User issue, but then if the user found how to disable then end with:

Touch /etc/hosts file
Install another tool (snap-proxy)
Download the snap locally and use --dangerous to install
And so on…

So where is the real technical explain of this… if they dont see the point, another lot of people see it, and into that set of people are sysadmin working in critical systems, so who knowns more of their system, the devs of snapd or theirself?

kyrofa · August 2, 2021, 5:44pm

@lfdominguez no one is arguing with you about what you’re saying, it’s how you’re saying it. As @popey hinted at in his response, this isn’t actually a technical problem. Canonical leadership just doesn’t want it, which is why no Canonical engineer will find time for it, and why any non-Canonical engineer will need to be a master negotiator if they want to write it themselves. I’m afraid your style of negotiation will not be convincing.

lfdominguez · August 2, 2021, 5:59pm

Agree… thanks and sorry with the thread… but is frustrating this kind of things jejeje, asking anyone has tried to push a PR with a proposal??? because if not when i have a time i will try send one…

kyrofa · August 2, 2021, 6:21pm

I don’t believe so, please feel free! Just remember what you’ll be facing. You must either convince someone to merge something they know their bosses don’t want, or convince the bosses that they want it. Neither will be easy; you will need to be eloquent.

futuretim · August 2, 2021, 6:45pm

Or fork it and carry a very small set of patches against it. Which is what I’ll have to do / have done for Project Kebe anyway. But it’s a non-zero amount of work and you have to keep it up-to-date yourself.

rickan · October 13, 2021, 12:55am

I just checked in here to see what the status is and whether it’s improved at all and I find it’s not.

I’m very disappointed in Ubuntu and Snap on this. I feel hugely betrayed. I have not upgraded from 16.04 and I will not until I can set it up do updates only when I am in a situation when it’s possible to do the updates and I initiate the process manually.

In my opinion Snapcraft is being very ugly on this.

I have the same shitty problem with my phone so when I’m home on my shitty Verizon Inet connection my phone has WiFi connection turned off so it does not wedge my bandwidth and use up my quota with updates.

rickan · October 13, 2021, 11:58am

I sure hope someone else has already made this observation:

This whole automatic update controversy indicates that the developers insist on violating the KISS principle. It’s just one of the symptoms of bad engineering, as well as other kinds, of judgment demonstrated by the developers, and probably their bosses, on this thread. Not only do I have to leave Ubuntu because of Snap but because I can no longer trust the Ubuntu corporate judgment.

I will look closer at the Linux Mint distribution and any others which might be without Snap and I will switch away from Ubuntu the very next time I visit a place with decent Internet bandwidth and when I have enough connect time.

galgalesh · October 13, 2021, 1:08pm

This is very easy to fix with Snap. Open the settings, go to the Wifi network settings, click the gear icon and check “Metered connection: has data limits or can incur charges”. Snap will not update anymore when on that network.