ubuntu-tv team mailing list archive

[Ian Santopietro <isantop@xxxxxxxxx>]

I think that your goals would best be filled by installing Ubuntu
Desktop. It's already suited to your needs and wants for a Smart TV.

In general though, I don't think we need to make Ubuntu TV into Ubuntu
Desktop, largely because we don't need to make TVs behave like
computers. We already have computers for that. Smart TV isn't about
turning TVs into computers, it's about providing more content from
intelligent sources to the TV. See
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smart_TV

On Tue, Nov 29, 2011 at 02:19, Jo-Erlend Schinstad
<joerlend.schinstad@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> Please try to make it a little easier to read. I had difficulty finding your
> reply at all.
>
> Den 29. nov. 2011 10:03, skrev Ian Santopietro:
>
>>
>> Why? What benefits does this offer? If you want Ubuntu Desktop, why not
>> just install Ubuntu Desktop?
>>
>
> Ubuntu TV will be Ubuntu Desktop with a different set of default
> applications, as I explained before. Having the normal Unity installed,
> which seems to require less than one megabyte, does not mean having the full
> Ubuntu Desktop. Why can't you see that it is possible to have something
> without requiring everything? Having Unity installed by default does not
> require you to have LibreOffice installed by default, for instance. But it
> should be installable, and the user should not have to hack Compiz in order
> to be able to switch between TV view and other things.
>
> Indeed, Unity is very much suited for a TV already, since it's specifically
> designed to allow you to use direct shortcuts to launch or switch to
> applications by numbers. So I'm not entirely convinced it would be necessary
> to have a radically different shell at all. A customized Ubuntu desktop
> might work well.

But instead of going with the current Desktop version of Unity, which
is tailored for the Desktop and being productive, why not create a new
version of Unity specifically designed to cater to what TVs have to
offer? Multitasking is usually not terribly important on a TV, since
at most you might be interested in browsing the internet while
listening to music, or something similar. Media playback controls
could easily be implemented through a remote, removing the need to
keep them present on the screen. If you want to keep them on screen
(Like as a status indicator), then you don't need a lot of space to do
so; a small overlay in the corner over the web page would be fine.

Because of this low focus on multitasking, we probably don't need to
use the launcher, which is used mostly for pinning apps and switching
between them.

Note that in this context, multitasking means actively doing two
things at once. You might want to be able to switch "Apps" without
loosing your place or having to navigate back to that webpage. But
each app would be full screen, with minimal UI present.

>
>> Having two modes *is* confusing for the end user, *and* it's a lot of
>> extra work for developers. Remember the netbook edition switcher?
>>
>
> I don't understand why it is impossible to make it easy to switch between
> two screens with a button. Can you explain that? I mean, you're talking
> about software that doesn't exist, and you still make the claim that the
> software _is_ confusing and that it is a lot of work for developers. I don't
> understand how you can know that about software that doesn't exist.
>

Based off of previous experience with other projects. Ubuntu Netbook
Remix had a utility to switch back and forth between "Netbook Mode"
and "Desktop Mode". The problem was that it was very difficult to
implement, so it was buggy. Additionally, most users found the purpose
of it confusing. Finally, it simply wasn't used, because the Netbook
launcher worked fine. So they dropped it (I think for 9.10, though it
could have been 10.04).

I'm not saying that I _know_ end users _will_ find it confusing. I'm
simply saying that we've tried similar things in the past, and people
didn't like them then. I don't think you'd need it now.

>
> Jo-Erlend Schinstad
>
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-- 
Ian Santopietro

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