About the level 4 and 5 security updates

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hoppimike

About the level 4 and 5 security updates

Post by hoppimike »

Personally, I think that leaving them there unselected with red blotches next to them (the colour of the level badge and exclamation mark that indicates they are security updates) is very silly.

Don't get me wrong, I ADORE Mint!! Easily the best distro, totally awesome, and very friendly for new users and the non-technical whilst still being very useful for those of us with more experience and technical ability.

But I do think that users need more direction than this. You can't present your average little old lady trying to use her computer to go on Facebook and check her email with "What do you choose - security or stability?" "These updates are important for security but may affect your system and it may not boot! Think about your actions!"

The poor old dear might have a heart attack xD

Point I'm making is... keep it friendly and dumbed down, honestly. Leave those updates off if they're not needed for most people, because the technical people can in just a few clicks opt to show them again.

Leaving them there looking all lit up red and intimidating yet not ticked it a great way to confuse and spook a new user, who is otherwise probably loving their simple Linux Mint experience.

So, yeah, just my 2 cents is all :)

And keep up the good work - awesome OS!

Mike
Last edited by LockBot on Wed Dec 28, 2022 7:16 am, edited 1 time in total.
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richyrich

Re: About the level 4 and 5 security updates

Post by richyrich »

Are you sure your name isn't Lebowski ? ? ? . . lol :lol:
hoppimike

Re: About the level 4 and 5 security updates

Post by hoppimike »

richyrich wrote:Are you sure your name isn't Lebowski ? ? ? . . lol :lol:
haha yeah I forgot I'd even set this avatar!

I like it though :)
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Re: About the level 4 and 5 security updates

Post by Pjotr »

They used to be hidden.... Some time ago, there was a lot of discussion at developers' level, about the security of Ubuntu versus the security of Linux Mint. I think that that discussion has lead the Mint developers to change the default settings for security updates for level 4 and 5.

It's a bit confusing for a new user, alright. It would be more straightforward to either hide them entirely again, or pre-select them like the level 1-3 updates.

All in all, my preference would be to pre-select them by default. That would increase the risk of unstability a little, but not much (non-security updates of level 4 and 5 would still be hidden). No more confusion, and it would improve the security reputation of Linux Mint in the eyes of Ubuntu users.

Of course you can make Update Manager behave like you want to yourself, but default settings are important.
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Crewp

Re: About the level 4 and 5 security updates

Post by Crewp »

I agree completely, I have gotten a few family members using Mint, and those updates confuse them. They should be hidden by default, and left for those with a little more experience.
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Re: About the level 4 and 5 security updates

Post by Cosmo. »

In an ideal world there would not even exist the need for leveling updates. One could update whatever exists, via GUI or command-line (apt-get), and there would not even exist this discussion at all.

In the real world some updates can break things; this does not happen for the majority of systems and users (if this would be the case, the developers would most likely see those problems themselves and would not release those builds), but a user, who gets affected, will not be happier by knowing, that most users do not have the problem. And because of that a simple do or do-not is impossible. Nevertheless those updates exist out of a reason; hiding level 4/5-secutity updates by default would result, that most users would not be aware, that they do exist.

Removing the activation for showing those updates is nothing, what makes rocket-science necessary. If the user comes to the point of wondering about that, than this is IMHO the wanted consequence. In my understanding of what Clem wrote about that I believe this is intended and I share this.

The point is, that undoing an update is mostly not easily doable - except if the user makes an image-backup. But the update-manager cannot know, if the user did it and how current the last image is.

So the question should not be, if they should get shown, but how to prepare the own system for save applying the updates.
hoppimike

Re: About the level 4 and 5 security updates

Post by hoppimike »

Cosmo. wrote:In an ideal world there would not even exist the need for leveling updates. One could update whatever exists, via GUI or command-line (apt-get), and there would not even exist this discussion at all.

In the real world some updates can break things; this does not happen for the majority of systems and users (if this would be the case, the developers would most likely see those problems themselves and would not release those builds), but a user, who gets affected, will not be happier by knowing, that most users do not have the problem. And because of that a simple do or do-not is impossible. Nevertheless those updates exist out of a reason; hiding level 4/5-secutity updates by default would result, that most users would not be aware, that they do exist.

Removing the activation for showing those updates is nothing, what makes rocket-science necessary. If the user comes to the point of wondering about that, than this is IMHO the wanted consequence. In my understanding of what Clem wrote about that I believe this is intended and I share this.

The point is, that undoing an update is mostly not easily doable - except if the user makes an image-backup. But the update-manager cannot know, if the user did it and how current the last image is.

So the question should not be, if they should get shown, but how to prepare the own system for save applying the updates.
True, a recovery system would be brilliant - I'm not sure if we have anything like this on Mint?

But I do think the devs should pick a side on this within the update manager. Make the call for hyper-casual users for them. You just have to. Hell, even I didn't know what to do about them and I'm experienced with Linux lol

Don't wanna confuse them into a situation like that where they don't feel like they can win! :)
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Re: About the level 4 and 5 security updates

Post by exploder »

I actually like the mintUpdate the way it is. My HP 655 laptop requires all the updates, including the 3.19 kernel to run right. My kid's P4 system only runs right with the mintUpdate defaults. With the system in place the way it is I do not have to fix the kid's system from updates gone wrong. They could care less about new kernels and stuff, all they want is their system to keep running. I read change logs and can fix my computers should something go wrong, they can't.

Even on my laptop, I would have just gone with the default updates if it had ran without problems. I looked at the higher level updates when things were not working right. A lot of the security updates have no real impact on most home users, there are a few exceptions. Even in Ubuntu where users apply all updates there are plenty of users with breakage.
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Re: About the level 4 and 5 security updates

Post by Cosmo. »

hoppimike wrote:True, a recovery system would be brilliant - I'm not sure if we have anything like this on Mint?
If you mean an image-backup (seems so, as you quoted me):
I use qt4-fsarchiver, you can get it with this PPA: ppa:dieterbaum/qt4-fsarchiver. Other users prefer clonezilla.
jonmarx

Re: About the level 4 and 5 security updates

Post by jonmarx »

I have a big Sony Viao laptop for home use and a small Sony Vaio laptop for travelling. Very similar models apart from screen size, both installed with the same ISO of Mint 17. For the home-use machine I only install level 1 to 3 updates, but I often use the travelling one over public wifi and for sharing files from other people's USB drives, so I 'select all' and install levels 4 to 5 as well. That's been going on for over a year, and I've noticed zero difference in stability between the two machines. Maybe I've been lucky.
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