OK - given it a go. I reckon you deserve a medal mate. This is a huge advance on the last version. Ran pretty smoothly and got everything installed OK. I have just a couple of minor things for you and then a more substantive feeling about how unintuitive some bits feel (see below). I tried to do the install as if I was an inexperienced user coming to UP5 for the first time - not so far from the truth.Schoelje wrote:I've uploaded a service release with all known bugs resolved so if you could test the 32-bit version:
First - Burned a DVD with the 32 bit rc1 iso. Undertook a fresh install with new partitions as if I was doing all this for the first time (I wish ).
Slideshow
This looked and ran great. Just a couple of things. The Safe Updates slide has no text yet? Also "Installs in about 10 minutes" looks very optimistic to me. My install on fast almost new hardware took exactly 20 minutes. It took 7 of those 10 minutes just to localize Firefox, Thunderbird and Libreoffice. Humans hate waiting for anything, especially beyond expectations. My advice - drop it altogether, or say something like "10-20 minutes".
I clicked at the "install complete - you need to reboot" dialogue but nothing happened. Clearly the user is expected to go to the menu and chose "Reboot" but most people, me included, are used to an automatic reboot when clicking at the end of an install. You normally click and get the message "Your system is going to reboot now - please confirm". Would that be possible? If not, perhaps some text to say "Please reboot your system now" and offer a reboot button or something. BTW - the Reboot option now appears on the menu OK so that's all good!!
The next action is at the message "Remove disc, close tray and press ENTER". I followed this but the first press did nothing. I waited for a few seconds to see what was what then hit ENTER again. This time it ran OK. Is there something running in the background that has to finish first and would cause the system to miss the first key press??
Log in procedure
After the reboot I got the login screen OK. I have mentioned this before but will again. If you enter your PW and press return nothing happens. Apparently you have to click on the username first. My question is why, and the second question is how the hell is a new user supposed to know that? It is completely counter-intuitive. The U/N box already has the U/N in it - is that not enough? Of course, if there are several accounts, then it is obvious that you have to select one name. But most people will only have one account. IMO:
1) the U/N box should be empty and it is then obvious that you have to type in the name (better security anyway), OR
2) if there is only one user, the U/N is pre-entered and the system accepts it as a default, only requiring the user to enter a PW, OR
3) as 2) above but text alongside the U/N box says "Please select the user name" or even better "Please click on the user name".
I appreciate that all this might be configurable, but the user has to be able to log in the first time to do it!
DDM Window
This looks fine but I got a bit confused by the options and the process. First "Get Started" to me suggests move on from this window to some new dialogue/ action. I didn't want to click on this in case I left the window as I still had to get the kernel and the video drivers. You might want to have a think about this one.
The first offer was to install the pae kernel. That looked fine - perhaps, though, when the kernel option is selected, the "Install Drivers" button could change to "Install Kernel"? This would be much clearer - could you do that?
I chose the option and up came the "Currently Nvidia, ATI.... are supported" window, with the kernel selected and the nvidia driver for my GeForce 210 unchecked. I could see the words "Checking hardware..." running at the bottom of the window but was not sure if I should now select the video driver.
So I left well alone. The kernel was downloaded and install OK but took a good 5 minutes - seemed a long time. The system then needed a reboot. My thoughts were - how many users with multicore systems would NOT want the pae kernel, supposing they even knew what it was! Would it not be possible to offer this option (or install it as the default anyway) during the main install stage. Presumably the first install requires installing a kernel - why not get it at that point, or stick it in the iso? Would this not save a reboot?
Video drivers
OK, after the reboot I got the DDM window again offering to install the video drivers for the correct card. I chose Yes and off it went. Pretty cool process I thought, though it took another 7 minutes from end to end and IIRC yet another reboot.
It began to feel a bit like installing Windows XP - all in all, from booting the DVD, through entering the user data, choosing language/keyboard etc, setting up the partitions, downloading and installing the new kernel and video drivers, three reboots, took almost an hour.
On the flip-side, the cool thing is the hand-holding through almost automated processes to get a great desktop and usable O/S all in one go. I just wonder if it could be streamlined a bit more by integrating it into the initial install? And/or just separating the stages in DDM a bit more clearly.
Hope this is what you wanted - I know I have gone on a bit....
If you want anything else tested or whatever, just ask.