Tyler on Ubuntu: Jailbreaking and Why it's good for us.

In case you all haven't heard, back in late July, Jailbreaking devices was ruled to be legal by the United States government, and similar bits of legislator are seeing movement in other notable countries (although those of you in the UK ought to know that it's technically always been legal there). Many countries have never had laws against it, or copyright laws that support claims made by companies such as Motorola, Apple, or Samsung that jailbreaking was somehow illegal.

You're probably wondering by now how in the world this could possibly have any impact on Ubuntu, or you, the Ubuntu user. The answer? More ways than you think.

Interoperability

Quite honestly, this is a point long overdue, but I'm going to say it anyway. There was once, not so long ago, a time when those of us who owned Apple mobile devices of any type were screwed when it came to using Ubuntu. There were a few monster workarounds that yielded less than spectacular results, and even those were generally only for older generation devices. Especially once things got to the point of the 'touch' generation of devices, which added apps and multimedia uses, Ubuntu users were left with hard choices of virtual machines with absurd USB workarounds and shared folders (and really slow sync times), or a dual-boot that we wanted to avoid for this very reason. I remember painful boots, having to wait 15 minutes to install windows updates and a new version of iTunes just so I could sync up a new album, or backup my apps. However, the Jailbreak community provided some very nifty ways to set up your iPhone or iPod to sync up wirelessly, which, while not optimal, was very welcome to nothing at all.

Eventually some very hard working folks at usbmuxd worked out a way to mount iPhone's and iPod touches out of the box with Ubuntu, which was included in vanilla 10.04 (and there was much rejoicing).

However, it should be noted here. Big companies, for the most part, don't care about Ubuntu. So when media devices become increasingly locked down, even those based on Unix and Linux kernels (I'm looking at you, Droid X), it is up to the Jailbreaking community to come up with ways to allow us to sync and use our devices with our Ubuntu Desktops, the way we want.

Now that it's legal, I expect we'll see even more growth in those realms. With significant demand, nothing will stop a large amount of apps that seamlessly work together with Ubuntu and Ubuntu apps, without having to worry about the closed-garden software center of the iOS, or the locked down boot-roms of many Android devices.

Naturally, none of that happens for free. People have to spend time planning and exploring, money has to be paid to run servers, and people have to actually develop the stuff. But without the added risk of possible legal action, whatever portion of Linux users who also have iPads, iPhones, iPod touches, Android phones and tablets, or any other device of that sort can now feel free to find new ways to bring the devices together, both on the Desktop developing side and on the Mobile client side.

So, while the iPhone (or other comparable, previously closed hardware/software) is nowhere even close to being open source, we do now finally have the ability to legally have software harmony between the mobile and desktop world. We just have to create it.

The Freedom We Want

Which, all said, is what we want. While there are plenty of apps available in the app store, there are tons of things that I know those Apple devices could do if the rules allowed it. Jailbreaking = Creativity time. Legal jailbreaking = Creativity time without repercussion. I see that being a win-win.

I've searched around the Ubuntu forums, and sure enough, there are  several threads asking if Ubuntu can be installed on the iPod, the iPad, the Droid, whatever. While I don't know why you would actually want to do so, from a usability point of view, there is no legal restraint keeping us from doing such a thing. If future versions of the iPad increase in power and connectivity, why not have an available version of Ubuntu to run on it? Why not spin our own alternate software to run on our device?

Because that's what this ruling means. It becomes our hardware again. A huge battle has been won in allowing the use of the software that we desire on the devices we buy, legally. That is huge, guys, and Apple has always been resistant to it. But they no longer have the ability to threaten with illegality.

Increasing Familiarity with Alternate OS's and Unix

This is also something that will, in the long run, turn out to be huge even if it's nearly impossible to measure, and even harder to really visualize.

Let me tell you a story. Well, less of a story and more of an overview. I have taken a friend of mine from point A, which was someone who didn't really care about what his device did, he just did what the device told him, to point... I don't know, G, wherein he jailbreaks everything he owns and runs Ubuntu on all his computers. The steps in between started with installing free software solutions like OpenOffice, to illustrating the benefits of Jailbreaking, to showing the ease of Repository use, the power of the terminal, and the complete controllability of Conky scripts and Compiz. He went from being one of those people with a 4 minute Windows boot time due to endless error messages and Java updates and bloatware to running Ubuntu and writing his own scripts.

I gave him a taste of freedom through Jailbreaking and software like Firefox, Chrome, and VLC, and this brought him into using Ubuntu full time.

Jailbreaking gaining momentum means more users becoming willing to install things that they want, instead of what they are told to want. It means that they decide what their computers and devices will do for them, instead of just putting up with their computer for the minimal amount of time necessary. It means that our devices will become a bit more Human friendly, instead of dictated to us by CEO's.

And that, friends, is a good thing for Ubuntu.

Tyler Brainerd is an End User Nerd, who has recently graduated college. He is a usability hobbyist, seeking a friendlier, more useful electronic experience for everyone he can possibly convince to care. On occasion he actually bothers to do what Joey asked him to, and write posts here on OMG!Ubuntu about usability and his own predictions of where Ubuntu might go, as well as fairly obsessively lurking around the OMG comment boards. He thinks that everybody ought to stop complaining that OMG is trying to use 'sex appeal,' unless, miraculously, orange juice and sunburnt noses have somehow become sexy.

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Tyler on Ubuntu: Nautilus

With the release of Nautilus-Elementary 2.30 I've been thinking quite a bit about File Browsers. I did a comparison of the 4 file browsers I see the most often, (Finder, Nautilus, Explorer, and Nautilus-Elementary), but now I'd like to focus a bit more on just Nautilus and Nautilus-Elementary.

Honestly, I'm rather impressed by the overall available functionality contained within Nautilus: Tabbed browsing, Spatial views, tree/list views, as well as many different other possible options available within a vanilla install of Nautilus. Once you tweak Nautilus up, its far easier to get to files and information in Ubuntu than in Windows or OS X.

But are we trained for failure when it comes to file browsing?

Nautilus in review

More than just in terms of GUI and looks, I would think that the very basic paradigm of file browsing is less than usable.

Lets look at a couple screenshots:

Here’s an example of a basically vanilla install of Nautilus. Now, it could be easy to tear apart the basic grossness of what’s happening here (I circled in red all of the primary controls, and in case you didn't notice, their ridiculously off-balanced and crammed together) but rather than look at just where the buttons are, I want to look at how we actually use this thing.

So here we are in the Home Folder. Which is a folder just like any other folder. So, why is it even a folder? I mean, in this screen shot we see a bunch of other folders. Are these things 'home' type things? To a new user, are they supposed to understand that this is meant as a directory to different areas of storing documents? Or are we supposed to stick random things inside of Home?

We, of course, are trained to be just ok with this sort of silliness. It doesn't bother us that there are ridiculous layers of folders within folders within folders, we just accept it.

Here's how Nautilus looks to me, thanks to Nautilus-Elementary and a modded breadcrumb trail thanks to Gnaag:

What have I gained?

To answer that realistically: not much. Mostly I've lost things. I've lost the duplicity of links, the confusion of buttons dedicated to computer and to home and ups and lefts and rights that confuse more than help.

But all this has done, really, is pare down what is still there. We still end up with a basically confusing mess to anyone who has not used a computer before. All sorts of things show up, with a completely unclear hierarchy of importance. Home, Desktop, File System, Network, Trash, and any other hard drive partitions or connected drives get the same treatment.

Even when switched over to a tree-view mode on the sidebar, we see Home, File System, and connected drives and other partitions as equal.

So what?

Well, here's what. I simply do not think that average users need to see all of these things, at the same time, with a completely confusing hierarchy (connected drives are in the sidebar, but also on the desktop, which is in the same hierarchy).

No really, so what?

When it comes to actual file browsing, we need to change what users see, so that your average everyday user is not so blown away by what they see. While the actual file structure itself may not need to disappear, I think that the way we interact with it must absolutely change. First of all, we need to change the idea of Home (or home folder, or the name of the user, or one of the other names available). When I go to my Home, the options presented to me should all be equal in importance, and I should need access to them on the same level. Otherwise, its not my home. I don't think that the Home folder should be presented as a folder at all. Not that you can't get to is when you need it: just that we shouldn't have a folder full of other folders. We should have a Home.

1. What might this look like? Honestly, I think buttons similar to what we have in the Software centre would suit this well. We could have a simple grid pattern with the different available categories, (which could, of course, be added to at need. dropbox, ebooks, or any other new categories should be add-able) which would be single click options. In addition, a bottom row of most recent documents could be beneficial as well.

2. Remove desktop from Home. I know! how horrible would that be? Some have actually suggested making the desktop the home directory itself. But in my opinion? The desktop should not be considered contained by the home directory, because when I have nautilus open to home, hovering above my desktop, it makes no sense to a new user to think that what is in the window over the desktop, contains the desktop. Neither does it make sense to think that the desktop being home is the same as nautilus, over the top. Honestly, I don't know the best place to put the desktop, but I do know that it confuses beginner users and moms and dads and what not.

3. I think we should add a directory called 'projects, which would essentially contain a list of names of projects, with documents not moved within, but tagged within. This is another thing that I do not know, technically speaking, how to actually do it in code. While this overlaps some with work in Zeitgeist, I think that its a better representation of what users really need, rather than just a documents folder, than a different directory for pictures. What if my project has both pictures, documents, and video clips involved in it? I want to store these each in their namesake directories, but they're all related to a particular project. Should I make a copy?

I, for one, find myself creating numerous directories within documents for school, or work, or blog projects, and then copying over the things that need to be there. This creates clutter, and an unnecessary emphasis on the Documents folder, as the things contained within it spread out as being more than documents. Rather, I think we ought to have the first click-able icon in our 'software-centre-style' Home be a projects button, which leads us to this tag-able database.

Clean up the sidebar

We need either a home on the sidebar, or a home button in the toolbar, not both. If we have the form of Home that I've described, then I don't think we need the sidebar, I think we need the button, because that gives the indication that its not just a part of a folder hierarchy, but a real place, important to the user and the things I'm going to use. Another option? Clearing away 'File System.' How often does the basic user need this? How unfriendly is that to a user? Instead, the baseboard 'Computer' is a catchall for hard drives, disks, and hard drives, and makes much more sense to use as an access point, but again, does not need to always be in the users eye. Put it away, and those of us who need it, can bookmark it. But my mom doesn't need it, my dad doesn't need it, heck, I don't even need it %90 of the time, so I don't need it visible, making it more difficult for me to click on what I do need. I think the same makes sense for Network, as I really don't need to see this until the few times I do, and those who do need it ought to be able to add it back. But your normal user? The Human Beings that Ubuntu is supposed to be for? They don't need to see it.

So what do we need in File Browsers in Ubuntu?

More of my files, less browsing. More things that make sense, less strange, confusing paradigms that new users won't be able to understand for the life of them.

Hate my ideas? Love my ideas? Let us know in the comments! I haven't thought of every circumstance, and I don't think I know everything! Let us know why you think these ideas are good, bad, or ugly.

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