On Fri, Oct 25, 2013 at 01:41:42AM +0100, Steve McIntyre wrote: > > I guess not everybody understands the reasons for Debian choosing a > default desktop, so I'll explain/expand them here. > > 1. We have several types of installation media (netboot, netinst, DVD, > BD) where we can happily install any desktop - they either contain > *all* of the bits needed for any of the desktops, or *none*. The > choice was made years ago to *not* ask users which desktop they > prefer during the tasksel phase, to reduce the number of questions > that new users would have to answer. Hence, we chose a > default. Since that point, we've added options in the boot menus on > these generic media (where possible, via isolinux or grub) to make > it easier to make a desktop choice, but to the best of my knowledge > most people just take the default option. We *could* revisit the > tasksel design choice to not list all the desktops if people want - > that's another discussion to have, maybe. >
I think it would be a good idea to have the netinst have an additional option to select desktop easily including the option for "command line only, no graphical desktop" as default. That would produce a minimalist install - ideal for servers - and the option at that time to add KDE/Gnome or whatever other desktop environment if you want a graphical desktop. That way, too, any changes that require to be made to accomodate the requirements of any particular desktop environment can readily be accommodated in package listings that install the environment. CD #1 for KDE, with a different #1 for LXDE/XFCE - not many people now have CD drives only. Can DVD #1 install multiple desktops in and of itself? For machines that can boot from USB, I now routinely dd the image of DVD1 straight onto a 4GB stick and go from there. Perhaps DVD#1 for KDE/XFCE/LXDE and a separate DVD#1 that bootstraps Gnome? > > I don't think it would be a sensible option to have multiple sets > of CDs, each tailored to a specific desktop. Hence, we end up > picking a default here too. > > >I understand that the both of these are good arguments, but maybe solutions > >can be found for both. One idea would be the design of better download pages > >[0] that provide minimal information about the desktop environments like a > >picture of the desktop and a link to the upstream project. Not sure what to > >do > >with the CD sets though. > > Quite. :-/ > All the best, Andy Cater
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