On Tue, Jul 1, 2008 at 9:34 PM, Dylan McCall <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> I am definitely not the only one who has had his blood boil from the
> recent swarm of articles "previewing" Ubuntu I with alpha 1. A specific
> problem right now is that this is causing a great deal of noise about
> the theme, which is Not Final and intended specifically to generate bug
> reports regarding dark themes. Because of these articles, there is a
> strong misconception rising that this is the shape of Ubuntu's new
> theme. This can be very damaging.
>
> More problems tend to arise down the line once development steps beyond
> the merge with Debian. Fortunately, we aren't there yet.
>
> This Needs to be fixed, because this release is going to get a lot of
> attention. Possible fixes:
>
>      * Very loud printing on the login screen, wallpaper or usplash
>        saying something along the lines of "this is a development
>        pre-release intended for testing. Do not use this operating
>        system for production work, and bear in mind that all content is
>        subject to change. Please file bug reports at launchpad.net."
>      * Information popup for the theme packages when they receive
>        updates, stating intent: As a means to test dark themes, and not
>        final; that users please watch out for theming issues and report
>        them because this release is the chance to fix them! Later, "we
>        are rotating between a variety of possible themes to gauge
>        interest. Please provide constructive feedback at
>        ubuntuforums.org". As for having a jarringly ugly theme to start
>        off with, I really hope that generates some contributions.
>
> In short, I think the alpha builds could do well making  more known that
> they are pre-release work, provided because the development process is
> 100% open. (There seems to be some left-over misunderstanding amongst
> "the crowd" that released work, regardless of status, should look nearly
> final. Not the case with open source).
> The info popups could actually be quite cool in this case, because they
> may carry all sorts of handy testing information. As is, Ubuntu Ibex may
> almost be mistaken as a release candidate. It would seem that
> journalists and / or crowds are leaping at that to generate noise.
>
> Bye,
> -Dylan
>
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>

Are all these excessive danger signs warranted? Pre release versions
have bugs - people get it.
Seriously, is this really a big issue? Do we have any solid data to
back this up?

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