UI Rant: Computer Janitor
I won’t deny that the Ubuntu repository has plenty of software with badly designed UIs. Not much of it, however, makes it into main, and I’m even more puzzled to see something like this in the default installation — developed by Canonical, no less.
Look at it. Look at it.
UIs like this usually come from applications whose developers wrote them to scratch their own itches. Their purpose and the purpose of their controls are obvious to the developers, not much to Joe Average, Jr.
The description for this application, the Computer Janitor, suggests that its purpose is to “bring the system to a state close to being freshly installed”. Based on that, I assumed its purpose was to delete all packages except for the default install and revert system settings to the defaults as well. I was wrong — it does something different. In fact, I still have no idea what exactly it does.
The only hints at its function are the fact that the list entries in the Unused window are package names. Otherwise, it seems to be designed as cryptically as possible. You can probably guess that it’s designed to remove unneeded packages, but where is it stated? And what’s supposed to go into the other two list views? When there’s an empty list, a good UI usually gives me a hint what’s supposed to appear there. Here, I’m left without a clue.
Now, on to minor nitpicks:
- No window icon, even though there is a taskbar one.
- There is a “File” menu, even though there is nothing to suggest that this application works with files. The only menu item in it is, of course, “Exit”. In fact, the menu is so small that it could easily be moved into buttons in the window itself.
- The “Optimize” list view is for some reason narrower than the other two.
- It suggests me to remove (I guess) libsane-epson-perfection-1670, which is a package with binary firmware for my scanner that I installed manually. It’s not on apt-get autoremove — what is it doing here?
- The spacing between widgets doesn’t comply to the GNOME HIG — there is no spacing between the list views and the edge of the window at all.
In short, we have an application whose UI is designed “for hackers” rather than for the general user (which is itself puzzling — “hackers” will just use command-line apt instead of a GUI utility like this). It would be no harm done if it was just lying somewhere quietly in universe, but what is this doing in the default install?
Concur. Computer-janitor is an obnoxious exercise in poor UI design. I seem to remember previous versions of Ubuntu shipping with an earlier version, or perhaps a different tool altogether, which actually had a sensible interface.
I believe that the current incarnation of computer-janitor was designed as a proof-of-concept, and no one got around to finishing it before 9.10 shipped..
I’d like to point out that its compatibility with gnome-globalmenu is more than can be said of OpenOffice and Firefox. It may not /function/, but at least it /looks/ okay.
The weird thing is that the old one was much more sane from an ui standpoint.
What old one? Was it called Computer Janitor too? I don’t remember any system cleanup utility being installed by default before karmic.
I implemented CJ. I’ve become used to people hating it. I am, however, moving on, so this will be my final communication about it.
The purpose of the tool is to clean up and fix up your system so it works better. It can remove packages, add packages, do missing configuration tweaks, etc. Some day perhaps it will warn you if there’s a better kernel for you to use, and so on. This is a slightly amorphous purpose, without clear borders, just like the job of a janitor. Odd jobs.
Yes, the UI sucks. The new version is better than the old one (empirically tested: way fewer people complained about the new one). I got some help from one person to for the current UI; on the whole, my requests for help did not result in much. (It’s a minor tool, and people with usability-fu have bigger fish to fry.)
The package description could also be improved. I suck at describing it, but if you come up with a better one, please file a bug and include it. The new maintainer will gladly apply it.
I wouldn’t describe myself as having “usability-fu”, but I’ve done UI prettification for other projects before, so I can help with this one.
At least this isn’t a regular-use application.
The Ubuntu Software Centre on the other hand does half of what Add/Remove did and is included by default on every desktop Ubuntu installation. Now that’s progress!
I wish they’d just customised PackageKit.
Actually, the Software Center has the same feature set as gnome-app-install. I think it’s an improvement in usability over the old tool, but still leagues away from the ideal.
see also my bug report :
https://bugs.edge.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/computer-janitor/+bug/482647
“Computer Janitor should be safe instead of relying on the user by displaying a warning”
Computer Janitor should be secured or removed
Worse than all this – as a mere novice I rashly ran this thing, since when some stuff no longer works. Obviously various dependencies are broken but I lack the knowledge to restore them (I’ve tried removing and reinstalling one affected program). This thing should never have been allowed near people like me.