Code review comment for lp:~albertomilone/gnome-control-center/randr-virtual

Alberto Milone wrote:
> On Thursday 29 January 2009 17:48:37 Mark Shuttleworth wrote:
>> Alberto Milone wrote:
>>> Alberto Milone has proposed merging
>>> lp:~albertomilone/gnome-control-center/randr-virtual into
>>> lp:~ubuntu-core-dev/gnome-control-center/ubuntu.
>>>
>>> Requested reviews:
>>> VCS imports (vcs-imports)
>>>
>>> With xserver 1.6, the ctrl-alt-backspace shortcut for killing X has been
>>> defaulted to off.
>>>
>>> At UDS it was decided for Ubuntu to accept this upstream change, but to
>>> provide GUI mechanisms for GNOME allowing the user to switch it on or
>>> off.
>>>
>>> This branch implements this mechanism.
>> I very much appreciate Alberto's work in implementing this, but would
>> like to test the decision against our commitment to ease of use. I think
>> enabling or disabling this feature in X is an expert option. I think we
>> can choose to enable it, or disable it, and of course we can allow
>> experts to change that through a config file or through a rebuild, but
>> this capability *should not* be exposed to end-users as a GUI option. It
>> will create more confusion than it will solve.
>>
>> Mark
>
> Dear Mark,
>
> I see your concern but the option which my patch adds is very simple, see the
> following screenshot:
> http://albertomilone.com/ubuntu/gnome/gnome3.png
>
> It says "Ctrl+Alt+Backspace restarts the xserver" and doesn't even mention the
> word "DontZap".
Alberto,

While setting the option is simple:
  1. It does make it too easy for novice users to inadvertently set up
their machines to do something that is potentially undesirable.
  2. Every option that we add to Ubuntu diminishes the value of every
other option. I think this is an important point to consider. Is this
option important enough to add to the cognitive effort that Ubuntu users
must invest?

Users have to stop and consider if they should use the option. What is
it? Should I care? At that point they have already paid a price.

Therefore, we should be absolutely certain that the benefit to users is
worth it. In this case, I wonder if the option really gives us an out
with the vocal users who don't want to see the option changed, and there
fore is meant to benefit us, not the users.

Thoughts?

Cheers, rick