We now have four ways of adding a repository; add it as a line in /etc/apt/sources.list, as a file in /etc/apt/sources.list.d, using Software Sources in the System > Administration menu, or in Synaptic. This only serves to confuse users. It is redundant and should be avoided.
There are also negative consequences of having it in the menus. By eliminating the need to open Synaptic, we're also eliminating the need to get to know Synaptic. That's a shame, because it's a really good package management application. Synaptic has the features of Tasksel built into it, for instance, and many people don't know that because they don't know Synaptic. Because people don't know it very well, they recommend that people open a terminal and run sudo tasksel for tasks and sudo apt-get install for packages. This in turn leads to guides that recommend copy-paste of sudo commands. This may lead to security issues for less advanced users who just want to install some software. They're being conditioned to use sudo carelessly, and to copy commands they don't understand and run them as root. This is a disease which we should fight with all possible means. Removing the Software Sources menu item, thereby forcing users to open Synaptic instead, is only a beginning. All wiki pages and help documents should also refer to Synaptic as the primary way of installing tasks and packages, and Add/Remove for desktop applications. Synaptic also lacks the possibility to enter a number of packages at the same time and install them, like you can do with apt-get and aptitude. I've filed a bug on that on launchpad: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/synaptic/+bug/194666 Best regards, Jo-Erlend Schinstad -- ubuntu-desktop mailing list [email protected] https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-desktop
