"Tick this box to install the software for this functionality" is poorly designed GUI

[Milan Bouchet-Valat]

Binary package hint: ubiquity

The new checkbox allowing to install common restricted software like MP3 and Flash (screenshot at [1]) is a very nice improvement in Maverick. However, I guess you didn't ask a designer before committing this! ;-) No strings in any UI describe the widgets of the interface itself: this is meta-information which confuses the user.

If you say "Tick this box to install the software for this functionality", you may as well change the "Forward" and "Quit" buttons to "Click this button to go forward" and "Click this button to quit", which obviously sounds silly. This checkbox isn't consistent with the conventions that are used all over the desktop, and not even with the second checkbox, which reads "Download updates while installing", rather than "Tick this box to download..." - you get the idea!

Also, "software for this functionality" is not a good idea, because this forces the user to wonder what "this functionality" refers to: better sum up the paragraph, this makes UI easier to parse (just like GNOME buttons in dialogs sum up the action they correspond to, in addition to the dialog's text).

So I suggest something like "Install third party software providing some essential features", or something like that - I'm not a designer, so it may be better to ask the UX team.

Another point is that the order of the two checkboxes and the layout are misleading: downloading updates during install is something very different from third party software, and it's currently not clear at all, since the explanation paragraph is not indented, and is above both boxes. I'd suggest moving the "download updates" checkbox to the top, then put the paragraph, and then the "third party software" checkbox.

I guess it's too late for Maverick due to the freezes, but still good to have.

1: http://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2010/08/little-things-that-matter-installing-non-free-codecs-in-the-installer/