Ubuntu Welcome could offer to set up Online Accounts

Screenshot attached. Sorry about the colors being wrong; that should be fixed in mutter 3.28.1 later this week.

This bug was fixed in the package gnome-initial-setup - 3.29.1-1ubuntu1

---------------
gnome-initial-setup (3.29.1-1ubuntu1) cosmic; urgency=medium

  * Merge from Debian experimental (lp: #1784617). Remaining changes:
    + debian/control.in:
      - Build-Depends on libsnapd-glib-dev, libsoup2.4-dev, libsysmetrics-dev
      - Enable langpack usage
    + Ubuntu-specific patches:
      - 0001-Don-t-run-welcome-tour-at-end.patch
      - 0001-Make-summary-page-explicitly-request-navigation-butt.patch
      - 0001-Ensure-stamp-file-if-the-user-quit-the-wizard.patch
      - 0001-Add-Ubuntu-mode-with-special-pages.patch
      - 0001-Display-the-ubuntu-welcome-wizard-in-Unity.patch
      - 0006-goa-Add-Ubuntu-Single-Sign-On-to-the-list.patch
  * d/p/0001-Add-Ubuntu-mode-with-special-pages.patch:
      - Support Meson build system
      - Show an dialog in case of error when enabling Livepatch (lp: #1764723)
      - Enable online accounts page (lp: #1762192)
  * d/p/0001-Display-the-ubuntu-welcome-wizard-in-Unity.patch:
      - Enable online accounts page (lp: #1762192)
  * d/p/0006-goa-Add-Ubuntu-Single-Sign-On-to-the-list.patch:
      - Show "Ubuntu Single Sign-on" first in the list in the online accounts
        page.
  * d/p/0007-goa-adjust-description-to-not-mention-email-or-conta.patch:
      - Adjust online account description to not mention email or contacts.

 -- Andrea Azzarone <email address hidden> Tue, 14 Aug 2018 16:12:10 +0200

(Sorry that I haven’t been scheduled to work on gnome-initial-setup until this week.)

For what it’s worth, after trying this out in Cosmic, I think this screen should be removed. This is for the reason that’s been at the start of the Online Accounts spec since August 2013: “The purpose of Online Accounts in Ubuntu is to simplify the overall experience, by reducing your need to enter sign-in details for an online service in multiple apps. This time saving comes at a cost: the mental complexity of dealing with a separate thing, ‘Online Accounts’. Therefore, Online Accounts should be involved only where it is reasonably likely to save time.” <https://wiki.ubuntu.com/OnlineAccounts?action=recall&rev=10>

When someone has not yet used any of Ubuntu’s installed apps, likely doesn’t know what apps are installed, probably doesn’t know what kinds of account each app works with, and almost certainly doesn’t know whether any of those apps use Online Accounts — inviting them to “Connect Your Online Accounts” is much, much more likely to waste time than to save it.

For example, if someone has a Gmail or Outlook.com account, and sees this screen, they would quite reasonably think that setting up their Google or Microsoft account would set up their e-mail. Only after completing the first-login setup would they discover that Ubuntu doesn’t even ship an e-mail app. And when they check their e-mail in Firefox instead — or if they always check their e-mail on the Web anyway — they would discover that Firefox completely ignores the account they set up, so they have to sign in all over again.

A second example: If someone uses Google Photos, they might reasonably think that “Connect your accounts to easily access your … photos” was a true statement. Only after adding their Google account, and completing the first-login setup, would they discover that it was not true: Shotwell has no “Data Imports” plugins installed by default, and when publishing, even if they guess that publishing to “Picasa Web Albums” (which hasn’t existed since 2016) is the correct choice for Google Photos, Shotwell completely ignores the account they set up, so they have to sign in all over again.

A third, and perhaps the most flagrant, example: If someone has a Facebook account, they might reasonably think that setting it up here would do something useful. As far as I can tell, it does nothing useful with *any* default apps, and when they visit Facebook in Firefox they have to sign in all over again.

This is not a criticism of our choice of default apps, or of their levels of integration. Software is often imperfect and incomplete. But that’s one of the reasons you should never be invited — whether at first login, or at any other time — to set up Online Accounts outside of a particular app. The only time you should be invited to set up an account is when an app, that you are currently using, tells you that it would actually do something useful. Because the only benefit, of Online Accounts, is that you won’t need to sign in if you happen to use a *second* app that tells you it can do something useful with that account. Inviting people to set up an account, when they can’t be expected to ...

Sorry to be so negative. It’s just really frustrating to see a feature, that exists only to save people time, steered so far in the opposite direction.

> This is not a criticism of our choice of default apps, or of their levels of integration.

No, I think it is really.

I strongly disagree with your premise that users hate being asked to log in to online services when first using a device. Android does that. It's optional. Most users are used to needing to sign in all the time to their services. Google asks me to sign in again multiple times per month. This is the first time I recall hearing someone complain about Online Account integration being offered in Initial Setup.

Thunderbird's lack of integration with GNOME Online Accounts (GOA) is an annoyance. I tried last year to get Thunderbird out of our default install but I wasn't able to get enough support for that. I believe geary now has GOA support in git master so that's one way forward eventually.

I don't have a Facebook account, but I believe Facebook would be useful if we switched from Shotwell to GNOME Photos. That's under discussion (maybe 19.04?) but we need the tracker MIR approved first at least.

Probably the most useful integration users will get in the default install is with the file browser. So I filed https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/nautilus/issues/629

We can pick which online accounts providers to show in gnome-initial-setup. I think it's reasonable to hide Facebook there for 18.10. The full list of providers will still show up in the Settings app (gnome-control-center).

I did not say, and I do not think, “that users hate being asked to log in to online services when first using a device”. If that was true, this would be much less of a problem, because many more would just skip the step! The problem is that this step will *seem*, at the time, like a reasonable thing to go through. Users won’t have any of the information they’d need to realize that it’s a waste of time. And we can’t tell them, because we don’t know what apps they’re going to install later. (Which is one of the reasons that this is not about our choice of default apps.)

Android invites people to set up a Google account (and Samsung a Samsung account, and Apple an iCloud account) for several reasons. One of them is commercial interest, which no longer applies to us. But another — restoring your device from a backup, which also doesn’t apply to us — is part of the setup process itself, so it’s reasonable to ask at setup. (And Android invites you to set up e-mail accounts specifically for the purpose of fetching your e-mail.) But they do not, as far as I know, invite you to set up a WeChat account or a Facebook account or a Line account, just in case you later use an app that uses one of those account types, even though tens of millions of people will. Because it’s a better use, of the population’s time, to defer that to the moment when each individual uses a relevant app (or, as in Nautilus, a relevant feature of an app) for the first time.

Matthew, I think you have a good point about apps offering (at first launch?) online account integration instead of expecting users to use the initial login experience or Settings > Online Accounts.

I filed https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/nautilus/issues/629 for Nautilus (marked a duplicate of a bigger design bug).

Someone should probably file bugs for Calendar and To Do.

I think the Software app already asks for Ubuntu log in when it needs it to install an app. Backups (Deja Dup) looks good to me too.

I think that's it for the default 18.10 install (except for LivePatch which is only in LTS releases and gets its own page in Welcome to Ubuntu).

For bonus points, the other GOA apps are Bijiben (GNOME Notes), Contacts, Documents, Evolution, Feedreader, Maps, Music, Photos, and Recipes. I think Recipes does well in its Export Ingredients step. Evolution, Maps, and Photos don't do very well.

(And a really hidden one: cpdb-backend-gcp which allows "printing" to Google Drive from the standard Ubuntu print dialog. But if you aren't logged in to Google in GOA, the print dialog doesn't advertise the feature at all. The almost complete MIR is LP: #1747762)

I encourage you to discuss this concern with the GNOME Design team. Generally, I think they prefer using #gnome-design on GNOME IRC.

There is a GitLab now which might work too:
https://gitlab.gnome.org/groups/Teams/Design/-/issues

I am removing Facebook from the Welcome to Ubuntu list of online accounts. LP: #1797736

Finally, people don't really read closed Launchpad bugs so you'll need to open new bugs if you want to pursue this further.