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posted by martyb on Thursday September 30 2021, @09:32PM   Printer-friendly

KDE's Telemetry: The Tip Of The Iceberg?:

Recently, there was a debate on the PCLinuxOS forum about KDE Plasma's implementation of telemetry through KUserFeedback. While in PCLinuxOS, we can remove it without any collateral effects to the system, while other users reported that doing the same in other distros (like Debian 11) results in the complete removal of KDE Plasma! Why force such an implementation, if, as KDE's developers say, it is just an innocuous, privacy-respecting measure?

Coincidence or not, in the past years many popular Linux distributions started rolling out optional telemetry. Then it was the time of computer programs: news broke out in May regarding Audacity, a popular audio editing app, which announced it was starting the use of telemetry. The move was finally pushed back after users revolted against it.

While many point out that the data collection is by opt-in and entirely anonymous, others have found that, even if you don't activate telemetry, data is still collected, using computer resources, registering "apps and boot, number of times used and duration in /home/user/telemetry folder." As such, they argue that, because of the way Linux permissions work, other programs could have access to these log files. KUserFeedback's FAQs page confirms this:

"KUserFeedback is designed to be compliant with KDE Telemetry Policy, which forbids the usage of unique identification. If you are using KUserFeedback outside of the scope of that policy, it's of course possible to add a custom data source generating and transmitting a unique id."

Do any Soylentils have opinions about this, or experiences with it?


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  • (Score: 0, Offtopic) by krishnoid on Thursday September 30 2021, @09:53PM (9 children)

    by krishnoid (1156) on Thursday September 30 2021, @09:53PM (#1183203)

    I just remember there was one KDE release that had animated icons, where you could wave your mouse pointer over the icon and it would loop a very short animation. Like a folder would open, a piece of paper would slide in, and the folder would close. Sure would be nice to have those as "training wheels" for older (or younger, at this point) people who have a little trouble working with the desktop.

    Like if you need to "save" a file, what's that little square with the oval near the top? A "floppy disk"? I need to Wikipedia it to know what it is? Man, computers with their funny little pictures sure are confusing.

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  • (Score: 3, Touché) by srobert on Thursday September 30 2021, @11:42PM (4 children)

    by srobert (4803) on Thursday September 30 2021, @11:42PM (#1183231)

    You don't recognize the floppy disk icon because you're young, and it was before your time. I didn't recognize it when it was new, because I was already old then.

    • (Score: 3, Interesting) by shortscreen on Friday October 01 2021, @05:39AM (3 children)

      by shortscreen (2252) on Friday October 01 2021, @05:39AM (#1183283) Journal

      The problem here is that most of us didn't learn hieroglyphics in school, we learned this new-fangled 'alphabet' stuff. Most of us, except for software developers evidently, who are still stuck on the idea of using little abstract illustrations to represent concepts. And when it comes time to choose an appropriate hieroglyph for their GUI, they don't choose one of the ones that've been around for centuries and are known to a billion+ Chinese, etc. They make up their own heiroglyph. BECAUSE THEY ARE SOFTWARE DEVELOPERS!!

      https://uxmyths.com/post/715009009/myth-icons-enhance-usability [uxmyths.com]

      • (Score: 2) by Dr Spin on Friday October 01 2021, @06:21AM

        by Dr Spin (5239) on Friday October 01 2021, @06:21AM (#1183298)

        I vote for a complete ban on all Icons that could be replaced by Kanji.

        --
        Warning: Opening your mouth may invalidate your brain!
      • (Score: 2) by DannyB on Friday October 01 2021, @03:13PM (1 child)

        by DannyB (5839) Subscriber Badge on Friday October 01 2021, @03:13PM (#1183391) Journal

        Thirty years ago user interfaces were fairly stable and being genuinely improved. Now UI design is a crazy free-for-all. No consistency. Hey, let's change the brake pedal into a cool hand crank control and put it where nobody will expect to find it!

        --
        People today are educated enough to repeat what they are taught but not to question what they are taught.
        • (Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Friday October 01 2021, @06:10PM

          by hendrikboom (1125) Subscriber Badge on Friday October 01 2021, @06:10PM (#1183452) Homepage Journal

          let's change the brake pedal into a cool hand crank control

          Just the kind of thing I'll need if diabetic neuropathy makes me unable to control my feet anymore. (I hope never)

  • (Score: 2) by captain normal on Friday October 01 2021, @03:53AM (2 children)

    by captain normal (2205) on Friday October 01 2021, @03:53AM (#1183273)

    Well if "Ctrl" + S stops working I be screwed too.

    --
    When life isn't going right, go left.
    • (Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 01 2021, @05:55AM (1 child)

      by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 01 2021, @05:55AM (#1183290)

      Apple did that. You want to open a document for reading only, but you look at it sideways it thinks you edited it (and writes to disk). You're supposed to remember to revert to get the previous state back.

      • (Score: 2) by acid andy on Saturday October 02 2021, @03:31AM

        by acid andy (1683) on Saturday October 02 2021, @03:31AM (#1183546) Homepage Journal

        That's kinda like all the Settings dialogs nowadays that have no OK button and apply as soon as you change them. That way if you change your mind about them you often don't have an easy way of getting the old settings back. It sucks.

        --
        If a cat has kittens, does a rat have rittens, a bat bittens and a mat mittens?
  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 01 2021, @05:54AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 01 2021, @05:54AM (#1183288)

    You can still do that on a number of Linux DEs and Windows. I still pull the prank of changing the static icons to animations from time to time.