Panic! 13 seconds to shutdown!

This morning, PackageKit checked for updates automatically, and then began to download and install them like I had configured. Half way through, I get this dialog:

Panic ensues. I close down all my half-finished code changes, save my drafts in evolution and work out how much stuff I have open on other workspaces that needs to be closed before the shutdown commences.

Of course, dialog was invalid, only the session sealert daemon restarted – but I was left wondering why it had notified me with the countdown with such ambigous wording. I don't even use SELinux on this machine, so what was sealert doing?

If it needs to reload, why do I get a countdown and dialog box? Just do it in the background without notifying me. Not cool.

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hughsie

Richard has over 10 years of experience developing open source software. He is the maintainer of GNOME Software, PackageKit, GNOME Packagekit, GNOME Power Manager, GNOME Color Manager, colord, and UPower and also contributes to many other projects and opensource standards. Richard has three main areas of interest on the free desktop, color management, package management, and power management. Richard graduated a few years ago from the University of Surrey with a Masters in Electronics Engineering. He now works for Red Hat in the desktop group, and also manages a company selling open source calibration equipment. Richard's outside interests include taking photos and eating good food.

One thought on “Panic! 13 seconds to shutdown!”

  1. It's just bad UI. At best it's the equivalent of a debugging printf left in the release by mistake. At worst it's the kind of look-how-much-work-I'm-doing showboating which used to plague free software apps. I'd wager that if you explained this to whoever wrote that dialogue, two weeks later the thing would instead have a notification balloon in the status panel. Which would also be pointless, confusing and annoying. – Chris

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