Software Center should not use the word "Free Software"

The spec that this software is based on is explicit about the words to use - I will subscribe the designer

Hi Ioannis, thanks for this report.

In a future version, "Get Free Software" will become "Get Software", with "Free Software" and "Paid Software" subsections. In the meantime, it is important to emphasize that all the software is free, because many new Ubuntu users will be unfamiliar with the idea of all the software being free.

You appear to be concerned with the distinction between open-source and closed-source software. Where the Center can deduce the licensing status of an application, this is displayed in the application screen, e.g. "License: Open source". We don't show this in the top-level navigation, though, because that would be unduly prominent given the small proportion of people who understand and care about licensing.

If you think there is some other reason we shouldn't use the term "Free Software", let us know.

On Mon, 2009-10-05 at 15:44 +0000, Matthew Paul Thomas wrote:
> Hi Ioannis, thanks for this report.
>
> In a future version, "Get Free Software" will become "Get Software",
> with "Free Software" and "Paid Software" subsections. In the meantime,
> it is important to emphasize that all the software is free, because many
> new Ubuntu users will be unfamiliar with the idea of all the software
> being free.
>
> You appear to be concerned with the distinction between open-source and
> closed-source software. Where the Center can deduce the licensing status
> of an application, this is displayed in the application screen, e.g.
> "License: Open source". We don't show this in the top-level navigation,
> though, because that would be unduly prominent given the small
> proportion of people who understand and care about licensing.
>
> If you think there is some other reason we shouldn't use the term "Free
> Software", let us know.

Well, the term "Free" as used in the open source world (and defined by
FSF: http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html ), does not include free
to use, but closed source software.

In this case, because closed source, but free-to-use software can be
used (e.g. Google Earth in Medibuntu repository, or some company
providing a local repository of purchased software for their desktops),
I think the word "Free" must be replaced with a more accurate one, like
"available", "available to use", or something like that, to reflect more
accurately the availability to use some software, which may not be open
sourced, but may be even purchased.

So I think the examples I provided, are good examples of this usage:

"For example:

"Get Free Software", can become "Get Available Software", in the
application.

The sentence:

"The Ubuntu Software Center is a virtual catalog of thousands of free
applications available for Ubuntu - software to make your computer more
useful",

can become:

"The Ubuntu Software Center is a virtual catalog of thousands of
available applications for Ubuntu - software to make your computer more
useful", in the Help".

Best regards,

--
Ioannis Vranos

C95 / C++03 Software Developer

http://www.cpp-software.net

I don't think there is any way of describing that something is free of charge better than using the word "free". Your suggestion, "available", doesn't serve the purpose: it applies just as well to software that costs money ("available for only $19.95") as software that doesn't. Other possibilities would be "Price: Zero" or "Price: $0", but neither of those would work in headings or in the navigation pane ("Get $0 Software"), and currency would also be hard to localize.

On the flip side, it is unfortunate that the FSF and its associates use the term "free software" in a sense that cannot be understood without explanation. I habitually used "free software" too, right up until the moment when I came to design the license presentation in this program and realized, oh crap, hardly anyone is going to understand that. This wouldn't be the first time a term coined by Richard Stallman has succumbed to contact with the real world, and it probably won't be the last. Fortunately in this case, though, we have an alternative in "open source" -- where even if people don't yet know what it means, at least they're much less likely to mislead themselves.

No matter how much you or I care about software licensing, more people care more about its price. There are various ways we can nudge people towards caring more about licensing (see the Hardware Drivers window for a slightly overwrought example), and I look forward to designing future features that will help people keep track of which proprietary packages they have installed, whether any of those have open-source equivalents, and so on. But in this case we really do need to use the word "free" as in price. Sorry.

On Tue, 2009-10-06 at 16:15 +0000, Matthew Paul Thomas wrote:
> I don't think there is any way of describing that something is free of
> charge better than using the word "free". Your suggestion, "available",
> doesn't serve the purpose: it applies just as well to software that
> costs money ("available for only $19.95") as software that doesn't.
> Other possibilities would be "Price: Zero" or "Price: $0", but neither
> of those would work in headings or in the navigation pane ("Get $0
> Software"), and currency would also be hard to localize.
>
> On the flip side, it is unfortunate that the FSF and its associates use
> the term "free software" in a sense that cannot be understood without
> explanation. I habitually used "free software" too, right up until the
> moment when I came to design the license presentation in this program
> and realized, oh crap, hardly anyone is going to understand that. This
> wouldn't be the first time a term coined by Richard Stallman has
> succumbed to contact with the real world, and it probably won't be the
> last. Fortunately in this case, though, we have an alternative in "open
> source" -- where even if people don't yet know what it means, at least
> they're much less likely to mislead themselves.
>
> No matter how much you or I care about software licensing, more people
> care more about its price. There are various ways we can nudge people
> towards caring more about licensing (see the Hardware Drivers window for
> a slightly overwrought example), and I look forward to designing future
> features that will help people keep track of which proprietary packages
> they have installed, whether any of those have open-source equivalents,
> and so on. But in this case we really do need to use the word "free" as
> in price. Sorry.
>
> ** Changed in: software-center (Ubuntu)
> Status: Incomplete => Invalid
>

I have to note, I am just exchanging ideas here, not pursuing to
convince you in any way.

Consider the following scenario:

You setup a repository for your company's computers, at a http site like
www.mywhatevercompany.com, where you place software that your company
*purchased*, to be available to your company's desktops/worksations.

This additional software will appear in Software Center as it is now,
under the title "Free Software", which is inaccurate.

Software Center, Synaptic, Add/Remove Software, apt-get, etc, are used
to install, remove and update available software, not only
non-commercial software.

So, at the present time (as Software Centre is *now*), I think the
phrase "Available Software" instead of "Free Software" covers all
possible situations/scenarios, for now.

That's my thoughts. Also, I have to say I am not Ubuntu Linux "fanatic",
I just use it because it suits me better right now. Before Ubuntu, I
used Scientific Linux (a Red Hat Enterpise Linux "clone").

Regards,

--
Ioannis Vranos

C95 / C++03 Software Developer

http://www.cpp-software.net

In v1, the Center doesn't show software in third-party repositories at all. In v2 it will, though, and your scenario is a useful contribution to the design of that feature. As I said, "Get Software" will likely become a section with "Free Software" and "Paid Software" subsections, but I was supposing that wouldn't happen until v3. The example of a private repository of site-licensed software, though, shows that we'd need to have subsections for v2. Something like:
    Get Software
    |– Free Software
    |– MyExample Repository
    '– Medibuntu Repository
That way, we wouldn't be incorrectly assuming any particular non-ubuntu.com repository was "free software". I've added a reminder to the spec about this. <https://wiki.ubuntu.com/SoftwareCenter?action=diff&rev2=218&rev1=217> Thanks!

That leaves the suggestion of changing "Get Software" to "Available Software". I did consider that wording early in the design process, but I thought "available" was a little too vague -- people might misconstrue "available" as "available on my computer". That said, I plan to organize user testing on the navigation in general soon, and if it shows the wording needs changing, we'll try "Available".

On Tue, 2009-10-06 at 21:10 +0000, Matthew Paul Thomas wrote:
> In v1, the Center doesn't show software in third-party repositories at all. In v2 it will, though, and your scenario is a useful contribution to the design of that feature. As I said, "Get Software" will likely become a section with "Free Software" and "Paid Software" subsections, but I was supposing that wouldn't happen until v3. The example of a private repository of site-licensed software, though, shows that we'd need to have subsections for v2. Something like:
> Get Software
> |– Free Software
> |– MyExample Repository
> '– Medibuntu Repository
> That way, we wouldn't be incorrectly assuming any particular non-ubuntu.com repository was "free software". I've added a reminder to the spec about this. <https://wiki.ubuntu.com/SoftwareCenter?action=diff&rev2=218&rev1=217> Thanks!
>
> That leaves the suggestion of changing "Get Software" to "Available
> Software". I did consider that wording early in the design process, but
> I thought "available" was a little too vague -- people might misconstrue
> "available" as "available on my computer". That said, I plan to organize
> user testing on the navigation in general soon, and if it shows the
> wording needs changing, we'll try "Available".

OK, these sound nice to me for now. I may come back to this in the
future. :-)

An alternative design you could consider for version 2 (based on current
Synaptic/Software Sources repositories of 9.04):

Get Software
    |– Ubuntu Software
    | |– [All sections currently contained in Software Sources::Ubuntu Software]
    |
    |– Third Party Software
       |– MyExample Repository
       |– Medibuntu Repository
       |– Some Commercial Software repository

The reason for that. For example, currently the "Ubuntu Software"
section, in Software Sources, contains the option "Proprietary drivers
for devices (restricted)".

I think cases like this, can't be fitted in the original suggestion
mentioned above.

Perhaps another example of this, is the "Software restricted by
copyright or legal issues (multiverse)".

Regards,

--
Ioannis Vranos

C95 / C++03 Software Developer

http://www.cpp-software.net

I would like to leave a comment, not directly related to the words to use, but to a possible misunderstanding of the word "free" among translators. If it is possible, when using the word "free" in a translatable string, it would really be appreciated to have a translators-comment just before it, explaining the real use of the word "free": if as in "free beer", or whatever.

This has been done in current software-center version for the string used as the price of the software, but nor for the "Get Free Software" one. This could lead to a not correct interpretation of the real meaning or the real purpose.

Hope this might be useful.

Policy at Canonical is to use the term Free Software in preference to Open Source, and to use it to mean "Software Libre". MPT has a good point that this is lost on the vast majority of consumers, but it's nonetheless important. I'll ask that the wording be fixed to accommodate both the needs of consumers and those of us who care about software libre.

Actually, this bug is just about to be fixed, in the way we worked out in this bug report in October. In the normal case, you will just see "Get Software", which aggregates software from all sources apt knows about (just as Synaptic does). If you choose to expand that item you'll see an item "Provided by Ubuntu", alongside items for any PPAs and other repositories you've added. So we avoid using the term "Free Software" at all.

The has been fixed in the manner described by mpt in comment #11, and has been released with the latest development version (1.1.12) of Software Center in lucid.

Sorry to comment again on this issue: there is always the "Get Free Software" button in the availablepane.py file. Since there is already a small comment before that gets included in the POT file for translations, will it be possible to add something more to that comment stating clearly how "Free Software" in that particular case should be treated?

Thanks.

The term "Get Free Software" should no longer be used anywhere in the interface. If it is, please report that as a separate bug.