PackageKit and default update strategy

[Colin Walters]

On Fri, 2008-03-14 at 17:44 -0400, Jeremy Katz wrote:
> On Fri, 2008-03-14 at 14:47 -0400, Robin Norwood wrote:
> > Also, I thought it might be a good time to revisit the default update
> > strategy.  Right now, gnome-packagekit provides an update icon similar
> > to puplet.  The default configuration is to just notify the user that
> > updates are available.  Some people have suggested applying security
> > updates automatically as the default configuration.  I personally like
> > the idea, but I suspect that some people will not like this behavior as
> > the default.
> 
> Given the number of updates we end up having (even just limited to
> security), I suspect that this isn't a great idea from a bandwidth
> perspective.  For the users who lack persistent connections (and thus
> tend to have lower bandwidth), they'd get online and then immediately
> start having their capacity drained by downloading updates.  

NetworkManager has a concept of connections which it won't automatically
activate.  For example, my Verizon Mobile Broadband falls into this
category.  Might make sense for the update system key off this by
default, since although the NetworkManager rationale is based on cost,
these types of connections likely have lower bandwidth too.