Comment 272 for bug 332945

@Matthew P. Thomas:
It seems you don't consider people having more than 5 windows open. I'm so used to having a large number of windows that a new one will be left unnoticed for a long time. I might even think I opened it at some point myself and just started doing something else while the update was running, so I'll close it instead of updating. Then there are people with (for example) gimp, which takes 4-5 windows itself.

On the other hand people are used to look at the notification area. It's almost empty when the system is installed, so anything bright in that area can be seen as "something is different". We look there when a new message comes in, when the network status changes, etc. Anything that is "different" there notifies the user. Even if the update window had a pulsating window bar, it's not enough for get my attention - many applications do something in the background and turn on notification - I'm used to ignoring it. (firefox download window at least)

The icon might get unnoticed in the line of other icons of course, but let's be serious - one of the screenshots posted here before with 20 or so icons - it doesn't happen for sane users. If anyone can put that many icons in their notification are, they are surely aware of the update / install procedure. You cannot create a crowded notification like that without putting a lot of effort into it. In short - if you create a mess, you will live in mess - that's not the reason to change how update works for everyone else.

Also there's no colour coding... notification was great - yellow -> look at me, red -> danger. Reaction to a new window -> close. Have you seen non tech-savvy users working with their computer? They usually don't care about open dialogs. They sometimes open some window by accident, so clicking on cancel / close on anything unknown is just something they are accustomed to. Auto-opening the update dialog will not help them at all - unless you make the dialog something like a splash screen that cannot be avoided... in which case it will just annoy even more people.

I really don't agree with your listed "steps to upgrade".
First time users may need to read the tooltip, but with the notification bubble it will be appearing anyways... It's not just about the number of clicks. I'd say it goes more like this:
1. there is a bubble, telling about updates and pointing at the yellow/red icon; that means the icon is for updates
2. use the icon to get updates
3. click the button to get updates

With the new system it's:
1. (maybe) Notice a new window bar
2. (in case of us) Think - did I forget to close it after the last upgrade, or was I waiting for package list update to finish, or is it notifying me about new upgrades / (in case of new users) what the hell is going on - did I do that?
3. decide on the next action and do it

I think the new system has the potential of wasting my time a couple of times when I leave the system updating, then get back and wonder what was my last action in that window. Was it long ago and should I check for new packages? Did it open like that? Etc. The old system might have been longer when you count clicks, but the effort to understand what's happening in that case was a lot lower.
Clicks is not the only thing you should be looking at. I'd prefer system that is nice to me, even if it adds 2-3 more clicks, than something annoyingly getting in my way that needs only 1 click.

I'm not sure I can describe my problem more clearly :/