After it was disabled in Ubuntu there doesn’t appear to have been much negative feedback about this.
Could it be because the change hasn’t affected those on LTS (larger organisations, companies…).
The feature came from a different time and the value of it has been somewhat superseded by private browsing in web browsers (for sharing with friends) and virtual machines (for developers).
Those are not really an alternative.
It’s a reasonably complex feature that seemed to take up a decent amount of time maintaining it in LightDM.
IMO this is the only good argument against it here. if it takes too much time to maintain it, perhaps a simpler workarround could be made (e.g. Comodo uses virtual desktops on windows that are sandboxed) or it should be abandoned in favour of more important features.
There have been a few occasions when people have noticed me using my laptop in public and asked about the OS.
When I tell them it’s a flavour of Linux, they say something like “Oh, that’s only for geeks” or “I’ve heard of it, but it doesn’t run normal stuff” or “It’s hard to use” etc.
I’ve been able to click on guest session, hand my machine over and let them have a play. Generally, misconceptions are dispelled quickly and I’ve even had a few people go on and switch to Ubuntu on their own machines as a result of using mine.
If I’d had to say , “Hang on while I create an account for you with limited privileges for you to try” and then faff about before handing the machine over, it’d spoil that first experience with Ubuntu.
So, for Ubuntu evangelism alone, I’d love to see guest account stay.
It’s also great when friends, family, coworkers just need to borrow my machine to check something online or hookup to a projector and give a presentation.
I used to use an app (timekpr) to limit the time my children could use the computer. One of their ways around it was to login as guest. From first principles with security, I don’t like giving anyone with physical access a “free” account. Every time I have run into it, it has been undesirable. Please ensure it is OFF by default.
Back in a days where I used Ubuntu, getting rid of guest session was one of the very things to do and it required terminal - a very “friendly” approach… One of many, irrational things in Ubuntu. Getting rid of it for good would be a plus. That or… having an easy, GUI way to switch it off.
I am for more options, always so easy GUI switch off would be preferred. But to answer for the question directly, I never needed guest session and cannot imagine scenario where it would be needed for me.
We use the guest session feature on Ubuntu 16.04 LTS on 15 PCs and laptops in our library and it is very useful. Its an easy way for an kiosk mode and it worked without problems. We’d love to see the guest session implemented in Ubuntu 18.04 LTS! For us, the guest session is the key feature to use ubuntu as operating system.
I have used the guest session feature on occasion to let people unfamiliar with Linux have a play around, and a couple of times to let people access their email. I can’t say that I really need it, but it was nice to have. I’d like to see it reimplemented, but it may not be worth it (for me) if the maintenance cost is really high.
I also see the point when used on library PCs (as mentioned above). I have been thinking about suggesting to our community library, which has two dysfunctional PCs (that used to run another OS when they worked), to install Ubuntu so that they can be used for something. If they had the guest session feature built in, that might make the case stronger.
in our environment guest sessions are desperately needed. we have daily a lot of people that need to access a computer and we cannot have them use their own. equally we don’t want their data on our system.
After it was disabled in Ubuntu there doesn’t appear to have been much
negative feedback about this.
In fairness, I did not use that feature since I was always single user - but
your question would assume that people may not have been using this
feature, which is one assumption (wrong or right).
The other assumption is as to how many people use ubuntu past the move
to systemd. And I can say from my use case, I flat-out stopped using any
debian distributions (excluding devuan) that moved towards systemd
altogether. Never felt anything was missing there for me, either.
I use Ubuntu in a high school classroom setting and the guest session is a fantastic feature in our setting. We have a lab of computers with frequent “walk-ins” coming in to use a computer. Without the guest session I need to create a generic user account and allow them to use that, which is not nearly as good for obvious reasons.
I’m in @aoakley’s use case too; I still use the Guest Session in 16.04 to let visitors use my desktop without worrying they damage it or browse my stuff.
I would like this feature is still there when I upgrade to 18.04 LTS.
I like having guest mode as I use Ubuntu on laptops that I loan out where lots of people use the same computer every day. The option to turn on or off should satisfy those who don’t want it. I don’t care if the default is off.
INDISPENSABLE in the network policy of my school!
During a trip to Africa (Cameroon), I also noticed the use of the guest session in a cybercafe. If the guest session disturbs most, it should be offered as an option, I assure you.
Just recently noticed that the guest session is not available any more. So obviously I rarely ever used it, but it is an important privacy protection feature for people who often share their computers with others. If possible it would be nice to re-enable that feature in 18.04.
I personally never used the guest session; however, many users would probably like to have the option to use it. If it were implemented, though, It would be nice to have it disabled by default and enabled through the settings app, rather than using a terminal configuration.
I really miss the guest account feature. I often find myself in settings, where people want to borrow my computer, but I can’t trust them access to my info otherwise, and it was very nifty to be able to just open a guest account and leave them with that.
Private browsing features does not meet this need, because they’ll still be free to wander all over my computer, private files etc. I think the feature should definitely come back.