UNIX greybeards threaten Debian fork over systemd plan

Re: Go for it

> Interface standards like DBus are how you achieve this,

> not the sprawling, all-encompassing mess that is presented

> to us at the moment.

You mean like those: http://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Software/systemd/dbus/

Please check you facts first, the systemd documentation (including all those dbus interfaces) is actually way better than the "normal" init stuff that I've encountered in the couple of years.

Re: Go for it

> Poettering would do to learn from the teachings of experience

Poettering doesn't learn. And he doesn't listen to anybody. That's the problem.

Re: Go for it

Well yeah, he should have used launchd form the beginning instead.

But ditch the init already and get out of the cave u cavemen.

Re: Go for it

Poettering IS A MOLE! His "secret handler" : CORPORATE AMERICA! He even has a little panegyrist/catamite running a fanboy site with a name a lot like "MORONIX." Forking is the ONLY thing which will save Debian. As for saving GNU/Linux, I've a Modest Proposal below...

The ugly FACT is that SWARMS of mediocre little dweebs like Chamber-Pottering have been excreted into the american software mills; conditioned from primary school to the M$ paradigm. DeadCat stopped upholding REAL software Freedom in the fall of 1999, a year which Chamber-Pottering or Michelle Tinkerbell doubtless only recall for their toilet training about then.

So, some Big Buck$ has hired this little shill and suddenly pumped a LOT of effort behind his poison code? GRAB HIM! HURT HIM REAL BAD, THEN KILL HIM! Neat, and sends a clear message to the timid sorts in corporate offices. A twisted Lennart-corpus on their front steps upsets their delicate digestions. They'll See Reason then.

I've tried one of the modern distros, Arch, a real loser thanks to their knee-jerk adoption of systemd, and 1 year of it has been quite enough. Show this little epistle to "Lennart" as his sweet-heart Tinkerbell at Moronix so fondly calls him. I'm a little far away to make the Hit, but creative minds closer to his nest may get cracking...

and Now, a Little Homily TO Lennart,

When you sell your soul so cheaply, to do such evil as you have, Lennart Dear Heart, don't wet your bed when Real People decide you need to stop exhaling into our atmosphere. I suggest YOU take a LONG Vacation. Pack your bags Little Man, NOW. Visit Tibet. Learn basket weaving. Keep your sticky little protuberances OFF all computer inputs though, or know Real People will be looking to correct some SERIOUS FLAWS in the WWW. Reflect on what you've done and why, but STOP IT NOW AND DON'T DO IT AGAIN!

Re: Go for it

So far the only good idea of Poetterings that I'm aware of is /etc/os-release . As someone said on another forum, he should stick to hacking text files.

Re: Go for it

Hmm, OSX is certified UNIX and it runs lauchd the very thing systemd wants to imitate.

Re: Go for it

I totally agree with not going the systemd route. There are a number of really good arguments against it.

However, I also think it's a battle that has been lost. I respect those wanting to fork and good luck to those trying give systemd the shove - I'd be happy to be proven wrong. But Debian is just the latest distro to fall before it. CentOS and SuSE use it so now that main Debian has gone this way, it's pretty much got control of all the castles. Slackware and others may be beautiful distros, but these three have all the enterprise presence between them Ubuntu has reversed position on systemd too, so that's the newbie / casual demographic as well (that's not a criticism of Ubuntu - it's just the most accessible distro so favoured by large numbers of these crowds).

Everything else is just islands in the sea.

Re: systemd to incorporate a shell too!!!

To be contrarian, I can see an argument for systemd on a desktop, where I may reboot it often. I typically don't reboot servers frequently, so I'm unconcerned about a fast boot, but I value being able to debug the startup process of a broken server with a shell and a text editor, which I can do with sys V init scripts, but can't do with systemd.

Re: systemd to incorporate a shell too!!!

Not sure systemd is a reflection of Solaris SMF. SMF is text file based, and would please the Debian elders in that regard. In accordance with unix philosophy, SMF is limited in scope, modular, constrained into one role and does that role transparently and (fairly) simply.

systemd is a windows-esque, monolithic, black box solution. ie. the opposite of Unix design. It is also p*sspoor by all accounts.

Re: systemd to incorporate a shell too!!!

Get off the Kool-Aid, kiddo. Might kill ya someday.

Re: So fork, then

Spot on Raumkraut.

There's also the little detail that the permission tree in systemd ("the user doesn't own the process, each process owns its children") is making a fragging permission mess very quickly which means that after a while you have to run a whole lot of shit as root, à la Windows pre-RT, or reboot to clean the mess up.

Systemd is a toy, not a proper tool. I say burn it. Burn it with fire.

Re: So fork, then

Ahh yeah, sysvinit was fine until Debian devs came along and broke out all those tiny scripts and symlinks in order to build a service configurator GUI that real sysadmins never bother with. All that needless indirection was enough to keep me away from Debian for 10+ years. ArchLinux is a breath of fresh are but unfortunately way too bleeding edge for me; package updates usually break things. So I use Debian-stable because it's relatively stable and doesn't force me to use dbus, pulseaudio, etc.

Dependency hell is my biggest fear with systemd. If there are dependencies like nginx>systemd>dbus that's a problem. Every unnecessary daemon is just wasting resources and opening up gaping security holes. Yup, there was a big one in dbus a couple months go...

I really don't care about all these efforts to improve Linux/*nix. It'll never be a good OS for desktops, servers, phones, drones, or anything. NEVER. I just make do with it until something better comes along.

Re: So fork, then

http://www.muylinux.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/funny-systemd.gif

Re: So fork, then

I agree with that, mostly because I fell into the same trap years ago with openSUSE 12.2 (12.1 was a waste of time as systemd was so buggy on that version and replacing it with sysvinit was the only solution). Since then systemd has crept like a huge slug-like creature into so many parts of the system including a mid-release change in oS 12.3 which killed a number of applications without notice. To this day I still keep 11.4, the last version of openSUSE not to have systemd in it and a bloody good version IMHO going in various places and may well do so beyond the death of its Evergreen support demise seven months hence rather than Poettering about with the broken dross I see more recently.

Re: So fork, then

> You probably liked Poettering's Pulse Audio as well, correct? How many years did it take good coders to fix that clusterfuck?

We're still counting. The fucking thing still does not work properly.

The problem however is not Poettering with his (on the face of it) good ideas and (in all evidence) incompetent and careless execution. The problem are those who listen to him and end up packaging up his stuff in our distros.

As someone has said above, it would appear (and I say appear because I haven't met him in person) that this young man still has a lot to learn, especially from the many mistakes the rest of us have done in the past.

As for systemd itself, it went alright on the workstations it's been running for about five months. Then I upgraded a couple servers recently... and then the Scheiße hit der Ventilator. Not a happy customer here. :(

Re: So fork, then

How many years did it take good coders to fix that clusterfuck?

You mean they fixed it?!? I normally switch it off for the sake of my own sanity at least.

Re: So fork, then

You probably liked Poettering's Pulse Audio as well, correct? How many years did it take good coders to fix that clusterfuck?

Very pertinent point I think. Pulseaudio was, in theory, fantastic. It had all sorts of things that were very good and very useful. It was one of the things that made me decide I could realistically use a Linux desktop - It was about making Linux easier for the desktop users.

Unfortunately it was implemented so badly, by someone with no apparent ability to listen or take suggestions, and was so frequently broken that in the end it was one of the main reasons I shelled out for a Mac.

Good ideas poorly implemented and largely untested seems to be the story of Pulseaudio and possibly systemd, but then it seems to be the entire Gnome (and KDE for that matter) philosophy these days. I blame the parents.

Re: the "fun" part about systemd

You make it sound like installing gnome is a must. If you want gnome, yea, you are stuck with systemd. That's systemd and gnome's fault, not gentoo. A lot of people who run gentoo are also likely to use something else then gnome (if they have a GUI) and the default installation manual still recommends using openRC.