[brainspider]

> However, linux is missing basic functionality other os's offer

Could you please elaborate on what some of those are?

> systemd is showing up and trying to fill in those blanks

I haven't really kept on top of all systemd releases, but all I can see is them replacing things that already exist, just doing them in a different way.

I agree the init system replacement was necessary, but I'm struggling to understand why and how it extended to trying to extinguish and replace every core function of the operating system ecosystem.

That's rubbing a lot of people the wrong way, especially as mentioned in the article, those who adhere to the unix philosophy of do one thing and do it right.

[justin_vanw]

I basically agree with everything you're saying, I just think if the people who think systemd is misguided spend their time writing blog posts about it, nothing will change and the people actually writing the code will have the final say, right or wrong.

[brainspider]

Just to play Devil's advocate here, I wouldn't say that nothing will change. Not everybody can code, and not everybody that can code has time to code for a new project. And that's no guarantee that if someone does submit code that it will be accepted.

I get the strong impression that systemd is driven by ego first, and technical innovation second.

But writing blogposts and making non-coders aware of some of the frustrations and dangers system administrators face will help the "business people" understand, and hopefully can put pressure from another angle.

We'll never all agree on one way of doing things, but I think that it's valid to socially encourage coders who have such a large sphere of influence and whose code can potentially be very harmful, to take more care and consider things outside their immediate bubble.

That blogpost alone has driven a lot of good discussions in this very thread, and I think that's as good and as healthy as helping more directly with submitting code.

[justin_vanw]

I think it's probably not that valuable to write a blog post. Lets see if the UMASK problem, which is totally legitimate and the blog post makes a great case for fixing, actually gets fixed.

[rocqua]

If the issue with systemd is deemed to be the backing culture, instead of specific code, writing patches isn't going to work. Instead you need to change hearts and minds. Blog posts work better for that (then again, if you are arguing, you've lost).

[ultramancool]

The thing is though - their code is already written. Systemd is entirely unnecessary for 99% of people, probably everything except some of it's LXC features has clear and popular alternatives. LXC is the only thing making me eye systemd with interest, but I'll come back to it in a few years once all the weird stuff is worked out.

[dijit]

It's nice to hear that you have the choice of not running systemd.

All production ready Linux distros (RedHat (and by extension CentOS), SuSE and Debian) are all running systemd and as a systems administrator for a large company I _must_ adopt it, I don't have a choice.

[ultramancool]

If those major distros weren't switching though, you wouldn't have to, which is what my point was. The only reason you're adopting it is not for a practical benefit, just because the distros did.

I run devops though for a small business and we've avoided the issue entirely using runit for our software.

[jude-]

It's probably because all the features they need are already met by existing tools. In that case, there's no need to write more code.