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by magicalhippo 462 days ago
> Say, your random self-hosted server thing that isn't escaping your LAN (e.g. Jellyfin or anything like this)

I tried reading your link but I'm none the wiser, so perhaps you could provide the docker-equivalent one-liner to start a Jellyfin instance using systemd-nspawn?
1 comments
godelski 462 days ago
There isn't a one liner because no one has built it. Which you be clear, this also had to be done for docker.

I'll admit, the documentation to really anything systemd kinda sucks but awareness can help change that

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magicalhippo 462 days ago
Ok, so I misread your question.

You're asking why hasn't anyone made something like Docker but with systemd-nspawn as the runtime or "engine".

edit: Found this article[1], which tries to do just that. Still not as convenient as Docker, but doesn't look terrible either.

[1]: https://benjamintoll.com/2022/02/04/on-running-systemd-nspaw...

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godelski 462 days ago
Yeah, definitely there is a big difference between something being technically better (or worse) and the actual usability of a thing. We have a long history of products that are not technically better winning out (for many reasons). I'm confident nspawn doesn't have nearly the attention and even few people know about it. Docs definitely suck. But we're also on a very technical forum, not a general audience one, so I kinda assume a context that people here are not as concerned about the user interface.
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magicalhippo 462 days ago
> But we're also on a very technical forum, not a general audience one, so I kinda assume a context that people here are not as concerned about the user interface.

I think that's a common mistake. I'm fairly highly technical compared to your average user, but I don't have that much higher tolerance to friction for stuff that's not my core concern.

Poor UX is definitely friction, and system administration is seldom my core concern. I'm fairly certain I'm not unique.

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godelski 461 days ago
I definitely explained that poorly. I was in the middle of some other work and typed too quickly. I'm sorry.

I more mean that technical people tend to be more willing to slug through a poor UX if the tool is technically better. I mean we are all programmers here, right? Programming is a terrible UX, but it is the best thing we got to accomplish the things we want. I'm saying that these people are often the first adopters, more willing to try new things. Of course, this doesn't describe every technical person, but the people willing to do these things are a subset of the technical group.

I definitely see UX as a point of friction and I do advocate for building good interfaces. I actually think it is integral to building things that are also performant and better from a purely technical perspective. I feel that as engineers/developers/researchers we are required to be a bit grumpy. Our goal is to improve things, to make new things, right? One of the greatest means of providing direction to that is being frustrated by existing things lol. Or as Linus recently said: "I'm just fixing potholes." If everything is alright then there's nothing to improve, so you gotta be a little grumpy. It's just about being the right kind of grumpy lol

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