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by nihsyndrome2 3999 days ago
How on earth did the modern linux distro become so dependant on software from this guy, when he clearly has no real world idea of things. No wonder people are jumping ship to the various BSDs!
5 comments

Here's Linus defending him on /. [1]

Linus: You can say the word "systemd", It's not a four-letter word. Seven letters. Count them.

I have to say, I don't really get the hatred of systemd. I think it improves a lot on the state of init, and no, I don't see myself getting into that whole area.

Yeah, it may have a few odd corners here and there, and I'm sure you'll find things to despise. That happens in every project. I'm not a huge fan of the binary logging, for example. But that's just an example. I much prefer systemd's infrastructure for starting services over traditional init, and I think that's a much bigger design decision.

Yeah, I've had some personality issues with some of the maintainers, but that's about how you handle bug reports and accept blame (or not) for when things go wrong. If people thought that meant that I dislike systemd, I will have to disappoint you guys.

1. http://linux.slashdot.org/story/15/06/30/0058243/interviews-...

More like defending the init part of systemd, but still mentioning personality issues with certain people involved with the project.

Sadly most of these debates gloss over that systemd has long since grown past being just a init replacement.

It has sprouted tentacles all over Linux userspace, and all of them are tightly connected to systemd sitting as init-in-chief.

Thus updating some higher level part of userspace, say the Desktop Environment, may well result in your Linux install getting a init-ectomy via the dependencies chain.

Perhaps it's generational? Maybe Mr. Poettering is a talented individual who lacks some specific experiences/history which requires re-learning some lessons from developing linux?
what generation is that? What counts as generational in something as fast moving as our ecosystem?
Unsure feelings when one of the first topics a community brings up about you is how you might need to be "re-educated".
This isn't just SystemD. you should ask rasterman sometime about his stint at RH Labs. There was a great interview with him and Havoc Pennington back in 1999 or 2000 where HP couldn't say a nice thing about the guy or his code, because he just didn't fit in with the redhat culture (he liked to wear formal wear to work - a subtle protest of mandatory office attire).

The entire Red Hat corporation has been like this since about the 5.2 release, when they removed "Redneck" as a system language option.

I guess someone at a TLA found the option offensive...
I sometimes lie awake at night asking myself that very same question.
you're certainly implying that lots of people do that, but really it's only a small vocal minority.
He has Red Hat's support. Anyway, no need to jump ship to the BSD clones. Just use Gentoo - OpenRC is a great init system: https://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/OpenRC
Not so sure about that. Since "mainstream" Linux is now on systemd, how long can some of these alternative init systems remain viable?

I always preferred the BSDs on the server anyway, systemd was just the final nudge I needed to get me to run it on my dev box (it actually makes things simpler anyway, I was not relishing the thought of having completely different init systems on my dev box and servers).

I run FreeBSD on my desktop, and I was surprised by how easy it was to get set up, and how quickly it detected everything.
Don't forget that pretty much every BSD flavor is actively working on their own systemd-like system.
Speaking as a sysadmin, I find something like launchd/upstart/systemd a ridiculously superior alternative to init scripts, in every way. So this is a good thing. (For various values of "systemd-like".)
Also speaking as a sysadmin, I've found "every way" to be inaccurate. Initscripts have their limitations, but the most glaring issues with them (lots of boilerplate, hard to write, etc.) have been resolved in BSD Land for quite a while, thanks to things like rc.subr.

systemd does have some nice features that I've come to appreciate on my GNU/Linux boxen, but I'm still not exactly sold when my OpenBSD boxen have a mostly-sane rc system not subject to most of the problems the systemd crowd claims are inherent to initscript-based systems.

That's not a problem. Even a good thing and the BSDs will build one properly.

The problem is how systemd came to be (through political games indeed of merit) and that it's not just an init replacement but that it gets its grubby fingers everywhere in the OS and that it's turning Linux into a Windows-like binary blob mess.

I'm a systemd fan and I would totally agree with this.
There's a difference between discussion regarding /a/ more in-depth system framework and discussion regarding a specific system framework. One of the constant things written about in these threads though is that they /don't/ want something "systemd-like" because it is such an intrusive, obstinate framework. I see some good ideas coming from the systemd framework, however, its consistent choice of poor defaults and byzantine structure leave me desiring something of a bit more lucid vision.
They are? That's interesting. Please provide details. What systemd-like systems are (to start with) the OpenBSD, DragonFly BSD, MirOS BSD, NetBSD, FreeBSD/PC-BSD, and Debian kFreeBSD people actively working on?
I'd go 100% OpenBSD if it wasn't for my deep-seated love affair with GNU and it's concepts (if not the figurehead). I'm starting to see the GNU boat being sabotaged, though, so I might be forced to abandon my compromised vessel and build a new 3-clause ship.

Gentoo is honestly the best of both worlds; linux compatibility, tons of applications, can be rebuilt from source, and a version of ports that doesn't suck. Their steadfast refusal to adopt systemd is pretty much icing on the cake at that point.

To be fair, if you want to run systemd on Gentoo, you can. It's all about choice. The user's choice.
As of late i have come to loath the user/developer distinction.

Any user is a potential developer given time and access to tools.

But as of late there has been more and more an attitude that developers has to go out of their way to protect users from themselves (user).

Thus you get the likes of ChromeOS where the default setup is highly restrictive. And flipping the "developer" switch either way wipes the device clean.

Thus there is a very big mental step to go "developer", rather than start out small with some scripts (thus getting familiar with code logic) and perhaps move on from there.

ChromeOS is also based on Gentoo. :)