4 ms·

So a tinkering person who has in the past used Slackware (at the end it looked like a bastardized Linux From Scratch), *BSD and after much meandering settled on

by koytch 10y ago

So a tinkering person who has in the past used Slackware (at the end it looked like a bastardized Linux From Scratch), *BSD and after much meandering settled on a minimal Debian desktop, but still uses Mint at work, should probably feel at home, you say?

qwertyuiop924 10y ago
Yeah. Arch borrows heavily from the BSDs. It even used to use their init system. Nowadays, OpenRC is the way to go if you don't want to deal with systemd.
- koytch 10y ago
  Might try OpenRC just as well. I've always liked the NetBSD rcorder-based startup, and OpenRC reminds me of it in some ways. But to be fair, I'm not in a hurry to replace sysv-rc.
  - jrapdx3 10y ago
    IIRC the FBSD init is derived from NetBSD, though diverged since early 2000's. There's a FSBD project to integrate OpenRC, and it's pretty far along. I think the objective is to replace the current init system with the more modern and flexible one.
  - rev 10y ago
    So, do you still use sysv-rc on your Debian/Mint? I've been trying to hold on to System-V on a Debian for what, about 2 years?, but some bugs found their way in after all and I gave up. Don't like the fact at all, installed OpenBSD wherever Nvidia is not involved and FreeBSD where it is, but still booting Debian from time to time.
    - koytch 10y ago
      I left Mint (17.X, the MATE spin) with whatever default rc the Mint guys chose. Upstart, I guess. My efforts go into customising my home system to my liking and these days my tastes are simple: Sawfish+dmenu or CDE, when I feel nostalgic. I'm now writing on a Debian… er… something… system. That version which tried to force systemd down my throat. I switched back to sysv-rc right after the update. What bugs are you referring to? Hopefully the possibility to switch rc will remain in future (I hear Gnome these days depends on systemd, WTF), otherwise I'll have to look for something else once again. Arch, probably. Or Slack + pkgsrc. Or I'll go back to NetBSD.
      - rev 10y ago
        Suspend, for one, stopped working for me with sysv-rc. The fact that it's an 8 years old testing/sid mix could contribute. I found that simple tastes make for an easy switch to... anything (for values of 'anything' not including lunatic fast-moving all-eating godzilla-sized init monsters obviously). My poison is some tiling wm (xmonad or spectrwm work best) + dmenu. A single config file is all you need (my spectrwm config is 4 lines long). As for a system to switch to Slack seems to be one of the last Linux strongholds. Arch (like Debian) needs tweaking to switch from systemd. There are also those Devuan guys... We'll see what future holds.
        koytch 10y ago
        Strange, suspend/hibernate with uswsusp works like a charm for me. For the first time since kernel 2.6, too. The only bug which occasionally bites me is that after several suspend/resume cycles the screen randomly blanks for a while and then restores its previous state. Killing X doesn't help, it's the same in the console. Only a reboot fixes it. I suspect the Intel BT driver.
        qwertyuiop924 10y ago
        http://systemd-free.org http://systemd-free.org provide painless instructions for the switch on Arch. Have you tried i3wm? It's my wm of choice, it's tiling and it uses dmenu by default. How does it stack up against spectrwm/xmonad?
        rev 10y ago
        No, I haven't, at least recently. I switched to tiling about 7 years ago, tried a range of WMs (dwm, ratpoison), stuck with awesomewm for several months, but as it was changing to Lua-based configuration with too much of a flux, I left it for xmonad. Two things that immediately struck a chord with me were multi-monitor support and sane keyboard shortcuts. This post¹ may add something for you. I learned of spectrwm only recently, it clones xmonad's UI, but is more practical (written in C, ini-style configuration vs Haskell code, doesn't need GHC installed). Painless switch for an xmonad user. ¹ https://www.acehack.org/posts/2015-09-19-i3.html https://www.acehack.org/posts/2015-09-19-i3.html
  - qwertyuiop924 10y ago
    Sysv is just kinda... yuck. There's a reason that there's a desire to replace it, and it's not just the desire for proper process supervision. It's a really ugly system. OpenRC is a lot better, but rc.d wins on simplicity.
    - koytch 10y ago
      Agree on yuckity :) But 'simple' is a big thing. 'Familiar', too.
      - qwertyuiop924 10y ago
        Minit, busybox init, s6, and rc.d are all simpler. Familiarity, on the other hand...

by koytch 10y ago

qwertyuiop924 10y ago

Yeah. Arch borrows heavily from the BSDs. It even used to use their init system. Nowadays, OpenRC is the way to go if you don't want to deal with systemd.

koytch 10y ago
Might try OpenRC just as well. I've always liked the NetBSD rcorder-based startup, and OpenRC reminds me of it in some ways. But to be fair, I'm not in a hurry to replace sysv-rc.
- jrapdx3 10y ago
  IIRC the FBSD init is derived from NetBSD, though diverged since early 2000's. There's a FSBD project to integrate OpenRC, and it's pretty far along. I think the objective is to replace the current init system with the more modern and flexible one.
- rev 10y ago
  So, do you still use sysv-rc on your Debian/Mint? I've been trying to hold on to System-V on a Debian for what, about 2 years?, but some bugs found their way in after all and I gave up. Don't like the fact at all, installed OpenBSD wherever Nvidia is not involved and FreeBSD where it is, but still booting Debian from time to time.
  - koytch 10y ago
    I left Mint (17.X, the MATE spin) with whatever default rc the Mint guys chose. Upstart, I guess. My efforts go into customising my home system to my liking and these days my tastes are simple: Sawfish+dmenu or CDE, when I feel nostalgic. I'm now writing on a Debian… er… something… system. That version which tried to force systemd down my throat. I switched back to sysv-rc right after the update. What bugs are you referring to? Hopefully the possibility to switch rc will remain in future (I hear Gnome these days depends on systemd, WTF), otherwise I'll have to look for something else once again. Arch, probably. Or Slack + pkgsrc. Or I'll go back to NetBSD.
    - rev 10y ago
      Suspend, for one, stopped working for me with sysv-rc. The fact that it's an 8 years old testing/sid mix could contribute. I found that simple tastes make for an easy switch to... anything (for values of 'anything' not including lunatic fast-moving all-eating godzilla-sized init monsters obviously). My poison is some tiling wm (xmonad or spectrwm work best) + dmenu. A single config file is all you need (my spectrwm config is 4 lines long). As for a system to switch to Slack seems to be one of the last Linux strongholds. Arch (like Debian) needs tweaking to switch from systemd. There are also those Devuan guys... We'll see what future holds.
      - koytch 10y ago
        Strange, suspend/hibernate with uswsusp works like a charm for me. For the first time since kernel 2.6, too. The only bug which occasionally bites me is that after several suspend/resume cycles the screen randomly blanks for a while and then restores its previous state. Killing X doesn't help, it's the same in the console. Only a reboot fixes it. I suspect the Intel BT driver.
      - qwertyuiop924 10y ago
        http://systemd-free.org http://systemd-free.org provide painless instructions for the switch on Arch. Have you tried i3wm? It's my wm of choice, it's tiling and it uses dmenu by default. How does it stack up against spectrwm/xmonad?
        rev 10y ago
        No, I haven't, at least recently. I switched to tiling about 7 years ago, tried a range of WMs (dwm, ratpoison), stuck with awesomewm for several months, but as it was changing to Lua-based configuration with too much of a flux, I left it for xmonad. Two things that immediately struck a chord with me were multi-monitor support and sane keyboard shortcuts. This post¹ may add something for you. I learned of spectrwm only recently, it clones xmonad's UI, but is more practical (written in C, ini-style configuration vs Haskell code, doesn't need GHC installed). Painless switch for an xmonad user. ¹ https://www.acehack.org/posts/2015-09-19-i3.html https://www.acehack.org/posts/2015-09-19-i3.html
- qwertyuiop924 10y ago
  Sysv is just kinda... yuck. There's a reason that there's a desire to replace it, and it's not just the desire for proper process supervision. It's a really ugly system. OpenRC is a lot better, but rc.d wins on simplicity.
  - koytch 10y ago
    Agree on yuckity :) But 'simple' is a big thing. 'Familiar', too.
    - qwertyuiop924 10y ago
      Minit, busybox init, s6, and rc.d are all simpler. Familiarity, on the other hand...