16 ms·

I have a strong dislike for systemd, so while I'm really sorry that upstart "lost" the fight, Ubuntu gained a lot of respect in my eyes with the decision to go

by tie_ 10y ago

I have a strong dislike for systemd, so while I'm really sorry that upstart "lost" the fight, Ubuntu gained a lot of respect in my eyes with the decision to go with the rest and avoid unnecessary fragmentation. This could have easily ended up another as another community rift, slowing down everybody along the way. Now they do it again with Wayland/Mir! It actually takes a significant amount of both balls and goodwill to give up on the product that you invested so much into for the sake of aligning better with your open source community. Bravo! FWIW, I too would like to keep the DE experience of Unity, and especially the Dash panel and shortcuts. If that expose-text-search could scan non-focused browser tabs that would be a killer feature, but that's for the other thread. The idea of "Let's simply ask HN users what they think" is a gem, that I suspect will now make it into many PMs' playbooks ;)

kuschku 10y ago
> FWIW, I too would like to keep the DE experience of Unity, and especially the Dash panel and shortcuts. If that expose-text-search could scan non-focused browser tabs that would be a killer feature, but that's for the other thread. Maybe switch to KDE’s KRunner? It’s the most functional and extensive search framework yet.
dustinkirkland 10y ago
Thank you!
yuhong 10y ago
I have a thread on when Pottering was hired at Red Hat: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14044287 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14044287 I think there was a lot of hate for PulseAudio too. I wonder what about Kay Sievers now, which was even hated by Linus Torvalds at one point.
- AsyncAwait 10y ago
  The 'haters' are the vocal minority. Lots of people I know, (myself included), actually prefer systemd as it greatly simplifies system management and writing of service files and is a lot more dynamic than upstart was. Maybe it's just my bubble, but systemd tends to be accepted as the right move now. I am sure the people who hate it have good reasons, but all I've heard is 'doesn't follow UNIX philoshophy', (guess what, the whole Linux ecosystem doesn't really, even Stallamn isn't a fan), 'centralized', (somewhat valid, but there's still Gentoo and Void Linux), binary text files, (installing a 'text logger' over journalctl takes 5s and the filtering capabilities of journalctl are awesome). Also, the hate for PulseAudio largely died years ago. I for one am glad for people like Pottering, who are willing to think longer term and produce great* software. Yes, maybe more buggy at the start, (but not really the case with systemd), but great eventually. Also, let's be honest, the reason you see more bugs in i.e. PulseAudio is because it is being developed in the open from its inception.
  - lettergram 10y ago
    Personally, I wish the Linux community went with ZFS. IMO it's still better than systemD as systemD still doesn't have a solid disk backup system... https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/ZFS https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/ZFS
    - walterbell 10y ago
      How is ZFS related to system initialization?
      - AsyncAwait 10y ago
        It's a shot at how systemd supposedly includes everything, I believe...
    - Twirrim 10y ago
      It can't, due to licensing incompatibility. ZFS is not compatible with the GPL. Canonical is treading a risky path with what they're doing. I would love ZFS to be native on Linux, BTFS has had too many scary data loss bugs to be able to trust it.
  - yarrel 10y ago
    If it takes "five seconds" to fix the presentation (but not the implementation) of SystemD's log files then there's no reason why people who do not understand SystemD's deficiencies shouldn't be able to spend the same amount of time Googling for one of the many clearly written accounts of them. And I know a lot of musicians who still find PulseAudio not fit for purpose. There's no hate, just frustration at the adoption of a bad solution crowding out ones that work better for their given use case.
    - AsyncAwait 10y ago
      > there's no reason why people who do not understand SystemD's deficiencies shouldn't be able to spend the same amount of time Googling for one of the many clearly written accounts of them. I listed the ones I could find and stated why I disagree with them, you could've made this a useful post by listing some additional ones, but instead you choose to just spell, (miscase?), systemd wrong.
peterwwillis 10y ago
I don't think anyone has ever dropped a distro because it wasn't using systemd, just like I don't think anyone ever moved to Ubuntu from a sysvinit system just because Ubuntu had upstart. I don't think there was ever a "fight" - they simply wanted to use systemd, and so they did. If Slackware ever moves to systemd, it will be a sad day, but i'll keep using Slack because it's the whole distro that I want, not just how the system initializes services. If I could deal with Windows's bullshit, I can deal with systemd. Just like ConsoleKit, and PolicyKit, and NetworkManager, and UPower, and PulseAudio, and HAL, and UDev, and DBus, and all the other annoying crap that's been shoved down our throats over the years. Now I know how old people feel when they talk about modern cars...
- mgbmtl 10y ago
  > "I don't think anyone has ever dropped a distro because it wasn't using systemd" That's an odd assumption. I have. I'm a big fan of standardisation. I understand some people not liking systemd, but there are a lot of folks out there who really prefer it. Once I started adopting it, I no longer needed/wanted to support cross-distro start scripts, since systemd does that. So non-systemd distros were dropped.
  - milesrout 10y ago
    systemd isn't a standard, it's a monoculture. There's a difference.
    - afarrell 10y ago
      Id be interested to hear what the difference is. By moniculture, are you saying that adopting systemd leaves you vulnerable to cross-distro vulnerabilities hitting a bunch of systems all at once? (Most of my knowledge on the downsides of monoculture come from Irish history) Or are you pointing to something else?
      - peterwwillis 10y ago
        It's a standard in the sense that Service Control Manager is a standard. But it's a monoculture in the sense that writing your application for Service Control Manager means it will only ever work on Windows NT-derived operating systems. That's not a good standard for an operating system supposedly about flexibility, compatibility, and choice. And it's even more annoying for software which isn't intended to be run in a monoculture, like most of the open source/free software world.
tomc1985 10y ago
Just curious as to how many of these replies have used systemd
- Twirrim 10y ago
  I would drop it in a heartbeat if I could. Dealing with servers it's not solving a problem I have, and just introducing the strangest behaviour along the way.
  - SteveNuts 10y ago
    Agreed, the config files for upstart were so easy to template out and always worked reliably.
  - josteink 10y ago
    > Dealing with servers it's not solving a problem I have, For me it's solving the problem of simply and reliably wiring up persistent and resilient services (not shipped with the OS). I don't know about you, but that's a need I especially have on servers. When systemd works, it works remarkably well.
    - tomc1985 10y ago
      Indeed, I've deployed it in both embedded linux and server environments and it works quite nicely in both roles.
    - Twirrim 10y ago
      >For me it's solving the problem of simply and reliably wiring up persistent and resilient services (not shipped with the OS). That aspect was already largely solved, and has been for a long time. runit, upstart, daemontools etc. Daemontools, like a number of djb's tools, manages to really manage to blend an amazing level of "just works" and "ZOMG, I configure this how?!"
      - tomc1985 10y ago
        I always hated the prevalence of so many tools -- I get sick of having to learn 30 variants of the same stupid thing because none of them seem to excel in every area. One server from recent memory had crap running in sysv, inittab, and with deamontools because not everybody liked the same system and kinda just did what they knew. I'm rather happy that systemd throws all that out.
sciurus 10y ago
"It actually takes a significant amount of both balls and goodwill to give up on the product that you invested so much into for the sake of aligning better with your open source community." They didn't do it to align with the open source community. They did it because Canonical wants outside investors, but potential investors don't think Unity can make money. https://news.ycombinator.com/edit?id=14056369 https://news.ycombinator.com/edit?id=14056369
- henriquemaia 10y ago
  Why not both? It hasn't to be an either/or type of thing.
- MR4D 10y ago
  True, but companies don't often come out and say that straight up. Usually they let things die on the vine. I think the OP was trying to say they could have taken the easy way out, but didn't.

by tie_ 10y ago

kuschku 10y ago

> FWIW, I too would like to keep the DE experience of Unity, and especially the Dash panel and shortcuts. If that expose-text-search could scan non-focused browser tabs that would be a killer feature, but that's for the other thread. Maybe switch to KDE’s KRunner? It’s the most functional and extensive search framework yet.

dustinkirkland 10y ago

Thank you!

yuhong 10y ago

I have a thread on when Pottering was hired at Red Hat: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14044287 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14044287 I think there was a lot of hate for PulseAudio too. I wonder what about Kay Sievers now, which was even hated by Linus Torvalds at one point.

AsyncAwait 10y ago
The 'haters' are the vocal minority. Lots of people I know, (myself included), actually prefer systemd as it greatly simplifies system management and writing of service files and is a lot more dynamic than upstart was. Maybe it's just my bubble, but systemd tends to be accepted as the right move now. I am sure the people who hate it have good reasons, but all I've heard is 'doesn't follow UNIX philoshophy', (guess what, the whole Linux ecosystem doesn't really, even Stallamn isn't a fan), 'centralized', (somewhat valid, but there's still Gentoo and Void Linux), binary text files, (installing a 'text logger' over journalctl takes 5s and the filtering capabilities of journalctl are awesome). Also, the hate for PulseAudio largely died years ago. I for one am glad for people like Pottering, who are willing to think longer term and produce great* software. Yes, maybe more buggy at the start, (but not really the case with systemd), but great eventually. Also, let's be honest, the reason you see more bugs in i.e. PulseAudio is because it is being developed in the open from its inception.
- lettergram 10y ago
  Personally, I wish the Linux community went with ZFS. IMO it's still better than systemD as systemD still doesn't have a solid disk backup system... https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/ZFS https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/ZFS
  - walterbell 10y ago
    How is ZFS related to system initialization?
    - AsyncAwait 10y ago
      It's a shot at how systemd supposedly includes everything, I believe...
  - Twirrim 10y ago
    It can't, due to licensing incompatibility. ZFS is not compatible with the GPL. Canonical is treading a risky path with what they're doing. I would love ZFS to be native on Linux, BTFS has had too many scary data loss bugs to be able to trust it.
- yarrel 10y ago
  If it takes "five seconds" to fix the presentation (but not the implementation) of SystemD's log files then there's no reason why people who do not understand SystemD's deficiencies shouldn't be able to spend the same amount of time Googling for one of the many clearly written accounts of them. And I know a lot of musicians who still find PulseAudio not fit for purpose. There's no hate, just frustration at the adoption of a bad solution crowding out ones that work better for their given use case.
  - AsyncAwait 10y ago
    > there's no reason why people who do not understand SystemD's deficiencies shouldn't be able to spend the same amount of time Googling for one of the many clearly written accounts of them. I listed the ones I could find and stated why I disagree with them, you could've made this a useful post by listing some additional ones, but instead you choose to just spell, (miscase?), systemd wrong.

peterwwillis 10y ago

I don't think anyone has ever dropped a distro because it wasn't using systemd, just like I don't think anyone ever moved to Ubuntu from a sysvinit system just because Ubuntu had upstart. I don't think there was ever a "fight" - they simply wanted to use systemd, and so they did. If Slackware ever moves to systemd, it will be a sad day, but i'll keep using Slack because it's the whole distro that I want, not just how the system initializes services. If I could deal with Windows's bullshit, I can deal with systemd. Just like ConsoleKit, and PolicyKit, and NetworkManager, and UPower, and PulseAudio, and HAL, and UDev, and DBus, and all the other annoying crap that's been shoved down our throats over the years. Now I know how old people feel when they talk about modern cars...

mgbmtl 10y ago
> "I don't think anyone has ever dropped a distro because it wasn't using systemd" That's an odd assumption. I have. I'm a big fan of standardisation. I understand some people not liking systemd, but there are a lot of folks out there who really prefer it. Once I started adopting it, I no longer needed/wanted to support cross-distro start scripts, since systemd does that. So non-systemd distros were dropped.
- milesrout 10y ago
  systemd isn't a standard, it's a monoculture. There's a difference.
  - afarrell 10y ago
    Id be interested to hear what the difference is. By moniculture, are you saying that adopting systemd leaves you vulnerable to cross-distro vulnerabilities hitting a bunch of systems all at once? (Most of my knowledge on the downsides of monoculture come from Irish history) Or are you pointing to something else?
    - peterwwillis 10y ago
      It's a standard in the sense that Service Control Manager is a standard. But it's a monoculture in the sense that writing your application for Service Control Manager means it will only ever work on Windows NT-derived operating systems. That's not a good standard for an operating system supposedly about flexibility, compatibility, and choice. And it's even more annoying for software which isn't intended to be run in a monoculture, like most of the open source/free software world.

tomc1985 10y ago

Just curious as to how many of these replies have used systemd

Twirrim 10y ago
I would drop it in a heartbeat if I could. Dealing with servers it's not solving a problem I have, and just introducing the strangest behaviour along the way.
- SteveNuts 10y ago
  Agreed, the config files for upstart were so easy to template out and always worked reliably.
- josteink 10y ago
  > Dealing with servers it's not solving a problem I have, For me it's solving the problem of simply and reliably wiring up persistent and resilient services (not shipped with the OS). I don't know about you, but that's a need I especially have on servers. When systemd works, it works remarkably well.
  - tomc1985 10y ago
    Indeed, I've deployed it in both embedded linux and server environments and it works quite nicely in both roles.
  - Twirrim 10y ago
    >For me it's solving the problem of simply and reliably wiring up persistent and resilient services (not shipped with the OS). That aspect was already largely solved, and has been for a long time. runit, upstart, daemontools etc. Daemontools, like a number of djb's tools, manages to really manage to blend an amazing level of "just works" and "ZOMG, I configure this how?!"
    - tomc1985 10y ago
      I always hated the prevalence of so many tools -- I get sick of having to learn 30 variants of the same stupid thing because none of them seem to excel in every area. One server from recent memory had crap running in sysv, inittab, and with deamontools because not everybody liked the same system and kinda just did what they knew. I'm rather happy that systemd throws all that out.

sciurus 10y ago

"It actually takes a significant amount of both balls and goodwill to give up on the product that you invested so much into for the sake of aligning better with your open source community." They didn't do it to align with the open source community. They did it because Canonical wants outside investors, but potential investors don't think Unity can make money. https://news.ycombinator.com/edit?id=14056369 https://news.ycombinator.com/edit?id=14056369

henriquemaia 10y ago
Why not both? It hasn't to be an either/or type of thing.
MR4D 10y ago
True, but companies don't often come out and say that straight up. Usually they let things die on the vine. I think the OP was trying to say they could have taken the easy way out, but didn't.