> OpenSUSE also had upstart in the meanwhile but continued to support sysvinit as an alternative. I wasn't aware of that ... it turns out that it was the other

> OpenSUSE also had upstart in the meanwhile but continued to support sysvinit as an alternative. I wasn't aware of that ... it turns out that it was the other way around: openSUSE 11.3 has this item, implying it's not the default: "Upstart is included as optional init system" https://en.opensuse.org/Archive:Product_highlights_11.3 https://en.opensuse.org/Archive:Product_highlights_11.3 openSUSE 11.4 then mentions systemd, although "experimental". https://en.opensuse.org/Archive:Product_highlights_11.4 https://en.opensuse.org/Archive:Product_highlights_11.4 openSUSE 12.1 defaults to systemd (see previous comment), with sysvinit as non-default option. So Upstart was a short-lived non-default option. > A big sell of Upstart and OpenRC was always that it was backwards compatible with old-style sysvinit-style scripts even though new ones were written in the new style. You are right that there are no distinct modes as such, my memory is quite fuzzy as it's been some years, and I wouldn't rely on anything I say. And it looks like Ubuntu (unlike Fedora) did replace a lot of init.d scripts with native Upstart jobs. https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+spec/replacement-initscripts https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+spec/replacement-initscripts I can't remember what the problem was with mixing init.d scripts and native Upstart jobs, or what impact it had, maybe it was not important in practice. The Debian wiki has this item, but, well, it's a Wiki, so perhaps it's not the most reliable source. Can't set proper dependencies until everything has converted from SysV init files to Upstart jobs. https://wiki.debian.org/Debate/initsystem/sysvinit https://wiki.debian.org/Debate/initsystem/sysvinit