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> and there should be Linux distros packaged without systemd. systemd should be an optional package on all distros. Shoving it down throats is one of the valid

> and there should be Linux distros packaged without systemd. systemd should be an optional package on all distros. Shoving it down throats is one of the valid major criticisms. What should have happened instead is systemd was optional on Debian at setup and Debian was forked to include it by default. It is simply backwards that Debian needed to be forked for purity. Duvuan shouldn't need to exist, but it very much does. The entire ideology of openness and freedom has been turned on its head. Instead of "what is best for everyone is good enough for me," has become with entitlement "what is best for me is good enough for everyone." Maybe you like the way you do things, but would any here really insist on forcing everyone else to use your methods and no others? systemd, among other valid criticisms, is unmistakably fascist. For anyone but parent, don't just be thin-skinned and downvote my comment because you have allowed yourself to be insulted. Be courageous and disagree with me if you can. How is systemd not fascist?

piperswe 4y ago
The primary definition of fascism, according to the Merriam Webster dictionary, is this: > a political philosophy, movement, or regime (such as that of the Fascisti) that exalts nation and often race above the individual and that stands for a centralized autocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader, severe economic and social regimentation, and forcible suppression of opposition systemd has nothing to do with nation or race. There are much better words than fascism to describe Debian's prioritization of systemd.
- Maursault 4y ago
  Thank you, and a worthy attempt, but as you have defined Fascism, the political movement and a noun and proper name, as opposed to the adjective fascist, as in advocation of an authoritarian regime and in opposition of and intolerant of opposing views, and in modern definitions, a synonym of "bullying," your post is somewhat of a straw man. Obviously I was not suggesting that systemd was literally Nazi software. What I was saying is that systemd, as an unnecessarily complex machine in itself as it proceeds to annex other parts of the system, is autocratic, strongly regimented and centralized, suppresses opposition, and subordinates individual interests.
oofnik 4y ago
I would suggest a better word to describe systemd design philosophy is authoritarian, if we're going to stick with political science terminology. Human systems tend to flourish when political and economic decision-making is relatively distributed throughout a given population. I believe this position is backed by a reasonable amount of empirical observation. Machines are (as of this writing) programmed by humans. Unlike humans, machines are automated rule-followers. This is substantively different from decision-making, which is a uniquely human trait involving moral agency, free will, etc. (at least as I'm defining it for the purposes of my argument). If you try to turn humans into automated rule-followers by decree, they tend to become miserable. Fortunately, one does not have to take into account how machines feel about being absolved of all decision-making, making such control systems very effective (you don't have to kill / imprison the dissenters). But even though the machines might be more effectively programmed by a centralized, unified, top-down, "authoritarian" control architecture, you still need humans to build this controller. And since we know software projects end up mirroring the communication structure of the humans in charge of building them, it follows that authoritarian-minded software engineers would be a best fit for building such systems. The converse is that libertarian-minded software engineers tend to recoil in horror when they encounter authoritarian software design, no matter how unified, elegant, or effective it may be. Such things are a moral transgression to the libertarian.
rainbow29822 4y ago
>systemd should be an optional package on all distros. Why? Should glibc also be optional? What about the Linux kernel? What about apt-get? You can technically replace those things but it's a ton of extra work, almost like shipping a completely different distro. At the end of the day, a distro decides what packages it wants to support and what it doesn't. The specific choice of supported packages is often what defines a distro and sets it apart from the rest. If they have limited manpower and choose to save themselves time by picking only one init, or libc, or desktop environment, or anything, that's their decision. >but would any here really insist on forcing everyone else to use your methods and no others? No. There are hundreds of Linux distributions to choose from, and anyone can make more distributions any time they want. No one is forced to do anything. Also, using Linux is optional to begin with. >systemd, among other valid criticisms, is unmistakably fascist. For anyone but parent, don't just be thin-skinned and downvote my comment because you have allowed yourself to be insulted. Be courageous and disagree with me if you can. How is systemd not fascist? You should stop and think a bit more before making these comments that you appear to be acknowledging as histrionic and insulting. By this definition BSD is also "fascist" due to only shipping BSD init, and the Linux kernel is "fascist" due to only shipping one set of drivers, and Devuan is also "fascist" for not supporting systemd...
- effie 4y ago
  Why? That is a very good question! Libc and linux kernel are good solutions to well defined problems: a standard C library, and a kernel. They pretty much do what is expected, sometimes they do more, but not by much. Systemd? It is not a good replacement for an init system for the users. Instead, it is an OS functionality accretion for the benefit of distributors, a baroque monstrosity that provides mediocre buggy solutions to too many problems that have nothing to do with init. It boots nondeterministically (socket activation is not such a universally great idea), sometimes hangs randomly, it disrespects the user when ignoring keyboard input while waiting 90s or indefinitely for some condition, or launching zillions of bogus hog processes for every user login event. Some of these can be mitigated on a production server, but bad taste remains.
  - rainbow29822 4y ago

piperswe 4y ago

The primary definition of fascism, according to the Merriam Webster dictionary, is this: > a political philosophy, movement, or regime (such as that of the Fascisti) that exalts nation and often race above the individual and that stands for a centralized autocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader, severe economic and social regimentation, and forcible suppression of opposition systemd has nothing to do with nation or race. There are much better words than fascism to describe Debian's prioritization of systemd.

Maursault 4y ago
Thank you, and a worthy attempt, but as you have defined Fascism, the political movement and a noun and proper name, as opposed to the adjective fascist, as in advocation of an authoritarian regime and in opposition of and intolerant of opposing views, and in modern definitions, a synonym of "bullying," your post is somewhat of a straw man. Obviously I was not suggesting that systemd was literally Nazi software. What I was saying is that systemd, as an unnecessarily complex machine in itself as it proceeds to annex other parts of the system, is autocratic, strongly regimented and centralized, suppresses opposition, and subordinates individual interests.

oofnik 4y ago

I would suggest a better word to describe systemd design philosophy is authoritarian, if we're going to stick with political science terminology. Human systems tend to flourish when political and economic decision-making is relatively distributed throughout a given population. I believe this position is backed by a reasonable amount of empirical observation. Machines are (as of this writing) programmed by humans. Unlike humans, machines are automated rule-followers. This is substantively different from decision-making, which is a uniquely human trait involving moral agency, free will, etc. (at least as I'm defining it for the purposes of my argument). If you try to turn humans into automated rule-followers by decree, they tend to become miserable. Fortunately, one does not have to take into account how machines feel about being absolved of all decision-making, making such control systems very effective (you don't have to kill / imprison the dissenters). But even though the machines might be more effectively programmed by a centralized, unified, top-down, "authoritarian" control architecture, you still need humans to build this controller. And since we know software projects end up mirroring the communication structure of the humans in charge of building them, it follows that authoritarian-minded software engineers would be a best fit for building such systems. The converse is that libertarian-minded software engineers tend to recoil in horror when they encounter authoritarian software design, no matter how unified, elegant, or effective it may be. Such things are a moral transgression to the libertarian.

rainbow29822 4y ago

>systemd should be an optional package on all distros. Why? Should glibc also be optional? What about the Linux kernel? What about apt-get? You can technically replace those things but it's a ton of extra work, almost like shipping a completely different distro. At the end of the day, a distro decides what packages it wants to support and what it doesn't. The specific choice of supported packages is often what defines a distro and sets it apart from the rest. If they have limited manpower and choose to save themselves time by picking only one init, or libc, or desktop environment, or anything, that's their decision. >but would any here really insist on forcing everyone else to use your methods and no others? No. There are hundreds of Linux distributions to choose from, and anyone can make more distributions any time they want. No one is forced to do anything. Also, using Linux is optional to begin with. >systemd, among other valid criticisms, is unmistakably fascist. For anyone but parent, don't just be thin-skinned and downvote my comment because you have allowed yourself to be insulted. Be courageous and disagree with me if you can. How is systemd not fascist? You should stop and think a bit more before making these comments that you appear to be acknowledging as histrionic and insulting. By this definition BSD is also "fascist" due to only shipping BSD init, and the Linux kernel is "fascist" due to only shipping one set of drivers, and Devuan is also "fascist" for not supporting systemd...

effie 4y ago
Why? That is a very good question! Libc and linux kernel are good solutions to well defined problems: a standard C library, and a kernel. They pretty much do what is expected, sometimes they do more, but not by much. Systemd? It is not a good replacement for an init system for the users. Instead, it is an OS functionality accretion for the benefit of distributors, a baroque monstrosity that provides mediocre buggy solutions to too many problems that have nothing to do with init. It boots nondeterministically (socket activation is not such a universally great idea), sometimes hangs randomly, it disrespects the user when ignoring keyboard input while waiting 90s or indefinitely for some condition, or launching zillions of bogus hog processes for every user login event. Some of these can be mitigated on a production server, but bad taste remains.
- rainbow29822 4y ago