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I have to wonder if this is some kind of statistical bias based on the type of engagement. There are some people who are vehemently opposed to systemd, for a v
by akerl_ 2y ago
I have to wonder if this is some kind of statistical bias based on the type of engagement.
There are some people who are vehemently opposed to systemd, for a variety of reasons with varying degrees of merit. I think it's fair to say that systemd's developers broadly ignored those people, figuring out (correctly) that if they convinced a majority of distribution maintainers, and made the user experience for the average user smooth enough, that was actually going to be successful. As it should be: distro maintainers get to pick how their distros work, and users determine which distros they use.
And systemd has a clear sell for those groups: distro maintainers can standardize their service scripts, often just using what an upstream package author can write agnostically to distro, and users can handle the majority of base system functionality without having to pick things like "which of these cron daemons should I install".
- theamk 2y agoI'd also add that systemd appeals to application developers (no daemon code, one file for all distros). And it appeals to sysadmins too (no more /etc conflicts on any package update! Modify any system service! etc..) Which brings me to the question of which category systemd does not appeal to? I am guessing "minimalists" and "people who like things done the old way" - and those are simply not that numerous compared to others.
- egorfine 2y ago> broadly ignored those people, figuring out (correctly) that if they convinced a majority So, politics at its worst. Being ignored on a matter, especially when there is merit involved, can make someone a highly motivated hater.
- akerl_ 2y agoSurely for each individual distro, they get to make their own decision about how to build their system. I can’t stop you from hating, but if your pitch is that distros shouldn’t be allowed to make their own choices about what to include if you disagree… I guess your option is to start your own distro. No linux distro was forced to adopt systemd. They did it on the merits, from their determination.
- egorfine 2y agoI have to strongly disagree on the last one. Systemd is pretty much a canonical (pun intended) example of a solution in search of a problem. Systemd as PID1 is nice on merits. I wouldn't want to get back to sysv initscripts. Everything else is incredibly hostile to practical unix philosophy and solely exists out of spite and politics. This is my opinion and I realize I'm in the minority.
- akerl_ 2y agoWhy do you think Linux distros adopted systemd, if not because they thought it was a good choice for themselves and their users?
- egorfine 2y agoThat's a good question tbf. Systemd as PID1 got its merits, hands down. Even coming from a person so destructive as LP, systemd as PID1 is still a good product. Perhaps everything else is feature creep and architecture astronauts[0] type of things. 0 https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2001/04/21/dont-let-architecture-astronauts-scare-you/ https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2001/04/21/dont-let-architect...
- akerl_ 2y agoHow does that account for the distros using systemd-networkd, timesyncd, resolved, etc, where they’re separate binaries and services, instead of their predecessors? If the other binaries aren’t better for maintainers and their users, why are they replacing other tools with them?
- egorfine 2y agoI think it's change for the sake of change. I think it's mostly politics coming down from Red Hat. How exactly I'm not sure, but I fail to see any sane reason behind replacing things that worked well for decades with new things that are oftentimes inferior on merits. Anyway. systemd vs unix philosophy is an insurmountable ravine and I chose to stay in what I think is sane camp.
- egorfine 2y ago> pick things like "which of these cron daemons should I install". And we're back at it: systemd seemingly has plans to eliminate cron. I was not impressed when I have been pulling my hair out on why certain jobs in Ubuntu still run despite being removed from cron files. Turns out, systemd now has 'timers'. So, mark my words: a few Ubuntu releases down the line, cron will become an optional package and after a couple more it won't even be available. Up next: sudo.
- akerl_ 2y agoYes. Systemd timers are an order of magnitude better for the average distro maintainer and the average user than the various ways of invoking and running cron.