8 ms·

Uselessd

169 points by muyuu 12y ago

silon3 12y ago
"like" (it happened to me) No journald. Consequently, this also means no libqrencode and libmicrohttpd integration, nor hooking coredumps to the journal. The default log target for auxiliaries is now LOG_TARGET_SYSLOG_OR_KMSG. The main case against binary logs is their corruptibility. This happens more often than you’d think, due to not having any transaction consistency, as an RDBMS would. The advice of the systemd developers on handling this? Ignore it.
- Uberphallus 12y ago
  Not related to all binary logging, but journalctl is incredibly sluggish. Some combinations of slow (rotating) media, certain filesystems, and underpowered CPUs (ARM in my experience) and you get a barely usable logging system that makes you want to punch your box.
  - pgl 12y ago
    I found this to be the case as well. Especially on a busy system where there are a lot of events, when you're trying to find the cause of an issue and constantly opening and closing logs, the lag is definitely noticeable.
  - rakoo 12y ago
    I don't even have an esoteric setup and every time I want to read logs I'll have to wait 30 secs. Even though there is absolutely no activity.
    - vidarh 12y ago
      Sounds like you're running into some bug. I've never run into any perceptible lag.
    - the_mitsuhiko 12y ago
      That sounds odd. Did you try to strace it and see what it actually does?
    - toupeira 12y ago
      Try "journalctl -e" or "journalctl --since today", it seems like by default it will load all available logs which leads to this slugishness.
      - perlpimp 12y ago
        it is slow because log is read written in a block binary format but pager accepts byte granular fseek feature to go forward without loading everything into $PAGER's buffers.
      - rakoo 12y ago
        See ? People complaining before reading TFM. Thank you !
  - mrweasel 12y ago
    I'm not currently using Linux, so I might be wrong, or misunderstanding what you're trying to do, but could you just have journald write to syslog? ForwardToSyslog=yes in /etc/systemd/journald.conf.
  - the_mitsuhiko 12y ago
    To be honest: that's kinda to be expected if you run it on a slow machine. However you can configure it to be in-memory only and forward to syslog and you have it as it was before.
    - XorNot 12y ago
      I'm highly suspicious that syslog can actually be faster in such a situation. If you can't seek to the disk quickly, then it doesn't matter what you do - logging will be slow if you need to flush frequently.
- the_mitsuhiko 12y ago
  > The main case against binary logs is their corruptibility. This happens more often than you’d think, due to not having any transaction consistency, as an RDBMS would. The advice of the systemd developers on handling this? Ignore it. To be honest, if the format is done well there is no reason you cannot still read all the non corrupted records. textfiles corrupt too, you just generally live with them being broken because you can read the unbroken stuff. Going by the bug tracker the journald approach is to make the reader work with broken files better.
  - valarauca1 12y ago
    This is like saying. "I get shot going to work every day. But I bought a bullet proof vest, so life is okay." Iron bandages don't solve problems, they for a short time work around them. Except because nobody actually like writing systems level code, they stick- forever.
    - the_mitsuhiko 12y ago
      > "I get shot going to work every day. But I bought a bullet proof vest, so life is okay." You get corruption if the machine shuts down incorrectly. In binary or text files. In that case journald/syslogd act like a black box. Syslogd will give you whatever garbage it has in those text files, journald will give you the surviving records and will tell you which ones are unreadable. If you want to not get shot, shut down your machine properly. If you cannot shut down your machine properly because it crashed then you have data garbage if you want it or not. Drives work that way. I'm not sure what you are arguing for. Journald does not write broken records itself.
  - XorNot 12y ago
    The binary logs are append only. The bug tracker entry says that they got "some corrupted logs" but not how. People get corrupted or truncated text logs all the time, they just ignore it because "oh the log ends midway through a line? eh". The ridiculous "oh my god my logs will be always ruined thing" is a beat up by those who need to assassinate something about systemd, because it's always been devoid of any technical accuracy or discussion.
- ape4 12y ago
  I googled "libqrencode". Is it really QR code encoding?
  - the_mitsuhiko 12y ago
    Yep. It's because when you kernel panic most people do not feel like typing stuff off a screen. If you have a QR code on your monitor however you can easily scan it and it contains all the info about what is wrong. That's a pretty good feature if you ask me.
    - ape4 12y ago
      That is a useful feature! The way it was written it sounded like QR codes were going into the logs.
    - uselessdguy 12y ago
      That's a Linux kernel feature, not a systemd feature. It's unrelated: http://www.linux.com/news/featured-blogs/200-libby-clark/773488-opw-intern-develops-qr-code-for-linux-kernel-oops-messages http://www.linux.com/news/featured-blogs/200-libby-clark/773... systemd has libqrencode integration, in order to, if I recall correctly, display a QR code when you generate FSS keys from journalctl.
taeric 12y ago
Ok, this has to have been one of the more interesting reads on what the complaints against systemd are. Ridiculously entertaining, to boot.
- cwyers 12y ago
  Honestly, I feel the opposite -- I feel like this project acts as a far better rebuttal to some common misconceptions about systemd than Lennart's blog post about systemd myths. Why isn't systemd portable? You could read Lennart's explanation, or you could just look at all the things these guys had to rip out in order to get systemd to compile (and then not work) on non-Linux kernels.
  - taeric 12y ago
    I think we are mainly in agreement. This was a very informative project. Now, in my case, I happen to have furthered my distrust of systemd in the process. But that is secondary to just having learned more about what exactly is involved by looking at this.
otterley 12y ago
Original discussion, about a month ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8348025 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8348025
pgl 12y ago
This is such an excellent example of how to actually approach what you don't like about another project. It also has the potential of actually being really useful (despite the name): there are lots of _good_ bits in systemd which are out of reach for people who disagree with so much else in it. I really hope this takes off.
muyuu 12y ago
Thread on their latest release: https://forums.darknedgy.net/viewtopic.php?id=4659 https://forums.darknedgy.net/viewtopic.php?id=4659 Still very early days though.
dantillberg 12y ago
Grammar nit: I believe that "complementary kitchen sink" would mean that the kitchen sink goes really well with it, while "complimentary kitchen sink" would mean that the kitchen sink is included at no additional charge.
- agumonkey 12y ago
  I believe it's the opposite. Compliment : positive quality. Complement : making a whole. ps: not native english speaker.
  - iopq 12y ago
    compliment (n.) "An act, or expression of civility, usually understood to include some hypocrisy, and to mean less than it declares" [Johnson], 1570s, complement, via French compliment (17c.), from Italian complimento "expression of respect and civility," from Vulgar Latin *complire, for Latin complere "to complete" (see complete (adj.)), via notion of "complete the obligations of politeness." Same word as complement but by a different etymological route; differentiated by spelling after 1650. complimentary (adj.) 1620s, "conveying a compliment," from compliment (n.) + -ary. In later use loosely meaning "free of charge." complement (n.) late 14c., "that which completes," from Old French compliement "accomplishment, fulfillment" (14c., Modern French complément), from Latin complementum "that which fills up or completes," from complere "fill up" (see complete (adj.)). Originally also having senses which were taken up c.1650-1725 by compliment.
  - shawabawa3 12y ago
    While your definitions are technically correct - GP is right. Complimentary means "free", complementary means "goes well with"
    - agumonkey 12y ago
      Okay, thanks
n0body 12y ago
do not care. i've lost interest in systemd stuff now. use it. don't use it. whatever
gnud 12y ago
This is a very good initiative. But linking "GNUisms" to the communist party website is just dumb.
- raverbashing 12y ago
  Yeah, I'm not criticising it, but I expected an actual example .
  - uselessdguy 12y ago
    Off the top of my head: __compar_fn_t (just a typedef), strndupa(), parse_printf_format(), canonicalize_file_name(), the GLOB_BRACE flag, implicitly included headers, error.h (also in uClibc)... We have notes in our Bitbucket source.
- currysausage 12y ago
  It might be unprofessional in this context, but it did make me smile. The GNU project's political dedication is vital to the OSS world, but quality of code, documentation and usability often do feel like an afterthought. The minimalism of the BSDs, for example, always is a refreshing contrast. (Don't get me wrong, I don't want to flame, I use GNU tools on a daily basis. Just when you know what they mean, the rather unexpected link is pretty funny.)
  - fafner 12y ago
    GNU tools are rather well documented and well usable. I really don't understand the claims you are making.
    - currysausage 12y ago
      It starts with this: The full documentation for XY is maintained as a Texinfo manual. If the info and XY programs are properly installed at your site, the command info coreutils 'XY invocation' should give you access to the complete manual. No, I don't want to spend days learning how to use yet another obscure hypertext browser. That's not the Unix way anyway. GNU's Not Unix, and that's fine - but annoying at times.
spitcode 12y ago
http://boycottsystemd.org/ http://boycottsystemd.org/
joelberman 12y ago
I do not want to spend the time to learn new things unless they are directly related to my work. So systemd was a PITA for me, but now I am fine with it (BTW, I have used UNIX since the late 60's so have seen a lot). This project looks great, but I do not have the energy to care, I will just deal with whatever comes with my distro. By the way, pick a better name. I suspect many OSS and home grown projects fail for the simple reason that the name, while clever, makes people either think the project is a joke, or some geeky thing, or unprofessional. Either pick an obvious descriptive name, or be prepared to spend a boatload of money building name recognition.
- uselessdguy 12y ago
  The name is perfect and I do not see myself changing it. The fact that so many people misunderstand makes it better. The Linux Action Show thought we were calling systemd "useless" and went on a hilarious rant, there's people on LinuxQuestions.org who really insist that it's pronounced "use less dee" (I call it "uselessdee", as in it's of no use, personally).
  - brazzy 12y ago
    So basically you're doing all this for the lulz of confusing and pissing off people and don't really want anyone to actually use the software?
    - uselessdguy 12y ago
      Humorous names aren't exactly new to free software.
    - nknighthb 12y ago
      An existing alternative to systemd is called upstart. Three of the most popular VCSs are called git, mercurial, and subversion. A major open-source image manipulation program is known as The GIMP. A popular email client among a certain crowd is mutt. less is more, we snort our networks, and manage our VMs with a vagrant. We compile our mission-critical code with a gnat, use browsers written by organizations named after radioactive lizards and an infant noise, write menu-driven applications with curses, and Uglify our JavaScript. And you're worried about somebody calling their own project "uselessd"?
muyuu 12y ago
Top of /r/linux right now: http://www.reddit.com/r/linux/comments/2k5b7e/the_concern_isnt_that_systemd_itself_isnt/ http://www.reddit.com/r/linux/comments/2k5b7e/the_concern_is... "The concern isn’t that systemd itself isn’t following the UNIX philosophy. What’s troubling is that the systemd team is dragging in other projects or functionality, and aggressively integrating them."
JoshTriplett 12y ago
Because systemd was entirely too consistent across environments, so it needed some inconsistency introduced. The documentation reminds me a lot of Emacs's "ANTINEWS", listing all the functionality you lose by downgrading to the previous version of Emacs. Except in this case, it's actually a "NEWS" file, showing all the functionality you lose by downgrading from systemd to uselessd. > Certain superfluous unit types removed, namely devices, timers, swaps, mounts and automounts. So under uselessd a service or socket file cannot depend on the presence of certain mounts, for instance (RequiresMountsFor=). Nor can a service run maintenance tasks periodically with supervision on the maintenance task, and with all the privilege-dropping, isolation, and security features easily accomplished with a systemd service. (And even if a cron implementation implemented such features, they'd work gratuitously differently from systemd services.) Nor can the availability of a device trigger the reliable, monitored launch of a service with all those same systemd features. > Setup routines for various MAC/ACL systems, including SMACK, IMA and SELinux, are gone. We want to stick to a more clearly defined purpose, one that is agnostic of such elements. Nonetheless, we have retained SELinux access routines in D-Bus APIs and unit options for SMACK attributes in socket unit files to respect existing configurations. So anyone who actually wants to use such security systems is screwed, then. Good thing Linux isn't about choice. > systemd-fsck has been replaced with a service file that starts /sbin/fsck to fsck devices. In essence, this isn’t much different from what systemd-fsck already did, but with the overhead of a middle man executable interfacing with /sbin/fsck cut out. This also means that the systemd-defined sysctl parameters for its fsck are gone, and you should use the old ones (/forcefsck, etc.) instead. So now, in order to force a check of a filesystem on reboot, you must write to that filesystem, potentially doing further damage to it.
- uselessdguy 12y ago
  ANTINEWS is the best kind of NEWS. And you don't just lose things, come on. Our recent support for running a system instance of systemd/uselessd without taking over init (as early and rudimentary as it still may be) is a good thing. Cross-libc is another. A couple of things from main.c were refactored into independent tools. This is still a giant WIP and it's quite experimental. We make this perfectly clear in the wiki that it's not ready for system integration or daily use, and there's still a long way to go (including some more radical ideas) before we ever think of making a stable release. uselessd is about sticking to processes. Did we not make that clear? If you want a dedicated supervisor, you can use something explicitly designed for such a purpose, like monit or supervisord, instead of using systemd's mixed functionality. Device activation can still be accomplished through (e)udev. We're device node manager-agnostic. We made this clear. No, you're not screwed. I think you completely ignored the fact that we intend on being portable. This is still early, again, but nonetheless we do compile on FreeBSD and Debian GNU/Hurd and some of the tools (like systemd-delta) actually run properly. To be honest, we haven't tested the systemd-fsck unit. We mostly removed the binary due to being something that used libudev and looked like it belonged to a shell script more than anything. You can still force fscks through other means (tune2fs for ext2/3/4, etc.) We'll be sorting this out. It sounds like this project offends your personal ideological sensibilities, as you totally misunderstand its purpose and fail to realize it's a WIP and unstable. By the way, I liked the jab about choice. I wish we all voted for the same political party, too.
muyuu 12y ago
Modded out of the FP. Guess the mods know best heh.

169 points by muyuu 12y ago

"like" (it happened to me) No journald. Consequently, this also means no libqrencode and libmicrohttpd integration, nor hooking coredumps to the journal. The default log target for auxiliaries is now LOG_TARGET_SYSLOG_OR_KMSG. The main case against binary logs is their corruptibility. This happens more often than you’d think, due to not having any transaction consistency, as an RDBMS would. The advice of the systemd developers on handling this? Ignore it.

Uberphallus 12y ago
Not related to all binary logging, but journalctl is incredibly sluggish. Some combinations of slow (rotating) media, certain filesystems, and underpowered CPUs (ARM in my experience) and you get a barely usable logging system that makes you want to punch your box.
- pgl 12y ago
  I found this to be the case as well. Especially on a busy system where there are a lot of events, when you're trying to find the cause of an issue and constantly opening and closing logs, the lag is definitely noticeable.
- rakoo 12y ago
  I don't even have an esoteric setup and every time I want to read logs I'll have to wait 30 secs. Even though there is absolutely no activity.
  - vidarh 12y ago
    Sounds like you're running into some bug. I've never run into any perceptible lag.
  - the_mitsuhiko 12y ago
    That sounds odd. Did you try to strace it and see what it actually does?
  - toupeira 12y ago
    Try "journalctl -e" or "journalctl --since today", it seems like by default it will load all available logs which leads to this slugishness.
    - perlpimp 12y ago
      it is slow because log is read written in a block binary format but pager accepts byte granular fseek feature to go forward without loading everything into $PAGER's buffers.
    - rakoo 12y ago
      See ? People complaining before reading TFM. Thank you !
- mrweasel 12y ago
  I'm not currently using Linux, so I might be wrong, or misunderstanding what you're trying to do, but could you just have journald write to syslog? ForwardToSyslog=yes in /etc/systemd/journald.conf.
- the_mitsuhiko 12y ago
  To be honest: that's kinda to be expected if you run it on a slow machine. However you can configure it to be in-memory only and forward to syslog and you have it as it was before.
  - XorNot 12y ago
    I'm highly suspicious that syslog can actually be faster in such a situation. If you can't seek to the disk quickly, then it doesn't matter what you do - logging will be slow if you need to flush frequently.
the_mitsuhiko 12y ago
> The main case against binary logs is their corruptibility. This happens more often than you’d think, due to not having any transaction consistency, as an RDBMS would. The advice of the systemd developers on handling this? Ignore it. To be honest, if the format is done well there is no reason you cannot still read all the non corrupted records. textfiles corrupt too, you just generally live with them being broken because you can read the unbroken stuff. Going by the bug tracker the journald approach is to make the reader work with broken files better.
- valarauca1 12y ago
  This is like saying. "I get shot going to work every day. But I bought a bullet proof vest, so life is okay." Iron bandages don't solve problems, they for a short time work around them. Except because nobody actually like writing systems level code, they stick- forever.
  - the_mitsuhiko 12y ago
    > "I get shot going to work every day. But I bought a bullet proof vest, so life is okay." You get corruption if the machine shuts down incorrectly. In binary or text files. In that case journald/syslogd act like a black box. Syslogd will give you whatever garbage it has in those text files, journald will give you the surviving records and will tell you which ones are unreadable. If you want to not get shot, shut down your machine properly. If you cannot shut down your machine properly because it crashed then you have data garbage if you want it or not. Drives work that way. I'm not sure what you are arguing for. Journald does not write broken records itself.
- XorNot 12y ago
  The binary logs are append only. The bug tracker entry says that they got "some corrupted logs" but not how. People get corrupted or truncated text logs all the time, they just ignore it because "oh the log ends midway through a line? eh". The ridiculous "oh my god my logs will be always ruined thing" is a beat up by those who need to assassinate something about systemd, because it's always been devoid of any technical accuracy or discussion.
ape4 12y ago
I googled "libqrencode". Is it really QR code encoding?
- the_mitsuhiko 12y ago
  Yep. It's because when you kernel panic most people do not feel like typing stuff off a screen. If you have a QR code on your monitor however you can easily scan it and it contains all the info about what is wrong. That's a pretty good feature if you ask me.
  - ape4 12y ago
    That is a useful feature! The way it was written it sounded like QR codes were going into the logs.
  - uselessdguy 12y ago
    That's a Linux kernel feature, not a systemd feature. It's unrelated: http://www.linux.com/news/featured-blogs/200-libby-clark/773488-opw-intern-develops-qr-code-for-linux-kernel-oops-messages http://www.linux.com/news/featured-blogs/200-libby-clark/773... systemd has libqrencode integration, in order to, if I recall correctly, display a QR code when you generate FSS keys from journalctl.

taeric 12y ago

Ok, this has to have been one of the more interesting reads on what the complaints against systemd are. Ridiculously entertaining, to boot.

cwyers 12y ago
Honestly, I feel the opposite -- I feel like this project acts as a far better rebuttal to some common misconceptions about systemd than Lennart's blog post about systemd myths. Why isn't systemd portable? You could read Lennart's explanation, or you could just look at all the things these guys had to rip out in order to get systemd to compile (and then not work) on non-Linux kernels.
- taeric 12y ago
  I think we are mainly in agreement. This was a very informative project. Now, in my case, I happen to have furthered my distrust of systemd in the process. But that is secondary to just having learned more about what exactly is involved by looking at this.

otterley 12y ago

Original discussion, about a month ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8348025 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8348025

pgl 12y ago

This is such an excellent example of how to actually approach what you don't like about another project. It also has the potential of actually being really useful (despite the name): there are lots of _good_ bits in systemd which are out of reach for people who disagree with so much else in it. I really hope this takes off.

muyuu 12y ago

Thread on their latest release: https://forums.darknedgy.net/viewtopic.php?id=4659 https://forums.darknedgy.net/viewtopic.php?id=4659 Still very early days though.

dantillberg 12y ago

Grammar nit: I believe that "complementary kitchen sink" would mean that the kitchen sink goes really well with it, while "complimentary kitchen sink" would mean that the kitchen sink is included at no additional charge.

agumonkey 12y ago
I believe it's the opposite. Compliment : positive quality. Complement : making a whole. ps: not native english speaker.
- iopq 12y ago
  compliment (n.) "An act, or expression of civility, usually understood to include some hypocrisy, and to mean less than it declares" [Johnson], 1570s, complement, via French compliment (17c.), from Italian complimento "expression of respect and civility," from Vulgar Latin *complire, for Latin complere "to complete" (see complete (adj.)), via notion of "complete the obligations of politeness." Same word as complement but by a different etymological route; differentiated by spelling after 1650. complimentary (adj.) 1620s, "conveying a compliment," from compliment (n.) + -ary. In later use loosely meaning "free of charge." complement (n.) late 14c., "that which completes," from Old French compliement "accomplishment, fulfillment" (14c., Modern French complément), from Latin complementum "that which fills up or completes," from complere "fill up" (see complete (adj.)). Originally also having senses which were taken up c.1650-1725 by compliment.
- shawabawa3 12y ago
  While your definitions are technically correct - GP is right. Complimentary means "free", complementary means "goes well with"
  - agumonkey 12y ago
    Okay, thanks

n0body 12y ago

do not care. i've lost interest in systemd stuff now. use it. don't use it. whatever

gnud 12y ago

This is a very good initiative. But linking "GNUisms" to the communist party website is just dumb.

raverbashing 12y ago
Yeah, I'm not criticising it, but I expected an actual example .
- uselessdguy 12y ago
  Off the top of my head: __compar_fn_t (just a typedef), strndupa(), parse_printf_format(), canonicalize_file_name(), the GLOB_BRACE flag, implicitly included headers, error.h (also in uClibc)... We have notes in our Bitbucket source.
currysausage 12y ago
It might be unprofessional in this context, but it did make me smile. The GNU project's political dedication is vital to the OSS world, but quality of code, documentation and usability often do feel like an afterthought. The minimalism of the BSDs, for example, always is a refreshing contrast. (Don't get me wrong, I don't want to flame, I use GNU tools on a daily basis. Just when you know what they mean, the rather unexpected link is pretty funny.)
- fafner 12y ago
  GNU tools are rather well documented and well usable. I really don't understand the claims you are making.
  - currysausage 12y ago
    It starts with this: The full documentation for XY is maintained as a Texinfo manual. If the info and XY programs are properly installed at your site, the command info coreutils 'XY invocation' should give you access to the complete manual. No, I don't want to spend days learning how to use yet another obscure hypertext browser. That's not the Unix way anyway. GNU's Not Unix, and that's fine - but annoying at times.

spitcode 12y ago

http://boycottsystemd.org/ http://boycottsystemd.org/

joelberman 12y ago

I do not want to spend the time to learn new things unless they are directly related to my work. So systemd was a PITA for me, but now I am fine with it (BTW, I have used UNIX since the late 60's so have seen a lot). This project looks great, but I do not have the energy to care, I will just deal with whatever comes with my distro. By the way, pick a better name. I suspect many OSS and home grown projects fail for the simple reason that the name, while clever, makes people either think the project is a joke, or some geeky thing, or unprofessional. Either pick an obvious descriptive name, or be prepared to spend a boatload of money building name recognition.

uselessdguy 12y ago
The name is perfect and I do not see myself changing it. The fact that so many people misunderstand makes it better. The Linux Action Show thought we were calling systemd "useless" and went on a hilarious rant, there's people on LinuxQuestions.org who really insist that it's pronounced "use less dee" (I call it "uselessdee", as in it's of no use, personally).
- brazzy 12y ago
  So basically you're doing all this for the lulz of confusing and pissing off people and don't really want anyone to actually use the software?
  - uselessdguy 12y ago
    Humorous names aren't exactly new to free software.
  - nknighthb 12y ago
    An existing alternative to systemd is called upstart. Three of the most popular VCSs are called git, mercurial, and subversion. A major open-source image manipulation program is known as The GIMP. A popular email client among a certain crowd is mutt. less is more, we snort our networks, and manage our VMs with a vagrant. We compile our mission-critical code with a gnat, use browsers written by organizations named after radioactive lizards and an infant noise, write menu-driven applications with curses, and Uglify our JavaScript. And you're worried about somebody calling their own project "uselessd"?

muyuu 12y ago

Top of /r/linux right now: http://www.reddit.com/r/linux/comments/2k5b7e/the_concern_isnt_that_systemd_itself_isnt/ http://www.reddit.com/r/linux/comments/2k5b7e/the_concern_is... "The concern isn’t that systemd itself isn’t following the UNIX philosophy. What’s troubling is that the systemd team is dragging in other projects or functionality, and aggressively integrating them."

JoshTriplett 12y ago

Because systemd was entirely too consistent across environments, so it needed some inconsistency introduced. The documentation reminds me a lot of Emacs's "ANTINEWS", listing all the functionality you lose by downgrading to the previous version of Emacs. Except in this case, it's actually a "NEWS" file, showing all the functionality you lose by downgrading from systemd to uselessd. > Certain superfluous unit types removed, namely devices, timers, swaps, mounts and automounts. So under uselessd a service or socket file cannot depend on the presence of certain mounts, for instance (RequiresMountsFor=). Nor can a service run maintenance tasks periodically with supervision on the maintenance task, and with all the privilege-dropping, isolation, and security features easily accomplished with a systemd service. (And even if a cron implementation implemented such features, they'd work gratuitously differently from systemd services.) Nor can the availability of a device trigger the reliable, monitored launch of a service with all those same systemd features. > Setup routines for various MAC/ACL systems, including SMACK, IMA and SELinux, are gone. We want to stick to a more clearly defined purpose, one that is agnostic of such elements. Nonetheless, we have retained SELinux access routines in D-Bus APIs and unit options for SMACK attributes in socket unit files to respect existing configurations. So anyone who actually wants to use such security systems is screwed, then. Good thing Linux isn't about choice. > systemd-fsck has been replaced with a service file that starts /sbin/fsck to fsck devices. In essence, this isn’t much different from what systemd-fsck already did, but with the overhead of a middle man executable interfacing with /sbin/fsck cut out. This also means that the systemd-defined sysctl parameters for its fsck are gone, and you should use the old ones (/forcefsck, etc.) instead. So now, in order to force a check of a filesystem on reboot, you must write to that filesystem, potentially doing further damage to it.

uselessdguy 12y ago
ANTINEWS is the best kind of NEWS. And you don't just lose things, come on. Our recent support for running a system instance of systemd/uselessd without taking over init (as early and rudimentary as it still may be) is a good thing. Cross-libc is another. A couple of things from main.c were refactored into independent tools. This is still a giant WIP and it's quite experimental. We make this perfectly clear in the wiki that it's not ready for system integration or daily use, and there's still a long way to go (including some more radical ideas) before we ever think of making a stable release. uselessd is about sticking to processes. Did we not make that clear? If you want a dedicated supervisor, you can use something explicitly designed for such a purpose, like monit or supervisord, instead of using systemd's mixed functionality. Device activation can still be accomplished through (e)udev. We're device node manager-agnostic. We made this clear. No, you're not screwed. I think you completely ignored the fact that we intend on being portable. This is still early, again, but nonetheless we do compile on FreeBSD and Debian GNU/Hurd and some of the tools (like systemd-delta) actually run properly. To be honest, we haven't tested the systemd-fsck unit. We mostly removed the binary due to being something that used libudev and looked like it belonged to a shell script more than anything. You can still force fscks through other means (tune2fs for ext2/3/4, etc.) We'll be sorting this out. It sounds like this project offends your personal ideological sensibilities, as you totally misunderstand its purpose and fail to realize it's a WIP and unstable. By the way, I liked the jab about choice. I wish we all voted for the same political party, too.

muyuu 12y ago

Modded out of the FP. Guess the mods know best heh.