Just finished reading Hackers: Heroes of the Computer Revolution, and if we could travel back and show the original hackers at MIT things we use in 2020 like systemd, electron etc. I think they would be in complete disbelief over the amount of bloat, and ask us why we stopped caring and started to accept software design like that.
Operating Systems Without Systemd
91–100 of 166 posts
Re: Operating Systems Without Systemd
#92Re: Operating Systems Without Systemd
#93Plug for Void, the community recently added support[0] for the Pinebook Pro, so it's been my daily driver for a few months now. [0] https://github.com/void-linux/void-mklive/issues/105
Thanks! I just reinstalled Manjaro yesterday, but I guess I will be installing Void today!
Re: Operating Systems Without Systemd
#94Maybe I'm just out of the loop but what is the controversy regarding systemd?
Mostly that it WAY more complicated than it needs to be, and it often replaces well written and tested tools with VERY poor implementations. Things like NTP, syslog, DHCPd, cron, iptables, mount, automount, handling /tmp, /dev, DNS, su/sudo, etc. Letting the init system talk to the network before userspace has the ability to setup firewalls gives me the heebie jeebies. Often the implementations of systemd don't handl…
Interesting that you list DNS, because in my experience one of the worst-implemented network protocols in pre-systemd Linux is the DNS client. The systemd implementation isn't perfect either, but it's a lot better.
The design of classic Linux DNS simply assumes that 100% of Linux systems are university lab machines, and that there is a single DNS server that is 100% reliable.
I've heard people making various arguments to support the classic Linux DNS client's failings as if they were features. These have included: that I should "fix" my telco's DNS servers (wtf!?), set up a HA load-balancing solution on premises (in my home!?), use anycast routing (really!?), reinvent the DNS protocol to not require multiple servers (I'll get right on that), or change third-party software to not require DNS (wat?).
When pressed, all of these people eventually boiled their arguments down to: Fine, yes, it's broken, but it's the way it is, that's what the man page says, that's what was established in the 1980s, and systemd is different so we don't like it!
It's mind boggling how conservative Linux people are...
Re: Operating Systems Without Systemd
#95Earlier quoted context omitted.
>It’s about an ever expanding take-over of userspace by a single module, which is not the Unix way. You confuse Systemd the init system with Systemd the project. The Systemd project can be described as "GNU coreutils but for low-level system components". People hear about all the tools that the Systemd project maintains and think that all that functionality is built into the init system, when the reality it's >50 sep…
You know, I had to integrate with `journald` a bit ago and I was prepared for a nightmare after all the ruckus raised about systemd. And you know what? It’s fantastic . The API is generally well-designed (if not without a few sharp corners) and the whole thing is incredibly well thought out. Sure, plain text logs let you use standard UNIX tools. But doing so sucks . God help you if there’s a newline in your logs or i…
Next, have all the settings in some sort of central database.
And in 20 years, Red Hat will have finally finished re-inventing Windows NT on top of the Linux kernel.
Re: Operating Systems Without Systemd
#96At what point is it just systemdOS?
Lennax
Re: Operating Systems Without Systemd
#97Earlier quoted context omitted.
If the issue is a single module take over of userspace then I have good news for you. The systemd project is made up of multiple modules handling differing tasks not all of which you have to use.
Modules which only work with their own other modules and fail to work with other people's modules aren't modules, they're a monolith.
Would you say Postfix is a monolith? Or qmail?
Re: Operating Systems Without Systemd
#98Maybe I'm just out of the loop but what is the controversy regarding systemd?
Mostly that it WAY more complicated than it needs to be, and it often replaces well written and tested tools with VERY poor implementations. Things like NTP, syslog, DHCPd, cron, iptables, mount, automount, handling /tmp, /dev, DNS, su/sudo, etc. Letting the init system talk to the network before userspace has the ability to setup firewalls gives me the heebie jeebies. Often the implementations of systemd don't handl…
> Letting the init system talk to the network
What?
Re: Operating Systems Without Systemd
#99Maybe I'm just out of the loop but what is the controversy regarding systemd?
The issue with systemd is that it is developed in a similar way to traditional UNIX systems like Solaris, BSD etc.: the low-level user-space parts of the OS are developed as a single project with a coherent design vision, common configuration syntax, documentation, etc.
Naturally this is very controversial and people complain that it is against the UNIX philosophy.
Re: Operating Systems Without Systemd
#100Earlier quoted context omitted.
If someone is able to create something that is half as good as systemd then distros will switch time it. The thing is that systemd solves a lot of problems for distros in a good enough way (frankly, currently in a way that is better than any existing alternative) that they are happy to have systemd deal with those issues while they focus on the stuff the distro makers are interested in.
> If someone is able to create something that is half as good as systemd then distros will switch time it. Not a given, since one of the issues with systemd is its integrations. Replacing init now requires you to replace your system logging and session manager, at a minimum, as well as replace all your service files.
systemd-logind is optional and you would be able to use ConsoleKit instead if anybody had maintained it in the last 5 years.
Unlike e.g. upstart in its native mode, systemd can run SysV init scripts.
https://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/233468/how-does-sys...