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Don't panic and keep forking Debian

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Re: Don't panic and keep forking Debian

#91

I've been waiting for this fork. It means I can install a .deb-based distribution again. Here's hoping this is as successful as Libreoffice or X.org has been.

huh? this is the first release to really require systemd. how could you have been waiting for a fork when one wasn't even necessary until a release that isn't even marked stable yet.

Re: Don't panic and keep forking Debian

#92
post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Because non-technical/non-contributing users are nothing but a drain to FOSS projects." except that the size of the userbase drives companies to port their products to the platform.

Sure, there are long term high level strategic interests that could be helped for sure. How convincing is this though? "I would like you to volunteer to work on this project that you don't want and wouldn't use (and therefore probably won't do a great job with). You will be inundated with support requests from unskilled users. I would like you to do this because if a lot of people do it, it might convince a unspecifi…

Big issue here is the issue that open source has with designers. It's really frustrating to try to get a clear vision executed in the "doocracy" of an OSS project, where developers will often implement features to "scratch an itch".

Re: Don't panic and keep forking Debian

#93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, of course. I occasionally learn a new language (or develop one), and I'm regularly using new APIs. However this completely changes everything about managing servers, for no compelling reason. It will create a large amount of hassle for no significant benefit.

No compelling reason? you should probably read the docs a bit more. If you don't have any philosophical concerns with systemd, then you will find a lot to love there.

I just re-read some docs, and I still can't see any compelling reasons. I'm not concerned about booting a few seconds faster (I only reboot my servers once every year at most). Regarding memory footprint: that has never been an issue. Binary logfiles are a disadvantage to me.

Re: Don't panic and keep forking Debian

#94
post #5

The same freedom that leads to all the many, many flavors of linux gives a great diversity of ideas. The downside is it fragments the finite development efforts of the contributors to the point where it becomes difficult to compete with the wider marketplace. I wonder sometimes if it were possible for everyone to contribute to one linux desktop if the situation would be different today. As it stands, after nearly thr…

Some things on Linux were broken from Day 1 like drivers and X because it they were easier. I doubt a coherent team could have fixed these without rewritting which taks too much time. It took MS 6 years to make XP into Vista, I doubt OSS people operate on that kind of timeframe.

Re: Don't panic and keep forking Debian

#96
post #23

Can someone TL;DR the problem with systemd?

systemd replaces a large number of startup and utility programs (specifically: sysvinit, pm-utils, inetd, acpid, syslog, watchdog, cron and atd). It also adds new daemons for logs, logins, locales, hostnames and a few other services. Most of this is a good thing. Faster. Newer code that is easier to maintain. Less reliance on shell scripts favoring declarative config files instead. But change has lots of difficulties…

> systemd replaces a large number of startup and utility programs (specifically: sysvinit, pm-utils, inetd, acpid, syslog, watchdog, cron and atd). It also adds new daemons for logs, logins, locales, hostnames and a few other services.

> But there are other objections from people who think systemd is too big in scope or too controlling or focussed on one technology or another or... some kind of conspiratorial trap or something (http://boycottsystemd.org). I think these arguments are a little hyperbolic since systemd isn't actually a single monolithic system and is really an overarching project to update a lot of major system utilities.

The problems start when those replacement system utilities become (more or less) tightly coupled, so if you want to change one of them (say, I want to use my own DHCP client) then you need to change all of them (and it's increasingly looking like you can't).

Re: Don't panic and keep forking Debian

#97
post #89
post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This. I'm not saying modern Windows is fault free. It may have an inconvenient user interface for some things, it may not always do the thing you want it to etc. but it never fails to boot, everything but Apple hardware runs it flawlessly and it has a massive third-party software selection. For me, though, Ubuntu's user interface is just so much more convenient for programming and the other things I do that I manage…

> but it never fails to boot, Except when it does. I have a friend who got a virus that deleted the Windows bootloader / ntldr from C:, but hes not as technically literate and lives two states away. Nothing can fix it. He does not have the technical wherewithal to remove the drive and recover files, there is no way to rewrite those specific files without reformatting the disk, and if the Windows install CD does not f…

This is way OT, and I'm pretty rusty in Windows land, but there used to be a tool you could run if you booted to a command prompt from a windows install disc that would rewrite ntldr and the boot sector. bootmgr.exe maybe? Something like that. Not all hope is lost!

Re: Don't panic and keep forking Debian

#98
post #23

Can someone TL;DR the problem with systemd?

systemd replaces a large number of startup and utility programs (specifically: sysvinit, pm-utils, inetd, acpid, syslog, watchdog, cron and atd). It also adds new daemons for logs, logins, locales, hostnames and a few other services. Most of this is a good thing. Faster. Newer code that is easier to maintain. Less reliance on shell scripts favoring declarative config files instead. But change has lots of difficulties…

But there are other objections from people who think systemd is too big in scope or too controlling or focussed on one technology or another or... some kind of conspiratorial trap or something (http://boycottsystemd.org). I think these arguments are a little hyperbolic since systemd isn't actually a single monolithic system and is really an overarching project to update a lot of major system utilities.

Well, with roadmaps like this[1], one wonders if some of the criticism is really that hyperbolic or unjustified...

[1] http://0pointer.de/public/gnomeasia2014.pdf

Re: Don't panic and keep forking Debian

#99
post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, there are long term high level strategic interests that could be helped for sure. How convincing is this though? "I would like you to volunteer to work on this project that you don't want and wouldn't use (and therefore probably won't do a great job with). You will be inundated with support requests from unskilled users. I would like you to do this because if a lot of people do it, it might convince a unspecifi…

Big issue here is the issue that open source has with designers. It's really frustrating to try to get a clear vision executed in the "doocracy" of an OSS project, where developers will often implement features to "scratch an itch".

Yeah, it's hard not to see that as something it would be good to get past. Developers deal with that at the architecture level decently enough. Maybe the filling in part is just less fun than it is for software so it's harder to get volunteers? Maybe it's how credit/social capital works in a different community? It is frustrating, those skills make such a difference.

Re: Don't panic and keep forking Debian

#100
post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know exactly what you mean. But we both know these are very different things. For most people, their tablet and phone works absolutely seemlessly, with drivers, apps, downloads etc just working they way they want them to. It just never works that way on the Desktop unfort. I know loads of "average" people who have tried to use MINT/Ubuntu but eventually a big chunk end up reaching for Redmond after they spend too l…

> after they spend too long looking at StackExchange trying to figure something out. Why are they on Stack Exchange? If they are installing a Linux distro on a Windows computer, then of course you will have an unpleasant experience. If you want to use Ubuntu the right way without having to butt heads with anything, you buy a system from zareason / thinkpenguin / system76. You can / will run into the same "searching t…

Cheapest laptop on zareason: $699 Cheapest laptop on thinkpenguin: $599 Cheapest laptop on system76: $799

(unless, of course, I'm missing something)

...I'm running Ubuntu on an ASUS laptop that cost under $400, which worked almost seamlessly, and I installed Mint on my ma's laptop that cost under $400. (That incurred finding a new video driver to avoid running everything in 800x600)

I would love to have a Linux-out-of-the-box experience, but the price has to make sense.

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