Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Arch Linux to migrate to Systemd

mailman.archlinux.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

41–50 of 129 posts

Re: Arch Linux to migrate to Systemd

#41

Post by leif »

dredmorbius wrote: post #11

Systemd takes a reliable, known, thoroughly debugged process (init, or various of its tweaks, including Ubuntu's upstart and Debian's insserv ), and converts booting from a deterministic, predictable process to one that's inherently unpredictable . And the stated objective? "To reduce boot times". The best way to reduce boot times is to not boot . The reason I reboot systems is to return them to a known good state (o…

Shell scripts are awful for boot. They have no expression of a dependency graph and truly pathetic notions of state. Hell, starting a process in the background takes ACTUAL THOUGHT in a shell script. How insane is that? systemd may not be as thoroughly tested but at least it's designed thoughtfully and will eventually be more reliable. For now, let it be relegated to arch and let them test it. What are you even doing with arch on a server anyway?

Re: Arch Linux to migrate to Systemd

#42

Post by rogerbinns »

thaumaturgy wrote: post #29
FooBarWidget wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sorry, but shell scripts suck as a language for booting the system. You need to fork() and exec() for almost anything non-trivial, wasting precious CPU cycles in the progress. It looks like every Linux distro has its own way to manage boot scripts. And when they fail, you have no idea what happened. More importantly, init only handles starting and stopping of services. They don't manage services, like restarting…

I'm a daily laptop linux user, specifically Chakra Linux, http://chakra-linux.org/ . My wish list goes something like this: better wireless drivers, improved sleep/suspend/hibernate/resume, better power management, a better package manager, more up-to-date applications ... At the very, very bottom of that list -- the very last item, so far at the bottom of the list that it's in danger of falling off entirely -- is "f…

Note that a better way of saying things is that systemd deals with state changes a lot better. Booting is one big state change, but when you have a laptop you go through a heck of a lot of other state changes (suspend, hibernate, resume), docking, connectivity changes (eg wifi coming and going), storage added and removed etc. You may let other people use your system (more state changes).

systemd can also ensure that only services you use actually use get started. For example printing is done as a server on Linux (cups) so systemd can ensure it doesn't start until you need it. This reduces power consumption.

Because of the way systemd manages services it can also do a better job of isolating them and dealing with unexpected issues. For example if the print server crashes, or someone attacks it while in Starbucks you'll be better off. (Its chrooting is easier to use, as well as the way things are put into control groups.)

All the things you list require developer time and attention. If systemd lets developers spend less time on startup scripts, then they will have more time to devote to the things on your list. (If you've ever had to write startup scripts you'll know how long it takes to develop and debug them.)

Re: Arch Linux to migrate to Systemd

#43

Post by caf »

antihero wrote: post #23
dredmorbius wrote: post #11

Systemd takes a reliable, known, thoroughly debugged process (init, or various of its tweaks, including Ubuntu's upstart and Debian's insserv ), and converts booting from a deterministic, predictable process to one that's inherently unpredictable . And the stated objective? "To reduce boot times". The best way to reduce boot times is to not boot . The reason I reboot systems is to return them to a known good state (o…

Except in practise, systemd works fantastically and you're all worried about nothing. Systemd also does much more than that and handles stuff like daemonization and socket creation, so that these things don't need to be re-implemented in every program that requires them. Bash scripts are overly verbose, repetitive, and awkward in comparison to unit files. And you can always use sysvinit if you still aren't convinced,…

...except that those things do still need to be re-implemented in every program that requires them, since most POSIXy programs are portable to more than just systems using systemd.

Re: Arch Linux to migrate to Systemd

#44

Post by _sh »

jacques_chester wrote: post #31

There's a whole bunch of tools groping awkardly in a single direction here: 1. Give a graph to the computer 2. The computer makes the graph a reality http://chester.id.au/2012/06/27/a-not-sobrief-aside-on-reign... Puppet, Chef, Cfengine come at it from an on-disk direction. Upstart, SMF, systemd, launchd come at it from a runtime direction. They're still talking past each other. And it's annoying. What I would really…

  There's a whole bunch of tools groping awkardly in a single direction here:
    1. Give a graph to the computer
    2. The computer makes the graph a reality
The good ol' fashioned make tool does exactly this and, in the spirit of Unix, pretty much nothing else.

The problem is in determining whether the dependencies of a node in the graph are satisfied. Make does this by comparing file times. All the other 'graph resolving systems' you mentioned do something different. Obviously the solution is to abstract the dependency test from the graph itself. Then all these systems become pretty much the same.

Re: Arch Linux to migrate to Systemd

#45

Post by [deleted] »

_sh wrote: post #44
jacques_chester wrote: post #31

There's a whole bunch of tools groping awkardly in a single direction here: 1. Give a graph to the computer 2. The computer makes the graph a reality http://chester.id.au/2012/06/27/a-not-sobrief-aside-on-reign... Puppet, Chef, Cfengine come at it from an on-disk direction. Upstart, SMF, systemd, launchd come at it from a runtime direction. They're still talking past each other. And it's annoying. What I would really…

There's a whole bunch of tools groping awkardly in a single direction here: 1. Give a graph to the computer 2. The computer makes the graph a reality The good ol' fashioned make tool does exactly this and, in the spirit of Unix, pretty much nothing else. The problem is in determining whether the dependencies of a node in the graph are satisfied. Make does this by comparing file times. All the other 'graph resolving s…

[deleted]

Re: Arch Linux to migrate to Systemd

#46

Post by gbraad »

vhf wrote: post #6
tungstentim wrote: post #2

The link is to a proposal, rather than an announcement, but the replies seem very positive, which bodes well.

A proposal followed by a discussion without any opposition to the proposal, and then a decision. Announcement will surely be made shortly :)

Which resulted in a discussion on a different thread? http://mailman.archlinux.org/pipermail/arch-dev-public/2012-...

Re: Arch Linux to migrate to Systemd

#47

Post by jacques_chester »

_sh wrote: post #44
jacques_chester wrote: post #31

There's a whole bunch of tools groping awkardly in a single direction here: 1. Give a graph to the computer 2. The computer makes the graph a reality http://chester.id.au/2012/06/27/a-not-sobrief-aside-on-reign... Puppet, Chef, Cfengine come at it from an on-disk direction. Upstart, SMF, systemd, launchd come at it from a runtime direction. They're still talking past each other. And it's annoying. What I would really…

There's a whole bunch of tools groping awkardly in a single direction here: 1. Give a graph to the computer 2. The computer makes the graph a reality The good ol' fashioned make tool does exactly this and, in the spirit of Unix, pretty much nothing else. The problem is in determining whether the dependencies of a node in the graph are satisfied. Make does this by comparing file times. All the other 'graph resolving s…

> The good ol' fashioned make tool does exactly this and, in the spirit of Unix, pretty much nothing else.

Make still requires a manual step. I'm thinking of systems that do this themselves. Active control systems, constantly comparing the state of the world to the reference graph.

I don't want the unix tradition. The unix tradition is a pain in the rear end to actually administer. I want a single management framework with a single DSL that does it all.

Re: Arch Linux to migrate to Systemd

#48

Post by dredmorbius »

hollerith wrote: post #38
dredmorbius wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How often do you reboot your systems? What is giving rise to the need to reboot them when you do?

My computer changes location at least twice a week as I commute between my place and my girlfriend's place. A Mac mini serves my needs very well because (including AC adapter) it weighs only 2.7 pounds, and I really appreciate having more ports than most laptops have and not having to pay for and carry around a bad keyboard and a laptop display. (I consider all laptop keyboards bad keyboards, and -- maybe because I a…

Well ... you're not running Linux, so systemd is moot (you've got launchd instead, which has certain similarities).

I'm a fan of small form-factor systems, though I suspect we'll start seeing these as G3 tablets (where the iPad was G1, and the current Android-and-others are G2). Which is to say, devices with integrated display and battery, to which other peripherals may be attached (physically or wirelessly, say, by Bluetooth). That said, we're not there yet.

And yes, small form-factor PCs (CPU, no battery, no display) are pretty slick. I'm something of a fan of the FitPC offerings: http://www.fit-pc.com/web/purchase/order-direct-fit-pc3/ (Googling "small form factor" will show you numerous other vendors).

I used a similar configuration under Linux for a time, and as of mid 2000s, found suspend-to-disk worked pretty reliably, though not perfectly. In the past 4-5 years on laptops and desktops, I've had very few problems, mostly traceable to display drivers.

Re: Arch Linux to migrate to Systemd

#49

Post by hollerith »

dredmorbius wrote: post #48
hollerith wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My computer changes location at least twice a week as I commute between my place and my girlfriend's place. A Mac mini serves my needs very well because (including AC adapter) it weighs only 2.7 pounds, and I really appreciate having more ports than most laptops have and not having to pay for and carry around a bad keyboard and a laptop display. (I consider all laptop keyboards bad keyboards, and -- maybe because I a…

Well ... you're not running Linux, so systemd is moot (you've got launchd instead, which has certain similarities). I'm a fan of small form-factor systems, though I suspect we'll start seeing these as G3 tablets (where the iPad was G1, and the current Android-and-others are G2). Which is to say, devices with integrated display and battery, to which other peripherals may be attached (physically or wirelessly, say, by…

>In the past 4-5 years on laptops and desktops, I've had very few problems [with suspend-to-disk], mostly traceable to display drivers.

Thanks.

Re: Arch Linux to migrate to Systemd

#50

Post by jwcacces »

thaumaturgy wrote: post #29
FooBarWidget wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sorry, but shell scripts suck as a language for booting the system. You need to fork() and exec() for almost anything non-trivial, wasting precious CPU cycles in the progress. It looks like every Linux distro has its own way to manage boot scripts. And when they fail, you have no idea what happened. More importantly, init only handles starting and stopping of services. They don't manage services, like restarting…

I'm a daily laptop linux user, specifically Chakra Linux, http://chakra-linux.org/ . My wish list goes something like this: better wireless drivers, improved sleep/suspend/hibernate/resume, better power management, a better package manager, more up-to-date applications ... At the very, very bottom of that list -- the very last item, so far at the bottom of the list that it's in danger of falling off entirely -- is "f…

I'm a daily laptop linux user, and like you I know how to go a long time between reboots, so I can wait for my computer to start up.

But forget about us, we're already converts, we don't matter. My grandfather (93 years old) is also a daily laptop linux user. When he presses that power button, that laptop better be booted and ready /yesterday/. And when he pushes it again, it better be off before he closes the lid. Slow startup and shutdown times are simply not an acceptable user experience; they are literally the difference between enjoying and wanting to use the computer, and not wanting to bother with it.

And don't think for a minute he's going to learn about suspend, hibernate, power savings, battery life, or whatever. It's just not going to happen. His laptop lives in the closet, so it's going to be off (either by his doing, or the battery running out). When he sees something on tv and wants to read about it, he takes the laptop out, plugs it in, and turns it on. If it's not ready for him when he's ready for it (i.e. now) then he just won't use it.

However, since I've got that sucker booting from power button to firefox home page load complete in under 7 seconds, he uses it all the time. And it's amazing how it enriches his life. You simply can't get computer use to penetrate into lives like his without fast booting and an easy user experience.

Post reply on HN