[kwlug-disc] What is all this about systemd?

Fri Jul 18 17:28:03 EDT 2014

On 2014-07-17 21:26, unsolicited wrote:
> But that is the key ... we are dependent upon the distros.
> 

Well.. actually we are not. Or we do not need to be. I remember the time 
when RedHat
decided that you could only get updates of packages if you buy their
distro and not use the community version (before they even split RH and
Fedora). I moved away from RedHat at that moment. With a short stint
using SuSe, I moved to Kubuntu. And since Canonical got more interested 
in
phones than the desktop, I moved on to Crunchbang for the moment.

We are far more dependent on the kernel than the distro. I am far more
concerned that a lot of the dbus functionality with move into the 
kernel, in
order for systemd to work. Well let me rephrase this. I am far more 
concerned
if such functionality will be as default in the kernel.

Technology progresses. I have been using *nix systems for more than 35 
years now.
While I understand your argument about the moving target, I am used to 
it.
Bleeding edge technology will always move on. The real issue ensues when
the choices are gone. I have no problem with Canonical/Ubuntu chasing
the dream of being relevant in the mobile market. However, Jono Bacon 
responded
once to one of my blog articles criticizing Ubuntu for not listening to 
the community,
that the idea of Free Software is to scratch one's itch. Well, that 
means, if
a particular distro does not do that for you anymore, you have choices. 
You can either
try to use you influence there to change directions. Or you can move to 
another
distro that fits you better. Or you can start a community that has the 
same issues you
have and start a new distro (I actually have been a while ago trying 
that out a bit too
with tanglu)

It will become problematic when those choices are taken away. Hopefully, 
that will not
happen, because there are enough people who need a *nix in the 
traditional sense more
than a toaster that does everything, and such a community will be 
sustainable. Due
to the licensing, we have the freedom to try that.

> More particularly, we are dependent upon the most popular distros -
> Debian (Ubuntu), Fedora (CentOS/RHEL), or (Open)SuSe based. It is a
> hard sell to an enterprise outside of those. And even then Fedora and
> SuSe have in essence abandoned apt-get. And aside from Debian, these
> popular distros have corporate underpinnings - and thus vested
> interests in 'their' way, as going concerns.
> 

Fedora and SuSe were always rpm based and not .deb based.

> What they do over and above Linus impacts us as much or more than what
> Linus does. They're going to take his stuff regardless. How they munge
> it beyond that is beyond our control. We do not have enough feet such
> that voting with our feet is meaningful.
> 

One more point. What I am also worried about would be if applications 
become
dependent on dbus and systemd. In the end, I do need certain 
applications
and if they are so tightly bound on such technologies that they do not 
work
without it anymore, it would be as bad, as if they are tightly coupled 
inside
the kernel.

> I can get why the desire to move away from text files - but I don't
> get not building a command line interface as part and parcel of
> developing any given API. And I can get the desire for 'one true way'
> for any given thing. Simplicity, solve the problem, and move on -
> except, no problem is static. (An attitude I find in most service
> people that I have to keep fighting - "No!" don't cinch up that tie
> wrap, inevitably someone will have to follow you with further work and
> leverage what you have done. DON'T make them cut away all your work in
> order to do theirs! Do comment your code, DO make functions that
> return codes!)
> 
> And I can appreciate that 'Linux' is so big a haystack that it is
> problematic integrating your 'good stuff' with everything else, rather
> than just 'solving the problem and moving on'. 'cause integrating with
> everything is an impossible perpetually ongoing task, it's too big for
> any one person to know everything, so one never actually gets closure.
> 
> And probably the single biggest reason for so many abandoned projects.
> 
> 
> On 14-07-17 08:34 PM, Khalid Baheyeldin wrote:
>> Anyone can propose anything, no matter how absurd it is. If the FLOS 
>> (one
>> S) people including Lennart Poettering want to build monolithic 
>> subsystems,
>> that is fine. Let them do their thing. Others like me and you who find 
>> the
>> standard UNIX way better can ignore them and go about their business
>> unaffected.
>> 
>> But when these monolithic systems creep into almost every 
>> distribution,
>> including Debian and Ubuntu, then it is not someone we can ignore, 
>> even if
>> we want to.  It is being shoved down our throats.
>> 
>> Linus Torvalds had to stop accepting patches from the systemd 
>> maintainer,
>> and shout at him, because back in April because of this very 
>> monolithic
>> mindset.
>> 
>> I hope that sanity finds its way eventually, and we don't end up with
>> systemd being the only choice, with many things depending on it ...
>> 
>> 
>> On Thu, Jul 17, 2014 at 8:25 PM, unsolicited <unsolicited at swiz.ca> 
>> wrote:
>> 
>>> That's disturbing.
>>> 
>>> Guess my bubble that *nix is *nix burst with CentOS vs Debian. Got 
>>> worse
>>> with OpenSuSe. I like the phrase in the article ... "It’s a UNIX 
>>> system! I
>>> know this!." Not so much, it turns out. One of the reasons I got so 
>>> very
>>> tired of Windows was the moving target. Stop making me relearn what I
>>> already know, and let me get on with my day. I know how to use the 
>>> hammer,
>>> let me get on with doing something useful with it. Stop handing me a
>>> different hammer.
>>> 
>>> The recent thread here of "Switching Jobs from Debian Shop to RHEL?" 
>>> just
>>> re-demonstrates all of this.
>>> 
>>> The deal breaker for me is su vs sudo. sudo assumes there is more 
>>> than one
>>> admin per machine, and allows the logging / tracking based on that 
>>> userid.
>>> su takes that away, and forces the sharing / common root password 
>>> across
>>> the organization. <sad>
>>> 
>>> Not to start a flamewar here.
>>> 
>>> 
>>> On 14-07-17 05:51 PM, Khalid Baheyeldin wrote:
>>> 
>>>> If you are like me, and watching the creeping up of systemd (e.g. 
>>>> Debian
>>>> voting for it, and Ubuntu following), and dreading it ...
>>>> 
>>>> Here is an article why systemd is a concern, and the FLOS (one S!)
>>>> philosophy behind it ...
>>>> 
>>>> http://pappp.net/?p=969
>>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
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>>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
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> 
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