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from the apparently-sysvinit-on-debian-works-now dept.
https://lwn.net/Articles/786593/
An April Fools joke that went sour seems to be at least the proximate cause for a rather large upheaval in the Devuan community. For much of April 1 (or March 31 depending on time zone), the Devuan web site looked like it had been taken over by attackers, which was worrisome to many, but it was all a prank. The joke was clever, way over the top, unprofessional, or some combination of those, depending on who is describing it, but the incident and the threads on the devuan-dev mailing list have led to rancor, resignations, calls for resignations, and more.
Quick summary:
- Nicosia (a core dev) posted to the mailing list saying Devuan was compromised.
- Nicosia kept up the joke for some time.
- Nicosia admitted it was a prank later.
- Mike Bird suggested legal action against Nicosia and auditing/rebuilding the affected servers.
- Nicosia stepped down on April 11.
- Roio (a core dev) accused CenturionDan (a core dev) of causing Nicosia to step down.
- Reurich (a core dev) commented on the divide between people who want to use Devuan professionally and people who use Devuan for fun.
- Roio objected to Reurich.
- Reurich considered stepping down.
Some facts (?) gathered from the comments:
- Many core devs were unaware of the joke. They thought the compromise was real, as everyone but Nicosia was blocked from logging in to the affected server. They worked to shut down their infrastructure and isolate it from the supposedly compromised machine.
- The Devuan continuous integration server is apparently still down.
Related: Devuan Site Possibly Hacked
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 04 2019, @12:08AM (60 children)
Please get back to a systemd free Linux we desperately need!
(Score: 3, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 04 2019, @12:18AM
And HTTP free. GOPHER IS THE WAY -- GOPHER IS THE FUTURE!
(Score: 5, Informative) by Azuma Hazuki on Saturday May 04 2019, @12:19AM (23 children)
We have those. They are called Slackware, Gentoo, Alpine, and my personal favorites, Void and Artix. Devuan always felt a little "off" to me, and it seems the climate of its maintainers transferred into the finished product itself. This explains rather a lot.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 04 2019, @12:44AM (7 children)
Yeah, you are some super cool bi/transsexual millenial.
(Score: 5, Informative) by Azuma Hazuki on Saturday May 04 2019, @12:55AM (6 children)
Lesbian and cisgender, actually, and only *just* a Millennial by like half a decade. What does any of that matter to you anyway? It's not like you're ever going to have sex. With anyone. At all.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 04 2019, @01:00AM (2 children)
Apparently it matters enough to make it your .sig file.
(Score: 3, Touché) by maxwell demon on Sunday May 05 2019, @07:06AM (1 child)
You created her .sig file? The question was what it matters to you. Quite obviously it matters to her what she is.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 05 2019, @07:12PM
.sig file is created explicitly to show to others. You wear your red MAGA cap at me, and you ask why it should matter to me? Nazis with hitler salute is only for their own audience?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Farkus888 on Saturday May 04 2019, @01:04AM
Haha. That is one way to deal with trolls.
(Score: 0, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 04 2019, @01:20AM (1 child)
Since it refers to the decade, wouldn't being a millennial by half a decade mean you were smack bang in the middle?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 04 2019, @02:37AM
Depending on who you ask, actually. The most commonly accepted rule, according to demographers is 1981-96. Some do 1985-2000, some do 1993-2005, with a generation between millennial and Xers, which are sometimes referred to as Orgeon Trailers). Really, it depends on what particular experiences you consider to be most important in defining each cohort.
(Score: 3, Informative) by bobthecimmerian on Saturday May 04 2019, @12:49AM (1 child)
I can't speak for the others, but in Gentoo there are several supported init systems and systemd is one of them. You may know that already, I was just posting it for the sake of completeness.
There's also GuixSD, which uses GNU Shepherd as its init system.
I don't hate systemd, but choice is nice.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by hendrikboom on Sunday May 05 2019, @11:32AM
Devuan never stopped being available, and was never compromised. Only its website front page was affected by the April Fool prank, which was carried out with technical proficiency by a Devuan developer.
The mention of switching downloads to gopher was part of the joke. The pranker even went so far as to ensure that the gopher links he provided *actually worked* to obtain valid Devuan files.
Devuan still is as much a reliable systemd-free distro as it ever was, and remained so even during the time of the prank.
-- hendrik
(Score: 3, Interesting) by RS3 on Saturday May 04 2019, @01:14AM (7 children)
I'm primarily a SlackWare nerd from very long ago. Tried Gentoo and it's interesting. Love love Alpine. I've tried Debian / Ubuntu / Mint over the years; didn't quite grab me. Been running CentOS on live servers for 12 years and I've gotten used to it, but when CentOS 6.x support ends, so does CentOS in my life (unless someone wants to pay me big $). I've heard of but never tried Void nor Artix. If our Japanese muse likes them, I'm eager to try them, so thank you. (Arrgh, Artix requires X86_64 and Void SSE2. Was hoping to run one on an older but quiet low-power dual P3... Alpine it is, or maybe Gentoo. Everything points to Slackware.)
For anyone who's terribly bored: http://without-systemd.org/wiki/index.php/Linux_distributions_without_systemd [without-systemd.org]
I think really good package management is the most important thing for Linux to be adopted mainstream.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 04 2019, @03:22AM (6 children)
Really? You hate system D so much you won’t migrate to CentOS7? Sounds a Bit childish
(Score: 5, Insightful) by MadTinfoilHatter on Saturday May 04 2019, @05:42AM (4 children)
Given that there are options that comes without SystemD it's a simple - perfecly rational, non-childish - evaluation of the question: "Which option has fewer drawbacks: Upgrading to CentOS 7, and dealing with the problems of SystemD, or migrating to a different distro that doesn't have SystemD?" What your answer will depend a lot on context: What services are you running? What kind of experience do you have with SystemD? et.c. I don't blame the GP for coming up with the answer that a non-systemd distro is the way forward. There is also absolutely nothing childish about that. Claiming that it is sounds a lot like the Poettringisque rethoric of resorting to strawmen arguments, genetic fallacies, ad hominems and just plain "LA LA LA, I CAN'T HEAR YOU!" in defense of the tar baby that is SystemD...
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Saturday May 04 2019, @05:55AM
Oh thank you for an awesome reply. I had already submitted my less calm rational reply. This AC moron has been trolling me for quite a while. I think it's time to start deleting idiocy- clean up this site.
You really nailed everything I would have written if I was in the mood. The moron has NO idea what systems they are, who owns them, what budget is, what runs on them, their purpose, etc., but he's always got to comment authoritatively. I also was going to write that I'm wondering if he's Poettering (sp? don't care) himself.
The main point is: I never wrote that migrating away from CentOS had anything to do with "system D" (as he spells it).
I'd happily explain it but maybe someday when ACs are somehow brought under control.
Thanks again!
(Score: 3, Interesting) by bobthecimmerian on Saturday May 04 2019, @02:51PM (2 children)
I support init choice, but "Upgrading to CentOS 7, and dealing with the problems of SystemD" is absurd. I've worked in places that migrated hundreds of servers from CentOS 6 to CentOS 7 and all of the headaches were around software package changes and file locations (e.g. changes to the alternatives system we had to compensate for in our configuration management tools). The init system switch was transparent.
Don't like systemd? Fine. Don't want to use it? Fine. Problems? Debian derivatives and Red Hat derivatives are still the most popular Linux server distributions by far. systemd might have design choices you disagree with, and I respect that. But labeling it as unstable or difficult to learn is flat out trolling, it is neither.
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Saturday May 04 2019, @04:28PM (1 child)
I did not mod you down, and I only downmod posts that attack someone. Personally I don't think anyone should ever downmod because they disagree, but that's me and maybe someday I'll start a tech blog with my rules.
My reason for replying to you, besides that I completely agree with you and thank you for the informative post, is that I NEVER said my reason for migrating away from CentOS had anything to do with systemd. It's interesting how short-circuit-brain AC somehow made that leap of illogic, then people are responding in kind.
Frankly, systemd has nothing to do with it. It's a tiny company with a tiny budget with limited hardware that simply won't run 7 or 8. I'm just an occasional consultant. I enjoy the work, challenge, and atmosphere. The hardware works well, reliably, ain't broke. There's no Intel management engine or other worrisome hardware. If I push them to buy newer hardware, they'll move everything to godaddy, etc., and cut me out. It's just business. I have much bigger fish to catch. :-)
(Score: 2) by bobthecimmerian on Sunday May 05 2019, @01:57PM
Thanks. My response was aimed at MadTinfoilHatter, not your comment. You didn't say why you would not move to CentOS 7, he (/she/they/whatever) said "problems with systemd" and that was what got my reaction. Good luck with your business.
(Score: 3, Touché) by RS3 on Saturday May 04 2019, @05:45AM
Childish? Look in a mirror lately? You're the nitwit who keeps trolling me and you who needs severe shock therapy and full frontal lobotomy.
You don't know ANYTHING about my situation, but your mighty omniscience forces you to comment, revealing your true short-circuited brain.
Show me where I in any way conveyed that "system D" has ANYTHING to do with not moving to CentOS 7 or 8.
Go away. It's time to delete these moronic AC comments.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 04 2019, @02:05AM (4 children)
It's also called Debian, at least for servers and most desktops. A simple apt-get install sysvinit, reboot, apt-get remove systemd "stuff", and off you go.
Best way to deal with it:
- do a minimal install (you can tasksel later) NOTE: ONLY INSTALL SSH, NOTHING ELSE when tasksel comes up..
- apt-get install sysvinit, reboot, apt-get purge systemd
- add /etc/apt/preferences.d/systemd, with:
# this is the only systemd package that is required, so we up its priority first...
Package: libsystemd0
Pin: release stretch
Pin-Priority: 700
# exclude the rest
Package: systemd
Pin: release *
Pin-Priority: -1
Package: *systemd*
Pin: release *
Pin-Priority: -1
Package: systemd:i386
Pin: release *
Pin-Priority: -1
Package: systemd:amd64
Pin: release *
Pin-Priority: -1
You're done. Now systemd can't accidentally be pulled back in.
I have hundreds of servers, and dozens of desktops. I run sawfish as a WM, use trinity as a panel with its version of konsole, and I'm quite happy.
I had to recompile hplip at one point, but that's the only package I had to 'remove' systemd from.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 04 2019, @03:07AM
I've been a devuan user for I think two years now. A few days ago, I used debian ports to update my Alpha box to debian 10. So interestingly my closest to cutting edge debian box is a 21 year old machine that debian proper dropped a long time ago. I was surprised I wasn't being forced into systemd, although I don't run any gnomy shit.
What is the current state and projected future of systemd free debian?
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Saturday May 04 2019, @04:15PM
Thank you for the detailed instructions. That makes it quite clear why it's better to prefer a distribution that doesn't assume the presence of systemd if you intend to avoid it.
I really like Debian, so I've been considering Devuan. I may give it a shot the next time I need to do a system re-install, but I don't dislike systemd enough that I'd reinstall the system over it. So far.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 3, Informative) by Bot on Saturday May 04 2019, @06:50PM
I dunno, last time I put a server online i started from antix, BTW had to compile virtio into the kernel for the vps to boot, installed Python and postgresql and voila libsystemd pulled in by postgresql. Edited the makefile to not require systemd, recompiled repackaged. It works, which shows how artificial the hard dependency on systemd was, and makes me think that an average user is going to get systemd required a lot of times.
Account abandoned.
(Score: 3, Informative) by hendrikboom on Sunday May 05 2019, @11:42AM
Yes, that's how to install Debian without systemd.
The main differences between this and Devuan is that
(1) Devuan doesn't install systemd by default, so you don't have to get rid of it.
(2) A number of packages that require systemd in Debian have been changed (some might say changed back) so that they don't require systemd in Devuan. If those are what you want, Devuan is onviously preferred.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 04 2019, @12:24AM
Here's a systemd free Linux... https://sourceforge.net/projects/suicide-linux/ [sourceforge.net]
Any incorrect/unknown commands inputted will delete all data on the hard drive (rm -rf /).
(Score: 5, Interesting) by epitaxial on Saturday May 04 2019, @12:53AM (2 children)
Yeah its called Slackware and its still maintained by the original author. He had a lot of financial issues last year with his web store stealing most of his income. I donated a few bucks and you should too. https://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/slackware-14/donating-to-slackware-4175634729/ [linuxquestions.org]
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Bot on Saturday May 04 2019, @09:27AM (1 child)
So:
>a wild systemd appears!
>devuan is created, immediately targeted by trolls (message in mailing list: "why you don't add systemd to your distro")
>mr ian of debian dies in strange circumstances
>mr juan creator of void disappears without trace
>mr slacker gets siphoned off money
I guess gentoo and alpine devs' insurance premiums got higher lately?
Account abandoned.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 05 2019, @03:43PM
>mr slacker gets siphoned off money
To be fair Devuan likely manages to siphon off their own donations. Just look what happened to their bitcoin donations (no longer mentioned in the financial report, but blockchain transactions are public after all).
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 04 2019, @01:10AM (1 child)
That was a very dumb joke. Damaged the credibility of one of the last lights og hope against systemd in linuxland. I have looked at Devuan in the past and kept on walking. For daily drivers I use Mint, primarily, and some Manjaro. Sadly most other distros don't come close to those two! Real-world daily use, not comparing eye-candy, wobbly windows, wallpapers as 'features' and other BS 'review metrics.'
(Score: 1) by Ethanol-fueled on Saturday May 04 2019, @03:08AM
Well, you know those autistic dick-kneading "coder" types have no sense of humor.
I posted the above just to say Mint sucks. Did they ever get GRUB working yet?
(Score: 0, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 04 2019, @01:23AM (14 children)
jesus motherf*cking christ, I'd rather get a Win10 box and let Microsoft rootf*ck both my files and my anal cavity before I'd ever try to figure out what the hell distribution of Linux might possibly be the one I'd want to use.
Although I do admire the sheer stubbornness of anyone who tries to keep the Linux clusterf*ck of distros straight in their minds.
(Score: 1, Troll) by Gaaark on Saturday May 04 2019, @03:12AM (8 children)
So, NOT a nerd/geek, I see. Not a hacker either. Just a person who likes it up the ass, huh!
Good. for. you.
How the hell do you find out what you like unless you try different things? Did you stop at the first girl you met?......wait. Who am I kidding...you don't like girls, huh!
So... Windows and nothing but. Or Apple fan-boi? But not an operating system enthusiast.
Good. for. boring. you.
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 0, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 04 2019, @03:40AM (4 children)
You assume wrong, I'm afraid. I did try Linux almost 20 years ago. I honestly forget which distribution I tried back then, but I put together a cheap box and put Linux on it. Everything back then worked fine... except the modem (yep, days of dialup still where I lived then) would work when logged in as root, but not when logged in as a user. Bad mojo being on internet while logged in as root, so I tried to fix it. Failed. Searched for help. Couldn't find any. Finally logged into a "Linux Help IRC" channel, explained my problem to the folks there, and asked for suggestions. Got mocked and insulted instead. Sold box to coworker for his son to use as cheap Windows gaming box.
Since then, Linux has so many distros no one not obsessed could keep track. Like the Avengers, out of over 14 million possible timelines, only one will ever have a year of the Linux desktop. I don't think it's this particular timeline.
No, I guess I'm not an op enthusiast, although I did enjoy reading "The Design and Implementation of the 4.4 BSD Operating System". I use computers to do things, not for the sake of the computer itself. What's so funny is that Linux could be a contender for hearts and minds of nongeeks if you'd just settle on three versions. You don't even have to get down to one! Three! But you'd rather infight each other than band together. It's sad, really.
(Score: 5, Informative) by Azuma Hazuki on Saturday May 04 2019, @03:52AM (1 child)
With the full awareness that I'm responding to an obvious troll here...
It helps to think of Linux as only really having 6 different kinds or so, maybe even less. Debian/*buntu/other .deb distros, RHEL/CentOS/Fedora/SuSE/other .rpm distros, Arch and other pacman distros, Slackware, Void, Gentoo, and all the odd specialist ones like Alpine. Most everything else builds on the previous, and the majority of them on the .deb or .rpm branches.
If you're not sure which one to use the answer...well, the answer used to be Ubuntu, maybe Mint now, but if you're asking that question, you likely don't want to mess with the more complicated ones.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Saturday May 04 2019, @04:35PM
Reasonable, but I consider *buntu to be significantly different from Debian. Admittedly they are based on Debian, but Mandrake (whatever it's called now) was originally based on Red Hat, too. I'm more comfortable saying that Mint and the *buntus are basically the same, but the last time I tried Mint was, for some reason, extremely slower. I can't defend any guess as to why, but since I often have a bunch of Firefox windows open, it could be some browser interaction.
Really, the package format is less important that other choices. E.g. Red Hat made it impossible to read a disk partition when mounted from another system. I didn't intentionally *ASK* for encryption, but they must have decided that I wanted it. So ever since I've avoided Red Hat. This attitude *has* spilled over onto SUSE, but I'm not sure how validly. Of course, I'm one of those people who for a period of time tried every distribution they could get their hands on. (Well, actually until Red Hat discontinued their Professional Edition, I was a steady user of Red Hat. When they dropped it suddenly and without warning, they also dropped any allegiance I had to them. But they didn't do it also ungracefully, so I also didn't dislike them. [IIRC, at first I switched to Pink Tie Linux, as I still didn't have a fast internet connection.])
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 2) by Nuke on Saturday May 04 2019, @09:00AM
No-one keeps track of all the distros (apart from the guys who run Distrowatch, but that's their job) because you don't need to. Most of them are just different wallpaper. You just pick one and get on with the job.
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Saturday May 04 2019, @10:28AM
I'm not surprised you got put down when asking for help if your cry for help was as well crafted as your initial comment.
I also had problems with a modem in Windows. It would not work at all (the brain-dead system even offered to search and download the modem driver for me--- duh!).
Had to go to ANOTHER machine and download the driver from there and floppy it over to mine.
If you ask for help reasonably, you usually get a reasonable response: THAT is MY experience.
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 04 2019, @05:27AM (1 child)
dude.
queerbashing by using "likes it up the ass" on an inferred male AC?
super fucking lame. Are you the uncle who nobody invites to xmas or new years or thanksgiving, because he's too homophobic and someone's tired of getting bashed?
because, you come across like that uncle who, when the funeral is on a rainy day, has a no-show.
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Saturday May 04 2019, @10:14AM
You'd have to ask AC about your 'queer' problem:
"f*ck both my files and my anal cavity".
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 06 2019, @06:46PM
Meh, feeding a troll (the parent, not you...), and yes the attitude on display shows a lack of creativity or exploration. But just making the minor point that computers/technology/IT is only one corner of geekdom, and there are plenty of non-IT geeks in the universe. Throwing asparagus at other geeks is indeed enough to ask someone to turn in their card.... trying to say legit point while preserving a sphere that not all geeks use (or are interested in) Linux.
(Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 04 2019, @03:12AM
Go back to your coloring books.
(Score: 2) by realDonaldTrump on Saturday May 04 2019, @08:02AM (1 child)
Smart choice. Because Microsoft, very wisely, canceled April Fools Day. As far as, what goes out to the public. And possibly they have their little jokes. That only they know about. They can have their fun. Without having a total & complete FIASCO. Without so many people LOOSING THEIR MINDS!!!!
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Nuke on Saturday May 04 2019, @09:05AM
Microsoft play April Fool on their users every day of the year.
(Score: 3, Funny) by Bot on Saturday May 04 2019, @09:32AM
Jesus motherincarnated Christ, I'd rather get a Dolce e Gabbana suit made out of toilet paper before I'd ever try out to figure out what the hell kind of pants might possibly be the one I'd want to use.
Although I do admire the sheer stubbornness of anyone who tries to keep the men clusterf*ck of clothing items straight in their minds.
Account abandoned.
(Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Sunday May 05 2019, @11:55AM
Truth is, almost any of the popular distros will suit you. You are not a nitpicker. They are all very similar from the naive user's point of view. The biggest differences a naive-user will see is the decorations provided by the default desktop system. And both the decorations and the desktop can be changed easily. I get to choose my desktop every time I log in if I wish. It only takes a few seconds, but mostly I just use the one I've become used to.
Why so many distros? Because lots of programmers want to improve their systems. But the add-ons that are successful tend to be adopted by most of the popular distros so they end up not differing all that much.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by coolgopher on Saturday May 04 2019, @01:30AM (8 children)
It was a dumb joke indeed, and had this Nicosia paid attention to history [linuxtoday.com] he would not have gone there. I heard first-hand from JD, the author of userfriendly.org, just how bad the fall-out from the takedown joke was. Originally there were a whole raft of web comic authors who had plotted to all do it together, but they all(?) thought better of it save poor ol' JD who was left with the weight of the whole thing to shoulder. On the upside, he did find out he had quite the following within Microsoft, and got offers from senior staff there to "come down on their legal person like a ton of bricks", if I recall the phrasing correctly.
At the end of the day it's about trust. It's hard to earn, and easy to squander. April fools is a day where the pranksters frequently find out what fools they are...
(Score: 2) by Arik on Saturday May 04 2019, @01:39AM (6 children)
Let us not forget the historical origin of "April fools."
Where those who stood up for reality, were declared fools.
Those who pretended whatever the Pope wanted them to, oh, they're saints.
Screw your Saints and praise to your Fools. Your Fool's have invented nearly everything worth having. Your Saints have mostly made you miserable.
If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Magic Oddball on Saturday May 04 2019, @02:17AM (5 children)
Do you have a source for that? As far as my searches just showed me, historians aren't sure where April Fools' Day came from, partly because the custom and name for the day varies between countries.
(Score: 5, Funny) by AthanasiusKircher on Saturday May 04 2019, @02:48AM (3 children)
No, this is Arik we're talking about. Mostly smart guy. Sometimes says interesting stuff. I like a significant number of his posts.
But when it comes to claims in posts or sources for information, it's often just his rant -- all hat and no cattle. Or perhaps in his case we might say, "all font and no substance."
(Score: 2) by Arik on Saturday May 04 2019, @04:28AM (2 children)
I'm not here to play the victim but your almost forcing me to the far opposite just to counter your presumption. If I take the time to tell you something, the least you should do is to understand that what I have told you is backed up by what I've seen in my life, and just as valid at that level as whatever you've seen in your life.
If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 04 2019, @08:24AM
> what I have told you is backed up by what I've seen in my life, and just as valid at that level as whatever you've seen in your life.
I mean, none of us here were at the earliest April Fools. And hearsay is hearsay, and our ability and method to judge authority figures varies. So I think it's pretty reasonable to do a quick search and, finding nothing, get back to you with "I can't find corroboration. Were you imagining?"
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 06 2019, @08:04PM
No, since you are the one making claims the burden is on you to prove them if asked. It's pretty much that simple.
(Score: 2) by Arik on Saturday May 04 2019, @04:17AM
I've read a few historians you might have to dig to find. Most or all seem to agree that we all or mostly all started with a new year ~April and a lunar calendar.
In what we today would call temperate, or better, climates.
The actual origin of 'fools' was resistance to the Church.
My advice is to try to respect the church, but never under any circumstances respect the Church.
Satanist conspiracy very much like Scientology, that ratshit.
Tikkum Olam.
If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
(Score: 0, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 04 2019, @02:49AM
Where do adults get the idea from that doing April Fools jokes is something people will enjoy? Shitty American sitcoms?
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Magic Oddball on Saturday May 04 2019, @02:25AM
There already are quite a few; others mentioned some well-known examples, but I've used PCLinuxOS for years as it's one of the more user-friendly options and has a nice large well-varied repository that's almost on par with the major distros.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 04 2019, @02:27AM (3 children)
It stopped being a dumb joke once the dev went and kept up the charade saying that they were actually hacked.
From there, the rest of the team (who were not in on the joke) reacted responsibly -- they treated it like an actual attack because for all they knew, it was. It was April Fools after all, it's a fairly expectable date for some actual crackers having a laugh to go defacing a website.
It was so poorly executed of a joke that it completely wiped whatever credibility they've managed to accrue.
Keeping the rest of the team in the dark was the biggest issue, whether from a project point of view or even just as a "well, how are we going to go about doing our April Fools joke" discussion, which would have probably kept the worst aspects of this (like actually declaring that you were actually compromised) at bay.
(Score: 1) by redneckmother on Saturday May 04 2019, @05:34AM
That's so sad. I was quite "taken" by devuan, after being fsck'd so hard over the years with Fedora's adoption of systemd.
I hope all this sh*t will settle down soon.
I'm enjoying all the convos about non-systemd distros. I was a long time admin (for corporations) of various 'nix flavors, and could never wrap my head around the abandonment of KISS, and the windblows bastardization of distros via systemd.
Okay, contrarians, FLAME ON if you wish. I don't care, I just want my systems to be manageable. Give me a text logfile when sh*t fails. I don't need no f*ckin impediments, as I'm losing my cognitive abilities as I age, anyway.
Mas cerveza por favor.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by rleigh on Saturday May 04 2019, @10:35AM (1 child)
Yes, it was unforgivably stupid. While it's had its detractors, Devuan had been quietly working away building a solid distribution up over many months, and quite a lot of people, including myself, had placed a good deal of trust in their hard work. From all the infrastructure work, to the systemd-free packaging, and their principles and philosophy. Unfortunately, it only takes one immature "prank" to destroy that hard-won trust.
I unsubscribed from the lists a couple of days after the fallout began. I'm really sorry for all the other Devuan people who put in so much time and effort in making it a respectable distribution with its own dedicated following. I might revisit it in time. April fools jokes are lame and immature at the best of times. But this one went too far, and showed a complete lack of sensible judgement on the part of the developer/admin involved. Not only in thinking it was a good idea in the first place, but then not telling the truth afterwards. The trust we place in a distribution is based upon the trust we have in the developers and admins working on it that they will behave sensibly and responsibly with the interests of the distribution and end users first and foremost, and that trust was squandered for a stupid "joke".
(Score: 3, Interesting) by rleigh on Saturday May 04 2019, @12:09PM
I'll just follow up on this with a further point. Over the last three decades, the free/open software movement has gained a lot of traction. It's gone from being trivially dismissed as substandard amateur rubbish, to having real significance and held in high regard globally. In large part, that's due to companies and individuals being able to recognise that software written by individuals or by collective open projects can deliver software which is on a par, or better than, the best which commercial corporate teams could produce. But that is all dependent upon being able to have trust in the projects and developers concerned.
I've been working on free software projects for over two decades at this point. The teams I've worked with have for the most part made a huge effort to act and present themselves as competent, skilled professionals who could do great work and be trusted to behave responsibly. This led to both success in the free software world, as well as adoption by large corporations. One example would be CUPS and Gutenprint. These went from small company open source product and free software printer driver project, respectively, to being the default printing system and drivers on Linux, and laterbought and adopted, respectively, by Apple for use with MacOS X.
Not all free/open projects have this attitude and philosophy, but all the successful ones do for the most part. Technical excellence isn't enough on its own; you also need to act in a responsible and trustworthy manner for the long term as well. You don't see the Python, Perl or PostgreSQL developers doing antics like this. And as a result, these projects are well regarded and well adopted. But if you ever saw any one of these projects do something similarly stupid, you would see rapid abandonment for alternatives. Trust matters, when you want others to be able to depend upon you.
I've recently switched jobs from writing open source C++ libraries to working on a proprietary embedded C application. It's very interesting to see how free/open source stuff is seen from the other side of the fence. While some open source stuff is used, where appropriate and possible, there's also a large degree in trust in commercial proprietary products and relationships which you don't see on the hard-core "free software" side, as well as a skepticism as to the quality of random open source projects (which is not entirely incorrect, there's a lot of rubbish out there).