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posted by cmn32480 on Monday May 30 2016, @06:44AM   Printer-friendly
from the fed-up-with-the-UNIX-take-over dept.

The spreading of systemd continues, now actively pushed by themselves unto other projects, like tmux:

"With systemd 230 we switched to a default in which user processes started as part of a login session are terminated when the session exists (KillUserProcesses=yes).

[...] Unfortunately this means starting tmux in the usual way is not effective, because it will be killed upon logout."

It seems methods already in use (daemon, nohup) are not good for them, so handling of processes after logout has to change at their request and as how they say. They don't even engange into a discussion about the general issue, but just pop up with the "solution". And what's the "reason" all this started rolling? dbus & GNOME coders can't do a clean logout so it must be handled for them.

Just a "concidence" systemd came to the rescue and every other project like screen or wget will require changes too, or new shims like a nohup will need to be coded just in case you want to use with a non changed program. Users can probably burn all the now obsolete UNIX books. The systemd configuration becomes more like a fake option, as if you don't use it you run into the poorly programmed apps for the time being, and if they ever get fixed, the new policy has been forced into more targets.

Seen at lobsters 1 & 2 where some BSD people look pissed at best. Red Hat, please, just fork and do you own thing, leaving the rest of us in peace. Debian et al, wake up before RH signed RPMs become a hard dependency.


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  • (Score: 1) by pvanhoof on Monday May 30 2016, @09:59PM

    by pvanhoof (4638) on Monday May 30 2016, @09:59PM (#352778) Homepage

    Hello Zz9zZ. I'm a realist autist. That means I investigate. I do dig the manual of the box of legos. I did read Lennart's code. I even understand that it's by far not just Lennart's code. I recognize Lennart's code because I also sniffed PulseAudio's code. I somehow feel what is his. Yes, Lennart's style is there. His style is btw quite good. So I'm glad for the systemd project that Lennart is there. Because he has good taste.

    Few software developers have good taste.

    I actually also recognize Richard's code. The guy who munches hairs and plays with his feet to develop EMacs, and gcc. And yes, a huge amount of GNU tools. I kinda like his code, too. He's making good smells. He has a nice store in our bazaar. I frequently visit his store. But I also frequently visit Lennart's. I prefer Lennart's taste.

    We too have a sense of taste. You can pick us based on our tastes. All of the top guys have a taste.

    Lennart is a top guy. Find his taste. Either enjoy it, or hate it. But take it for its merits. His code is good. Highest quality. His mind is to the point. He's rarely political. Usually technical. I met him a few times, but still I have a great amount of trust in Lennart.

    That's because I know he can be evil.

  • (Score: 2) by Zz9zZ on Monday May 30 2016, @11:22PM

    by Zz9zZ (1348) on Monday May 30 2016, @11:22PM (#352810)

    Yes you have opinions, good for you. If it was left at that, choice between a or b, then I'd be alright with this whole debacle. However, it is not a choice because systemd got rammed down everyone's throats and is working on being a hard dependency if you want to use Linux. Thankfully there are forks, and I can only hope they are enough to keep the ecosystem open so that future software does not have to rely on systemd.

    You need to reevaluate your world view, you have a great amount of trust because you know he can be evil? It is 100% possible to create a technically better system that enables more shady ulterior motives. If you were truly a realist you would consider the possible negative outcomes, but I suspect you are similar to others I have met and will maintain your position until provided with incontrovertible facts. Personally I find it tiresome because it is very similar to debating with a person of faith. Nothing can be said to change the person's mind, or even alter the viewpoint slightly. Sadly, the "realist" perspective is often very narrow because we are imperfect human beings. If you throw out everything that isn't 100% verifiable then you are left with a smaller subset of information. Perhaps this sounds reasonable, but the human brain is quite good at inferring from incomplete data, so the realist approach loses that flexibility in return for the misguided comfort of absolutes.

    Maybe it will all turn out alright, but personally I don't like merging all system tools into one behemoth and I see it as an end run to eventually dominate and control the Linux ecosystem. Time will tell, but I will push back on the architectural decisions I disagree with. If sysd hadn't taken over all distros and then started getting its fingers on functionality way outside the init system's purview; then I would happily let it do its thing without complaint. Or if at the leas it was actually a more modular system where anyone could write replacements and tie back into the api. Ostensibly this was supposed to be how it worked, but that hasn't quite worked out.

    --
    ~Tilting at windmills~
    • (Score: 1, Troll) by pvanhoof on Tuesday May 31 2016, @10:21AM

      by pvanhoof (4638) on Tuesday May 31 2016, @10:21AM (#353005) Homepage

      To change my world view it would help if the debate around systemd wasn't one big ad hominem against Lennart. Just skipping the entries that are 99% about Lennart is or would be a daytime job. I specifically said that about that he can be evil as a sarcasm. But look oh look. The word Lennart falls and everybody is up in arms. As if he's the only developer behind systemd, as if the technical merits aren't what is important.

      Your criticism of systemd becoming a behemoth is what should be debated, yes. But not whether you like or dislike Lennart. However - systemd as a project, might be a sort of in a monorepo (just like most BSDs are developed). But by itself it's quite modularly done: multiple processes, multiple binaries and you can enable and disable compilation and installation of them. That doesn't sound to me like a behemoth or monolithic design. The choice of storing a large set of components and tools in a single repository is indeed something I don't lilke myself.

      I don't think it will last very long like that. I think that eventually the project will split up into multiple smaller ones. But time will tell.

      • (Score: 2) by Scruffy Beard 2 on Tuesday May 31 2016, @07:28PM

        by Scruffy Beard 2 (6030) on Tuesday May 31 2016, @07:28PM (#353181)

        When the same name keeps coming up in software that simply makes your system work better when removed, you start to treat any new code by the person with suspicion.

        I have "fixed" glitchy audio by removing pulseaudio. I have seen IPv6 auto-configuration "just work" without network- manager, but not with.

        I don't think the init part of systemd has actually bitten me in the ass yet; but I do find auto-mounting drives under the permissions of the currently active user annoying.

      • (Score: 2) by Zz9zZ on Tuesday May 31 2016, @09:55PM

        by Zz9zZ (1348) on Tuesday May 31 2016, @09:55PM (#353230)

        Thanks for a good reply :) Being human there will always be some who turn to personal attacks for one reason or another. I've read numerous complaints about Torvalds and Poettering, so its just something that happens when a person gets enough visibility.

        I hope you're right and sysd gets pared down, but I won't hold my breath.

        --
        ~Tilting at windmills~
  • (Score: 4, Informative) by sjames on Tuesday May 31 2016, @06:24PM

    by sjames (2882) on Tuesday May 31 2016, @06:24PM (#353155) Journal
    How about you apply the realist stance to systemd? Linux without systemd was more than good enough to spread like wildfire. It proved to be preferable to Solaris, aix, SCO (back when they had their own codebase). It was more popular than *BSD.

    So where is this hard proof that systemd is better. I have looked it over and found it to be a bad idea. It COULD have been implemented in a way that respected the existing APIs and did not introduce crazy dependencies. But that would mean giving up coercive takeover. Apparently, playing nice with others got the heave ho early on.

    You hate scripts? Look under the rug and you'll find hundreds of 'no really, it's not a script' files for systemd. To top it off, they use the logical equivalent of the 'comefrom' control structure. Yes, comefrom was a CS joke, but systemd uses it for real.

    It seems to me you took systemd on faith and now insist on hard evidence to bend from that position. You've blinded yourself.

    What does systemd ACTUALLY do that hasn't already been done quietly and cooperatively?

    • (Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Wednesday June 01 2016, @01:55PM

      by tangomargarine (667) on Wednesday June 01 2016, @01:55PM (#353463)

      To be fair, try-catches are basically comefroms.

      Of course, if somebody relied on try-catches for large portions of their control flow it would probably give me pause, too.

      --
      "Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
      • (Score: 2) by sjames on Wednesday June 01 2016, @05:21PM

        by sjames (2882) on Wednesday June 01 2016, @05:21PM (#353547) Journal

        Actually, try-catch is more of a conditional goto explicitly declared over a block of code. Comefrom is an unconditional jump in the global scope that is declared nowhere near where the jump will happen.

        Try-catch can be used well or poorly (too often poorly). There is no good case for comefrom. A classic example in BASIC:

        • 10 PRINT "Hello World!"
        • 20 GOTO 10
        • ....
        • 10000 COMEFROM 10
        • 10010 PRINT "Try and figure out how THIS happened, SUCKA!"