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I'm looking at evaluating Devuan for usage as the standard OS choice for a new job I just started. When Debian decided to suck the systemd cock I gave Devuan a good look and hoped it would work out but stuck with Debian so I had a relatively known quantity in production.
Now I'm watching Debian get dumber and dumber and I don't like it. Devuan also now has quite a bit of time under it's belt.
If you are using, have used, or even stopped using Devuan I'd like to hear from you. Any and all comments from love stories to horror stories.
I'd especially like to hear from people who have bent the installer - I'm a pro at pre-seed installs and extending the Debian installer so I'm curious what experiences people have in that space. I've read some reports of difficulties in the installer and that is concerning.
Thank you to any contributors!
(Score: 2) by VLM on Tuesday August 21 2018, @01:42AM (16 children)
There's a long tail of conversion where "most stuff" went freebsd that I run at home and professionally bu there's always that one dang thing that still runs debian-ish.
There's really not much to say; just works. The upgrade from devuan jessie to ascii was ridiculously calm and low key like the best upgrades in the history of Debian were, super smooth no issues.
I can't say much about it. It just works and gets out of the way as an OS should. Its very fast (supposedly systemd makes boots faster; faster than "really Fing fast" doesn't matter; I donno about that or if it matters at all; apparently not in my use cases)
And would that be "any linux problem" like the proverbial winmodems of the old days, or "a debian problem" WRT firmware oddly missing frm linux-firmware-nonfree or somesuch, or a genuine devuan problem?
(Score: 2) by Knowledge Troll on Tuesday August 21 2018, @06:18AM
What I remember, though I didn't keep notes, was someone complaining about a bug in the Devuan installer and behavior deviation from the Debian installer. I don't remember which release it applied to though and it's the only negative thing about it I can recall.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Whoever on Tuesday August 21 2018, @06:31AM (6 children)
Some of us don't care very much about that.
$ uptime
23:28:02 up 175 days, 57 min, 2 users, load average: 1.06, 0.97, 0.94
(Score: 2) by LoRdTAW on Tuesday August 21 2018, @08:12PM (3 children)
I always thought that was one of the worst selling points. Of all the things you want to advertise, boot time should be last thing. Stability, security, ease of use, and simplicity should be priority. Then again, those fly in the face of the monstrosity that is systemd. It's at this point you realize why they loudly advertised fast boot times; you're gonna need them.
Been using Void Linux but I'm not a serious system admin so my experience is desktop use and hobby development.
(Score: 2) by Knowledge Troll on Tuesday August 21 2018, @08:23PM (2 children)
It makes absolutely no sense at all for the case of servers because they take so long to POST. Even if systemd made a difference in boot times, which I did not notice myself, but even if it did, we are talking about gaining seconds of time in a process that takes over 3 minutes. Some servers take 5 minutes or longer to POST if they have a big RAID array.
Talking about shaving time off that was stupid.
Notice too how the boot time of systemd isn't really brought up anymore? That's because it was never a really serious thing, it was just a bunch of hand waving and crap to shove that cock down our throat.
(Score: 2) by Whoever on Wednesday August 22 2018, @03:50AM (1 child)
The time it makes sense is when you are spinning up hundreds or thousands of VMs in a cloud environment.
(Score: 2) by Knowledge Troll on Wednesday August 22 2018, @02:43PM
In the case of thousands of VMs in the cloud, why does saving a few seconds of boot time make a difference? Are they launching serially? Otherwise you can save 6 seconds x 1000 which gives you 6000 CPU seconds saved but still right around only 6 seconds of wall time.
Is a few seconds that important for autoscale?
(Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Thursday August 23 2018, @02:49AM (1 child)
I once read a report where somebody measured it and the systemd boot wasn't faster.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 23 2018, @08:05PM
Leaving aside slow firmware for now (which systemd can't help with), the single most important thing to achieve fast boot times is an SSD.
Once you have that it doesn't really matter what tool you use to run things at bootup.
(Score: 1) by DECbot on Tuesday August 21 2018, @06:33PM (7 children)
I had one issue updating from Jessie to Ascii, but that was due to my unusual (for Jessie) configuration of using ZFS on root--not officially supported. The fix was simple enough: booting to a live image, downloading the ZFS bits, import and mount the zpool, chroot into the freshly mounted zpool, download the missing ZFS bits and kernel headers for the target kernel, then rerun the initramfs-tools, and then update grub. Worked after a reboot. Well, it felt simple as this was the procedure for getting ZFS installed on root in the first place. Which on my Jessie configuration is what I had to do for every kernel update that I forgot to massage before rebooting. But I think that is more of an early adopter ZFS on root issue that a specific Devuan issue. From what I understand, I'd have to do the same thing if I were running Debian Jessie.
I've not had any issues other than what I listed above. Works pretty well for browsing, document editing, and terminals on a Lenovo thinkpad 420s. Minecraft will run, but I run into thermal constraints. The processor ends up thermally throttled even with the fan at full speed. It might run a bit cooler if I recompile all the binaries, but if I'm doing that, I might as well run gentoo.
I also got it to install once on a Linode (Debian Jessie --> Devuan Jessie). Didn't really use the server, so I can only add that it can be done.
cats~$ sudo chown -R us /home/base
(Score: 3, Interesting) by VLM on Tuesday August 21 2018, @08:12PM (6 children)
Yeah ASCII devuan works fine on linode. Very uneventful. Debian ran fine on linode long before the systemd contamination, so its as you'd expect.
To some extent if you're doing all the ZFS stuff may as well run FreeBSD... although you likely have your reasons, etc.
(Score: 1) by DECbot on Wednesday August 22 2018, @01:53AM (5 children)
Before Devuan, I did have FreeBSD installed. It became a pain to maintain and it lacked lots of polish for a laptop. Besides, it was impossible to play Minecraft. Though I did keep FreeBSD on the file/Minecraft server.
cats~$ sudo chown -R us /home/base
(Score: 2) by Knowledge Troll on Wednesday August 22 2018, @05:55PM (4 children)
I rather like FreeBSD and do have machines currently running it. Regarding minecraft: did the linux emulation not work with it?
(Score: 1) by DECbot on Wednesday August 22 2018, @07:30PM (2 children)
Minecraft would work, but it was around 4-10 frames per second. Previously when I had Xubuntu 14.04 on the same laptop, it was around 40 frames per second. Devaun is back to that 40 FPS range. As for finish, Devuan feels more polished than FreeBSD 11 desktop (XFCE) but less finished than Ubuntu 12.04 (XFCE).
cats~$ sudo chown -R us /home/base
(Score: 2) by Knowledge Troll on Wednesday August 22 2018, @08:15PM (1 child)
Thanks for the report, I haven't tried the linux emulation for anything beyond simple command line programs.
(Score: 1) by DECbot on Friday August 24 2018, @02:19AM
Come to think of it, I'm not sure if it used the Linux emulation. Desktop Minecraft is a Java application and I think jre7 was ported to BSD.
cats~$ sudo chown -R us /home/base
(Score: 2) by VLM on Thursday August 23 2018, @12:25PM
Its a java app so in theory openjdk "just works" but in practice, having been there myself, there's strange dependency related issues in how the JVM talks to your 3d hardware etc. Also I don't play Vanilla I only play modded, various FTB packs, or I'll just put in one or two mods for fun, but basically I never play vanilla and that is a whole nother layer of the onion of complexity once you get vanilla minecraft working.
Decbot likely ran into some 3D issue in the driver or java's numerous other dependency-ish stuff that affects gaming.
I might get back into minecraft again; this is all info from some years ago, before the whole Debian/systemd drama. Back then, minecraft and modded minecraft "just worked" on Debian.
The use case of "its just a bootloader for chrome emacs and xterm" is so different than the use case for "mac style GUI desktop-environment" that they may as well be different categories. Linux *BSD and other stuff has been a great bootloader for emacs and a browser on desktops since the 90s, so confusion reigns over discussion of how the animated 3-d dancing paperclip does or does not have working AI or whatever in full scale desktop environments.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 21 2018, @03:16PM
I run devuan embedded and on servers. I am satisfied. I'd say I'm really satisfied, but in reality it's only how Debian used to be. A keeping of the status quo, not an improvement, nor a following of Debian down the path of idiocy.
I don't care about desktop environments, just an system that gets out of the way to let the userland code work. Devuan specific support can be imperfect, I never got a reply to my issue of the format of the packages catalogues. They were different from Debian, but in the end I dumped the proxy I was using which choked on those files.
Debian support seems to have decayed also, but that org is still much bigger. You have to know what you are doing, but we are professionals here.
(Score: 2) by requerdanos on Tuesday August 21 2018, @09:26PM (2 children)
I run Devuan on a script and executable testing server in my (home) office. It had 6 or 8 months of uptime until earlier this month when a truck hit a transformer near here and killed the power long enough to exhaust the batteries in the UPS units (wiping out the uptime of six machines; only a laptop running NetBSD survived throughout). No funky problems; Devuan seems to work just like Debian should.
No operational complaints.
I do object to their recent change in policy. They used to be a fork of Debian (but without forcing you to use systemd) including maintaining commitment to free software, the DFSG.
But Devuan has rejected this also, and includes packages from non-free on all installation media in case it thinks you need non-free firmware during your install. This establishes their priorities as not "free software" but "expediency."
I see why they would do such a thing, but it means that freedom doesn't reign supreme, which is a change from Debians's positions (in addition to just having no systemd).
So, it's something to know before choosing Devuan to make sure you would make the same choices in those areas where you want to deploy Devuan. If that's cool with you, and you are a Debian person, and their existing architectures suit your use cases, then you will probably be happy with Devuan.
(Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Thursday August 23 2018, @02:54AM
Well, they say Devuan is about choice. And you have the choice to use nonfree software if that's your wish.
But they do not support systemd. When asked, they say that systemd is the only significant difference between Devuan and Debian, and it's easy for someone who chooses systemd to just use Debian.
Your choice, not theirs.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Thursday August 23 2018, @12:31PM
For many years (decades) I'd point the compliance people at work to the DFSG and they'd go away as if a magic wand had been waved. At most I'd provide them a puppet (or later, ansible) script proving I only installed stuff from MAIN never from NON-FREE because that was all that was in the *list file /etc/apt/sources.list (remember the days before sources.list.d directory existed?...)
I think I'm still safe under that use case; having to comb thru those LICENSE files must be annoying for media vendors. Of course linux media vending began around '94 (I still have that cd somewhere) and now a days I don't think much install media gets sold.
To some extent if you bought non-free hardware that can only be used with non-free software then you're already screwed before you install Devuan, so its not a major additional loss.
(Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Thursday August 23 2018, @03:01AM (4 children)
I've been using Devuan for several years now, since the ancient alpha 2 release. It's been good to me.
So far I have it on an ancient 32-bit netbook (maybe about eight or ten years old), a even older 64-bit server, and a new Purism laptop.
On the Purism laptop, I found it easier to set up Devuan the way I want it using Devuan's installer than to set up Purism's OS the way I want it.
-- hendrik
(Score: 2) by Knowledge Troll on Thursday August 23 2018, @05:03AM (1 child)
How is the Purism lappy working out? I'm also looking at getting one for work and I'll probably start off with Devuan on it if that's what I choose.
Sounds like Devuan is happy on the lappy - how is the lappy itself?
(Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Tuesday September 04 2018, @12:21AM
I posted another reply in this thread, go read that one too. It has further information.
I am happy with my new machine, though I'd *like* it to have a wired gigahertz ethernet port and I'd *like* the RAM and CPU to be replaceable as a means of future-proofing. The keyboard works for me, although I'd prefer more physical separation between the usual typing keys, the six-key panel of delete/page-up.etc. keys, the arrow keys and the number pad. My hand occasionally drifts to the side and there's no tactile feedback about that.
I can feel when I've pressed a key; I just can't feel when it's the wrong key.
There are a bunch of keys on the top row with F1, F2, etc on them and also a bunch of obscure icons to be used in conjunction with 'Fn' beside the control key. The one for turning the speaker on and off seems to work. I don't now if the others work because I don't know what they do.
The touch pad has a code for tapping with one, two, or three fingers to indicate right-click, left-click, and middle-click. That doesn't work with Devuan out of the box, though there's probably something obscure I have to figure out how to configure to get that to work, though it works *fine* with Purism's own OS. Two-finger scrolling works with Devuan. I prefer to use a physical mouse, perhaps because the right and left clicks work that way.
-- hendrik
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Friday August 24 2018, @08:23PM (1 child)
I was curious about the Purism Laptop, so I checked it out.
"We believe people should have secure devices that protect them rather than exploit them. To that purpose, we provide everything people need in a convenient hardware and software product. We offer high-quality privacy, security, and freedom focused computers and software." -- Quote from their site. (Front Page)
Doesn't mesh with "Core M 5Y10c Core i7 6500U Core i7 6500U" -- The comparison specs on the CPUs in their Laptops.
When I was reading their spiel, I was expecting something interesting hardware wise. In reality, all they have is Linux on a computer.
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 3, Interesting) by hendrikboom on Tuesday September 04 2018, @12:03AM
They do believe that. But intel CPUs aren't what they should have been using. I don't think they had a choice considering what was realisticaly available when they started their design. I waited years for a better alternative but none showed up. Oh yes, there are some patched-together machines with ARM processors, limited memory, unfree graphics hardware, limited performance and not enough ports. Not an improvement on the 32-bit ancient machine I was using as a stopgap.
I'm not sure there are even now adequate SoC's available to make a competitive laptop other than with AMD/Intel compatible monsters. Though there are definitely prospects of having laptops with, say, RISC-V processors within a few years.
But they *have* got a machine that boots with coreboot, has a physical switch to shut off power to the camera and microphone, and has the Intel Management Engine about as disabled as it can be and still boot. Apparently as disabled as it has to be for Intel to sell to the NSA. Though I'm sure neither I nor the NSA are happy with the speculative-execution attacks.
I got one with a minimal hard drive, and 16G or RAM. Hard drive is field-replaceable, and I'll be doing that when prices come down; RAM appears not to be, so I have to get it now. I suspect RAM is the first thing I'll discover I don't have enough of, as browsers get evermore bloated.
The Purism OS made decisions that were contrary to the way I wanted to run my machine. I suspect my threat model is not the same as theirs. Although based on Debian (with, alas, systemd) it did not have enough of the Debian packages available to suit me. It's possible to ask the company for specific packages and influence what they decide to provide.
Devuan instead trusts Debian with just about everything except systemd and just refers package requests to the Debian repositories for anything they have not changed themselves.
-- hendrik
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Saturday August 25 2018, @01:50AM
I've used it for VMs and small servers and am thoroughly pleased with Ascii. As someone upthread mentioned, it's Debian the way it used to be. Which means it's a very BSD-like Linux in many good ways. I am a dedicated systemd hater and my daily drivers are Void or Artix, but neither of those (ESPECIALLY not Artix, holy hell...) are really suitable for production machines.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 31 2018, @07:30AM
I wanted to give dev1 a try so I torrented the netinst and proceeded to expert install. I chose the MATE desktop env but the network and battery applet icons were fucked up, they showed wrong icons. What a strange way for software to fail. The net applet showed the ethernet connected icon when there was no connection and the battery applet showed an exclamation mark icon regardless of whether the machine was plugged in or not... This made me a bit sour with devuan. I might give it another try in a year or two though.
To compare I installed latest debian and did all the same motions installing. Here the applets work just fine. Usually when something goes south I have a theory or two why it happened. Not this time.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 04 2018, @06:36PM (1 child)
I wouldn't recommend Devuan: they don't manage to timely update packages and stuff just ends up uninstallable.
See https://lists.dyne.org/lurker/message/20180904.132310.1a6a03e5.en.html [dyne.org] for an example, but the same happens for security updates of packages that Devuan forked: an update can be delayed by a loooong time until they decide to look at rebasing the trivial patch.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 04 2018, @10:56PM
About not timely updates, back when Debian was Debian (1999), Debian's top quality was not rushing updates. Back then, I interviewed Debian's John Goerzen, who said about upgrades, "it takes as long as it takes". Article about the interview at http://troubleshooters.com/tpromag/199906/_debian.htm. [troubleshooters.com] Frequent releases are not necessarily a good thing.
I can't respond to the claim that stuff is uninstallable, except to say I run it in VMs quite often, and I have no problems.