I took the mic at a certain conference, Q&A after the speaker made his pitch, shared my concerns about the topic. There were probably 300 people in that session. The speaker was obviously pro where I was con. Most of the audience were supporters, enthusiastic just to hear. No one spoke up for my side. (i.e., to second my statement or raise their own questions or worries) Possibly not one else was on "my side".
I felt alone.
More recently, my colleague Phil said "it's good to be contrarian". That's comforting, if not effective. I'd really like to bring actual change and not merely whine about the badness.My wife would surely appreciate if I were less contrarian in general.
Linux and SystemD
Speaking of whining, there's lots of that over SystemD. Time and again I hear from people who hate it. But it's not going away. The criticisms are legimitate, even if opinion. For example, SystemD assimilating the logging function is gross overreach, but not technically insurmountable. I can say I dislike the fact that logging is rolled into SystemD but can't prove that it doesn't work. So I (and others, I know they're out there) sit here under the rule of Lennart.
Then my friend Russ sent this ...
http://lkml.iu.edu//hypermail/linux/kernel/1408.1/02496.html
I don't know Christopher Barry, but I agree with everything he said. (He said it better than I could have and enumerated more facts than I would have.)
Call it Lennarx
If the kernel started by Linus is Linux, then the system daemon started by Lennart is Lennarx. Why not?
The pro-SystemD crowd would just as soon see the rest of us get over it, shut up, and accept "this is Linux". I've never understood (or never cared about) the benefits. They've never understood (or never cared about) the costs of it, what the rest of us lost. And what did we lose? Simplicity, for one thing. This is not a "who moved my cheese?" story.
For me, there's also the loss of interoperability. (SysV INIT is generally compatible with other Unix systems.) And I was told that one advantage of SystemD is faster boot times.Hasn't happened. Rebooting takes just as long, sometimes longer. But think about it ... faster boot time? WHY do we want to improve something we don't really want to DO so often?
There is Hope
Though we're often accused of tilting at windmills, there is real hope. The majority will no doubt continue with SystemD but the alternatives are out there. Hearing from people like Christopher Barry prove that we're not alone. Most of us also use the BSDs. And that's kinda the point: it's more about Unix and FOSS built for that API.
FOSS runs everywhere. FOSS fans have always had to fight FUD. This latest borg battle has made major inroads. It has assimilated some of our friends. But the remnant remains.
-- R; <><
