systemd: please stop trying to take over the world :)

[Karl Misselt]

On 06/13/2011 02:10 PM, seth vidal wrote:
> On Mon, 2011-06-13 at 22:46 +0200, Denys Vlasenko wrote:
>
>> Slide 14:
>> "systemd is an Init System"
>> "systemd is a Platform"
>>
>> systemd is a platform? Really? What next? systemd is an Aircraft
>> Carrier? More to the point: Lennart can call his program whatever he
>> wants, even Nuclear Submarine. The point is: some people might disagree
>> with having service management tool with Napoleonic aspirations. For
>> one, I do!
>>
>>
>> Slide 50:
>> "Shell is evil"
>> "Move to systemd, daemons, kernel, udev, ..."
>>
>> Again, shell, a tool which endured for 40+ years, is suddenly "evil".
>> I don't think this being the consensus.
>>
>
> I think this is the crux of the argument. It seemed to me one of the
> goals of systemd was to stop having a wide variety of possible
> mechanisms to do similar things. To intentionally remove the ability to
> swap out components. Part of that was to make things faster, part of it
> was to make them "simpler" (for uses of simpler meaning fewer options).
>
> The trick is whether or not you agree with that as a set of goals.
>
> If you do not then systemd is not fun and not for you.
> If you do then you are happy with it.
>
> I think the problem I've heard repeatedly is that a fair number of
> people are surprised how the decisions about those goals were made.
>
> I also think that as it becomes more well known: the lack of flexibility
> in specific places in systemd will be patched out/around.
>
> So, the items you're complaining about will become options or
> configuration items when people with significant-enough clout demand
> they change.
>
....
> -sv
>

Coming out of pure lurk mode - I think Seth's observations here
are true for a many of the things that have gone on in Fedora
recently (at the risk of opening wounds... eg. gnome3).  Your
options are:

1) Complain
2) Get involved in the development to the point where you are one
     of those with enough clout to 'demand change' - or at least do
     1) with some concrete technical observations as devoid as possible
     of vitriol and anger, at which point "Complain" would no longer really
     be the correct term.
3) Quietly move on to something more suited to your needs.

For my part I've chosen 3).  My servers have always run Scientific Linux
and I've migrated my laptop to SL6 rather than F15.  My desktops and
those of my users have been updated to F14, though I'll 'support' F15 for
those who want to pursue that upgrade path.  In the F14 EOL time frame,
I'll re-evaluate F16 wrt whether some of my issues with F15 have been
patched out/around and make a decision as to whether to fully migrate
away from Fedora at that point.

As a pure consumer of the product without the time to get involved with 2),
I don't think it's my place to pursue 1),  nor would it be very 
productive.  If
you choose to pursue 1), I think you'd have more success and have a more
productive hearing if you were to also engage in 2).  To pursue only 1), 
as many
seem to, will only lead to bad blood and a sore head as you continue to 
bang
it into that tree. To emphasize, this is not intended as a complaint or 
a flame
towards those working on Fedora development - just an observation on where
time might be more productively spent for those who have a problem with
certain components/development directions in Fedora.
Returning to lurk mode,
-Karl

-- 
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| Karl A. Misselt                             Office: Steward 254  |
| Steward Observatory                          Phone: 520-626-0196 |
| University of Arizona                          FAX: 520-621-9555 |
| Tucson, AZ 85721-0065                     misselt at as.arizona.edu |
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