[mdlug] Big brother gives M$ a 10 out of 10

[Steve Litt]

Jonathan Billings said on Thu, 23 May 2024 16:43:57 -0400

>> On May 23, 2024, at 12:25, Steve Litt <slitt at troubleshooters.com>
>> wrote:
>> 
>> LAP said on Wed, 22 May 2024 13:21:55 -0400
>>   
>>> An OS exists for one purpose only: to provide an interface for
>>> software to operate on hardware.  That is all.
>>> 
>>> Microsoft has always vastly exceeded this bound by providing its own
>>> utilities that are tightly fused to the OS.
>>> 
>>> Fortunately, GNU/Linux remains a true OS.  It provides nothing
>>> more than an API for independent software to exploit.  
>> 
>> Except systemd.
>>   
>>> 
>>> However, the encroachment of systemd is beginning to threaten
>>> this OS model.  
>> 
>> Oh, look at that, you had the same thought   
>
>I’m curious, how does systemd threaten that OS model?

Hi Jonathan,

You asked a very specific question. What you didn't ask was "Steve, why
do you think systemd is a piece of junk", so I won't address that.

Systemd threatens the Unix/Linux/BSD OS model by sabotaging the user's
and admin's ability to shape his computer to his needs, and his/her
ability to replace systemd with other software. Systemd does this both
as a technical product and as a political autocracy that spent a lot of
energy to get various distros to use systemd and compile their programs
to require systemd. Don't take my word for it: Listen to the early
writings and Youtubes of Poettering. Maybe if I get an hour sometime
I'll give you examples, but they're easy to find.

Elsewhere in this thread somebody mentioned that "systemd is a
marketing scheme" (I called it a political autocracy, but same thing)
is "not worth addressing". This is perhaps the fallacy of all
fallacies. How about if I say "arguments that Linux has advantages over
Windows" are not worth addressing? "Arguments that the earth is round
are not worth addressing."

Unix/Linux/BSD was meant to enable interchangeable parts. You can use
either Vim or Emacs or both, no harm, no foul, neither contains
halloween code to sabotage the other. In fact, you can easily replace
sysvinit with runit, s6 or OpenRC, or vice versa, or any of these with
any other. But when you try to replace systemd with another init
system, you need to plunge into every conceivable subsystem to undo the
damage. There are those that say "that's because systemd is more than
an init system". My point exactly: The fact that they jammed every
conceivable subsystem into systemd is the best example of systemd
threatening the Unix/Linux/BSD OS model.

By the way, in case it isn't obvious, I'm a *huge* fan of the runit
init system.

SteveT

Steve Litt 

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