[arch-general] Myths and reality about cronie

[Kaiting Chen]

I've compiled a short document describing exactly what cronie is and is not;
and if it were to be the default what would and would not happen to base,
[core], and the rest of Arch. It is my hope that this will clear up some of
the misunderstanding surrounding the current discussion on arch-general.

First of all the cronie in [community-testing] is compiled with
--enable-anacron. It installs not only an /etc/crontab but also an
/etc/anacrontab. Scripts in '/etc/cron.hourly' are run directly by
`/usr/sbin/crond` while scripts in '/etc/cron.daily', '/etc/cron.weekly',
and '/etc/cron.monthly' are run by indirectly by `/usr/sbin/crond` through
`/usr/sbin/anacron`.

Therefore it will accommodate both machines that are run continuously and
machines that are not.

Second cronie will in no way `replaces=('dcron')` but will most likely
`conflicts=('dcron')`. Therefore while it will be impossible to install both
on the same system having cronie in [core] will in no way force existing
users to switch.

Third if cronie is picked up as the default it will enter the 'base' group
while 'dcron' will leave the 'base' group. In the foreseeable future there
will never be a situation in which a package that is not in [core] is in
'base'.

Next it is absolutely not the case that every package in 'base' is critical
to the operation of a machine. For example 'reiserfsprogs' is in 'base' but
unless you have a ReiserFS filesystem then you don't need it. Every package
in 'base' is however installed by default.

Please note that the following point is my opinion and does not in any way
necessarily represent anyone else's point of view: At no point in time in
the near future will 'systemd' become the default on Arch. It may certainly
enter [extra] or [core], but sorry Thomas and falconindy, I just don't see
it becoming the default for a while. Therefore waiting for 'systemd' to
become the new default to replace 'dcron' is a serious mistake as we would
be waiting a very very long time. --Kaiting.

-- 
Kiwis and Limes: http://kaitocracy.blogspot.com/