[arch-general] When will Arch switch to Systemd

[Cody Maloney]

On Wed, Jan 19, 2011 at 6:22 PM, C Anthony Risinger <anthony at extof.me> wrote:
> On Jan 19, 2011 7:13 PM, "Ng Oon-Ee" <ngoonee at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> On Wed, 2011-01-19 at 17:22 -0600, Thomas Dziedzic wrote:
>> > On Wed, Jan 19, 2011 at 5:06 PM, Laurent Carlier <lordheavym at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>> > > Le mercredi 19 janvier 2011 16:02:52, C Anthony Risinger a écrit :
>> > >> On Wed, Jan 19, 2011 at 3:59 PM, C Anthony Risinger <anthony at extof.me
>>
>> > > wrote:
>> > >> > Any ideas when will Arch switch to systemd based booting system ?
>> > >>
>> > >> oh, and the last couple pages in the forum sound promising in regards
>> > >> to arch specific unit files, though i'd have to look closer as i
>> > >> haven't had a chance to try systemd myself for some time.
>> > >>
>> > >> any comments from someone out there currently using systemd and the
>> > >> arch unit files from AUR?
>> > >>
>> > >> C Anthony
>> > >
>> > > Let me resume:
>> > >
>> > > Currently there is no plan and no date.
>> > >
>> > > ++
>> > >
>> > >
>> >
>> > I'm not convinced systemd is better than the current initscripts in
>> > its current state. I've seen problems from people using systemd in the
>> > forums and in other sources. You should work on improving systemd on
>> > arch and getting everything documented if you really do like it.
>>
>> +1
>>
>> I've been observing the systemd thread, seems really interesting
>> (conceptually and practically). Will have to try it someday, when I've
>> graduated and the cost of an unbootable system becomes less heavy =)
>>
>
> I will likely put time into this when possible, but that's not very soon; I
> have another Arch related project with btrfs that I've delayed too long.  As
> for being better... I think the links provided to Lennart's blog explain
> that fairly well.  200 line bash scripts become 15 line service files.
>
> I was hoping to hear from someone currently using/trying the systemd related
> AUR packages, because some of the posts in the forum are very positive, and
> allude to good Arch specific support/experiences.
>
> ... so, anyone out there to support or refute this observation (with actual
> experience ...)
>
> C Anthony [mobile]
>

Better is a matter of opinion. From what I've gathered about systemd
it makes a lot of things a lot better/simpler/cleaner, and seems to be
fairly sensibly put together. However, I have a number of issues with
D-Bus (and HAL, although that has died already), and like being able
to avoid it on my server machines (Many Window Managers (WM) require
it, such as xfce and gnome, now so I'm stuck with it on my desktops
for the time being). Systemd definitely gets a lot right, and I do use
it some on my desktops which already have a strong dependency on
D-Bus.  I could see possibly trying to build a non-bash/sysv init
system for Arch to provide much of what systemd provides, but I don't
like bringing in D-Bus as a core system dependency to do so. I like
KISS, and D-Bus (at least in its current state), just doesn't fit into
my interpretation of KISS on any machine. I'm for making things
simpler, and don't mind replacing classic software, but D-Bus has
directly reduced both the predictability and stability of my machines,
two of the core things that makes Linux a nice environment for me to
work in. Maybe once applications all figure out how to interact with
each other more cleanly over D-Bus, then things will improve, but for
the time being, it has caused me nothing but problems.

Cody Maloney