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Re: systemd-fsck?



Hi,

Martin Steigerwald:
> Yet: I do think its about high time systemd developers and packagers adopt an 
> attitude of "never break userspace" like the kernel developers do.
> 
I beg to differ. At least in this case.

"su" does a bunch of things that are perfectly appropriate for something
that creates a "new" login. That's its job.

Running a daemon under its own UID is an almost-completely different
problem. We already have a tool which does this (start-stop-daemon),
which has been recommended for this task for umpteen years, and which still
works if there is no .service file – for whatever reason.

Every compiler toolchain upgrade breaks a bunch of packages, sometimes in
subtle ways, and mostly because the code was in some way non-standard.
You don't complain about that, do you? So why is systemd different?

Mind you, I am not defending the handling of this specific bug; certainly
the systemd people's attitude is somewhat … let's call it abrasive …
at times.

But, let's face it: I were a maintainer of a package that's consistently
held to higher standards than any other package, and for no clear reason
(much less a technical one), I'd become abrasive in short order, too.

> Telling "Go away, the bug is elsewhere" is just not an approbiate reaction  
> for developers of a low level system component.

For the record: I do not disagree with this statement.

-- 
-- Matthias Urlichs


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