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Re: DE features dependent on Systemd



On 11/30/2014 at 06:56 AM, Vincent Bernat wrote:

> ❦ 30 novembre 2014 10:10 GMT, Ivan Shmakov <ivan@siamics.net> :
> 
>>> Directly: DEs provide more useful features (especially power
>>> management) with systemd but will work correctly without.
>> 
>> I see nothing in the ‘apcupsd’ changelog [1] (which is about the
>> only package related to power management I have installed on my
>> systems) to suggest it ever having any Systemd integration.
>> 
>> Or does the above concerns the users of “normally battery-powered”
>> devices instead?
> 
> Previously, every DE would need to reimplement power management.
> Now, this is handled by systemd (and hence not by the DE anymore).

If I'm understanding this correctly, it would seem to have the side
effect that, if an upstream DE does drop its own internal
power-management implementation, that DE will no longer provide power
management when not running under systemd.

Conversely, if an upstream DE does not drop its own internal
power-management implementation, the described advantage disappears -
and now the DE has to worry about whether to use its own internal
implementation or rely on the external implementation, at runtime. This
adds code complexity, reduces testing of at least one set of code paths,
and probably results in different behaviors and levels of functionality
between the two implementations.

Thus, having systemd provide power management would at best have no
effect, more likely increase the likelihood of power-management bugs
(and make documenting power-management behavior harder), and at worst
encourage other software to drop support for running without systemd.
The first would indicate wasted effort; the other two would be bad.


Am I understanding the quoted statement incorrectly, or are there any
fundamental flaws in that logic?

-- 
   The Wanderer

The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one
persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all
progress depends on the unreasonable man.         -- George Bernard Shaw

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