Guys,
I really do NOT want to start a flame war, I know that you guys are tired about this "init" subject appearing over and over... But, my turn... :-P
First things first: Why I'm with Debian / Ubuntu?
A.: Because I like the work of Debian Maintainers (you guys and gals, sirs and madams), about how Debian compiles and packages every single piece of open source software out there (i.e., its `configure ; make ; make install` from `debian/rules`, I love it).
I really don't care that much about what init system I have (I'm using upstart and sysvinit these days, never used systemd - it IS too unstable (I tried it without success, lots of bugs popped everywhere when with systemd), invasive and dangerous to our comunity project (a.k.a. Debian))...
But please, guys, DO NOT LOSE "DEBIAN COMPILATION"!!
I mean, when I read that infamous guy, Poettering, talking about things like this:
It creeps the hell outta me! Specially this:
"...This greatly simplifies application installation, as there's no dependency hell..." - Poettring.
So, this guy uses a RPM-based distro, called RedHat/CentOS/Fedora, right?! I feel sorry for him... Poor guy...
Only that crap-distro(s) have a "dependency hell", not our shiny Debian. I don't know what that guy is talking about, honestly (well, no, I know - rpm+yum sucks). =P
Anyway, I see that there is room for improvements on software installing and updating (binary diffs, cow and etc?) but, wait, systemd instead of dpkg/apt?! I thought this thing was supposed to replace ONLY the init system, nothing more, neither udev (already engulfed)...
So, is systemd even trying to replace dpkg+apt too? Come guys... For real?!
Please, do not let this to happen here! Do not lose "Debian Compilation", and packaging, do not lose "[dpkg / apt] / debian/rules", for systemd!
Also, do not lose `dpkg-buildpackage` for "systemd-buildpackage"!!
This systemd thing has already gone too far. Keep systemd at its bare minimum level... Do not let it take over the whole distro.
Honestly, I don't fear systemd itself, or binary logs... I fear things like this:
Linux Kernel Developers Fed Up With Ridiculous Bugs In Systemd:
Linux systemd dev says open source is 'SICK', kernel community 'awful':
So, lets move on over this systemd thing, keep it at its bare minimum level...
I'm fine with a new init system, our current state of technology allows us to do that, something like systemd (I like its ideas, but don't like its "Mr. Knowitall" implementation, it looks really ugly and bloated), nevertheless, I'll try it later, maybe on 2016~2020, if it proves itself really stable (i.e., a nonissue in the near future) AND upstream developers change their attitude / behavior on bug handling, etc...
Please guys, don't take me wrong (no flame wars okay?!)... I'm just concerned about the preservation of our amazing Linux/kFreeBSD distro! Keeping `sysvinit-core` in Debian 8 (9, 10...) at a reliable level is a wise thing to do. Just in case... (I don't trust RedHat neither the Corporatocracy).
So! Let the men write their own init scripts powered by `sysvinit-core` for a long time ahead! Don't throw this away! Also, keep kfreebsd flavor for how long as possible (without systemd things, of course)! On Linux, it is fine to have systemd installed and around (like systemd-udev, logind0 and etc) but, sysvinit is important (even upstart is), do not lose it...
BTW, during Debian 8 installation, please, provide a (d-i, tasksel, alternatives, whatever) interface for selecting the initsystem, this is important! I know that it seems pretty easy to just run "apt-get install sysvinit-core" (or preseed it) (to get rid of systemd as init) after the installation but, if that [initsystem selection] option appear (during the installation), this will make Debian even stronger, as the only distro that provides, at least, two (sysvinit|systemd) reliable init systems. How cool is that?!
Also, without an interface for selecting an init system on Jessie, the popularity contest becomes unfair.
Honestly, I would like to wake up from this systemd nightmare.
I'm seeing that there is demand for a brand new Linux distribution, that will sit right in the middle of Debian and Slackware... Something like a Debian fork without DBus, systemd and PAM, but still with dpkg/apt "d-i" and lots of packages. Lets do it?! Lets fork Debian and remove systemd, dbus and pam out from it?! The fork `uselessd` (or a new udev) becomes more and more a necessity.
Just for the record, today is the first day that I tested systemd, then, systemd-journal consumed 100% of my CPU (plus rsyslog), something related to GPM and, "ecryptfs" does not umount my home dir anymore, after logout... Is it a systemd problem? How can I know? It is very hard to locate the bugs with systemd sitting in the middle of everything... I'm sure (more feelings than anything else, I know) that systemd is the wrong path to follow. For the sake of safety, we need `sysvinit-core` (and upstart) for at least, ~2020.
We need to keep `sysvinit-core` in Debian, no matter what, even with systemd around (as systemd-udev|logind)!
Cheers!
Thiago