Re: Draft text on Init Systems GR

[Ian Jackson <ijackson@chiark.greenend.org.uk>]

Brian Gupta writes ("Re: Draft text on Init Systems GR"):
> On Thu, Nov 14, 2019 at 7:51 PM Dmitry Bogatov <KAction@disroot.org> wrote:
>     > Dmitry Bogatov writes ("Draft text on Init Systems GR"):
>     > >     Choice 1: Affirm Init Diversity
...
> Do you think it's ok in any case to remove init scripts. Let's say
> an upstream stops maintaining init scripts, and only ships unit
> files and says, oh all the distros we care about use systemd, so
> we're not going to bother to support init scripts any more. Assuming
> we already have an init script that works fine, can/ should we
> remove it if the upstream no longer supports it? I guess my question
> is what does it mean to say "designed by upstream to work
> exclusively with systemd"? Is that ambiguous, or clear to everyone?
> I think we're going to hit grey areas, where upstreams may only test
> with systemd, but that it can be made to work with any init system.

I agree with this criticism of Dmitry's wording.

Russ writes:
> BTW, if this option passed, I believe the implication would also be
> that all GNOME ecosystem packages can drop all sysvinit support and
> that no maintainers of packages designed upstream to work with
> logind are under any obligation to support elogind. Is that what you
> intend?

This is very a undesirable consequence IMO.

Dmitry, I suggest instead, this change to your original text:

   Being able to run Debian systems with init systems other than
   systemd continues to be value for the project. Package not working
   with pid1 != systemd is RC bug, unless it was designed by upstream
   to work exclusively with systemd
   {+ and no support for running without systemd is available +}.

That means that if upstream drop the init script, or say they do not
care about non-systemd, we in Debian will still ship the init script
(and apply needed patches if they exist).

What do you think ?

Ian.

-- 
Ian Jackson <ijackson@chiark.greenend.org.uk>   These opinions are my own.

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