Which init system for Debian?

Posted Nov 14, 2013 22:04 UTC (Thu) by raven667 (subscriber, #5198)
In reply to: Which init system for Debian? by anselm
Parent article: Which init system for Debian?

> Pigs could fly given sufficient thrust. Nobody claims that systemd invented socket activation. It's just that its implementation is considerably more powerful and flexible than that of inetd/xinetd. So far nobody has deigned to retro-fit systemd's socket activation features into inetd or xinetd, and the way things are going as far as systemd adoption is concerned, doing so may no longer be worth the trouble.

This is becoming a trend, everything that systemd does another program could do as well but while the systemd team is implementing, testing, stabilizing and deploying these and other features other software teams haven't even started talking about design yet which makes it seem unfair when comparing systemd to other init systems because they just don't do all of the things that the Linux kernel can do.

Which init system for Debian?

Posted Nov 14, 2013 22:17 UTC (Thu) by anselm (subscriber, #2796) [Link] (2 responses)

We must compare software systems based on the features that they actually have, not based on the features that they might conceivably have at some point in the future if some unspecified person eventually gets around to designing, implementing, and releasing them.

In that sense systemd is running rings around all the other init systems available today. It may »seem unfair« that systemd is so featureful and cohesive but that is not an accident at all – it is a result of the work that Lennart Poettering, Kay Sievers and their team did over a period of years. In the meantime those who are claiming that »SysV init could so do all of this, too!« have apparently been sitting on their hands. If it is really as easy as you say, then show us the code (and the documentation, examples, …)!

Which init system for Debian?

Posted Nov 14, 2013 22:34 UTC (Thu) by raven667 (subscriber, #5198) [Link] (1 responses)

I think we've either joined a mutual admiration society (where is my membership card?), or more likely I'm a bad communicator, because you are restating the point I thought I made just using different words.

Which init system for Debian?

Posted Nov 14, 2013 23:41 UTC (Thu) by anselm (subscriber, #2796) [Link]

Oh good. I wasn't quite sure :^)