systemd 245 released

There is also a new database for holding user and group data and a systemd-repart tool for the management of partitions on storage-devices at boot time.

🎆 A new, official systemd release has just 🎉 been 🎊 tagged 🍾. Please download the tarball here:

        https://github.com/systemd/systemd/archive/v245.tar.gz

Changes since the previous release:

        * A new tool "systemd-repart" has been added, that operates as an
          idempotent declarative repartitioner for GPT partition tables.
          Specifically, a set of partitions that must or may exist can be
          configured via drop-in files, and during every boot the partition
          table on disk is compared with these files, creating missing
          partitions or growing existing ones based on configurable relative
          and absolute size constraints. The tool is strictly incremental,
          i.e. does not delete, shrink or move partitions, but only adds and
          grows them. The primary use-case is OS images that ship in minimized
          form, that on first boot are grown to the size of the underlying
          block device or augmented with additional partitions. For example,
          the root partition could be extended to cover the whole disk, or a
          swap or /home partitions could be added on first boot. It can also be
          used for systems that use an A/B update scheme but ship images with
          just the A partition, with B added on first boot. The tool is
          primarily intended to be run in the initrd, shortly before
          transitioning into the host OS, but can also be run after the
          transition took place. It automatically discovers the disk backing
          the root file system, and should hence not require any additional
          configuration besides the partition definition drop-ins. If no
          configuration drop-ins are present, no action is taken.

        * A new component "userdb" has been added, along with a small daemon
          "systemd-userdb.service" and a client tool "userdbctl". The framework
          allows defining rich user and group records in a JSON format,
          extending on the classic "struct passwd" and "struct group"
          structures. Various components in systemd have been updated to
          process records in this format, including systemd-logind and
          pam-systemd. The user records are intended to be extensible, and
          allow setting various resource management, security and runtime
          parameters that shall be applied to processes and sessions of the
          user as they log in. This facility is intended to allow associating
          such metadata directly with user/group records so that they can be
          produced, extended and consumed in unified form. We hope that
          eventually frameworks such as sssd will generate records this way, so
          that for the first time resource management and various other
          per-user settings can be configured in LDAP directories and then
          provided to systemd (specifically to systemd-logind and pam-system)
          to apply on login. For further details see:

          https://systemd.io/USER_RECORD
          https://systemd.io/GROUP_RECORD
          https://systemd.io/USER_GROUP_API

        * A small new service systemd-homed.service has been added, that may be
          used to securely manage home directories with built-in encryption.
          The complete user record data is unified with the home directory,
          thus making home directories naturally migratable. Its primary
          back-end is based on LUKS volumes, but fscrypt, plain directories,
          and other storage schemes are also supported. This solves a couple of
          problems we saw with traditional ways to manage home directories, in
          particular when it comes to encryption. For further discussion of
          this, see the video of Lennart's talk at AllSystemsGo! 2019:

          https://media.ccc.de/v/ASG2019-164-reinventing-home-direc...

          For further details about the format and expectations on home
          directories this new daemon makes, see:

          https://systemd.io/HOME_DIRECTORY

        * systemd-journald is now multi-instantiable. In addition to the main
          instance systemd-journald.service there's now a template unit
          systemd-journald@.service, with each instance defining a new named
          log 'namespace' (whose name is specified via the instance part of the
          unit name). A new unit file setting LogNamespace= has been added,
          taking such a namespace name, that assigns services to the specified
          log namespaces. As each log namespace is serviced by its own
          independent journal daemon, this functionality may be used to improve
          performance and increase isolation of applications, at the price of
          losing global message ordering. Each instance of journald has a
          separate set of configuration files, with possibly different disk
          usage limitations and other settings.

          journalctl now takes a new option --namespace= to show logs from a
          specific log namespace. The sd-journal.h API gained
          sd_journal_open_namespace() for opening the log stream of a specific
          log namespace. systemd-journald also gained the ability to exit on
          idle, which is useful in the context of log namespaces, as this means
          log daemons for log namespaces can be activated automatically on
          demand and will stop automatically when no longer used, minimizing
          resource usage.

        * When systemd-tmpfiles copies a file tree using the 'C' line type it
          will now label every copied file according to the SELinux database.

        * When systemd/PID 1 detects it is used in the initrd it will now boot
          into initrd.target rather than default.target by default. This should
          make it simpler to build initrds with systemd as for many cases the
          only difference between a host OS image and an initrd image now is
          the presence of the /etc/initrd-release file.

        * A new kernel command line option systemd.cpu_affinity= is now
          understood. It's equivalent to the CPUAffinity= option in
          /etc/systemd/system.conf and allows setting the CPU mask for PID 1
          itself and the default for all other processes.

        * When systemd/PID 1 is reloaded (with systemctl daemon-reload or
          equivalent), the SELinux database is now reloaded, ensuring that
          sockets and other file system objects are generated taking the new
          database into account.

        * systemd/PID 1 accepts a new "systemd.show-status=error" setting, and
          "quiet" has been changed to imply that instead of
          "systemd.show-status=auto". In this mode, only messages about errors
          and significant delays in boot are shown on the console.

        * The sd-event.h API gained native support for the new Linux "pidfd"
          concept. This permits watching processes using file descriptors
          instead of PID numbers, which fixes a number of races and makes
          process supervision more robust and efficient. All of systemd's
          components will now use pidfds if the kernel supports it for process
          watching, with the exception of PID 1 itself, unfortunately. We hope
          to move PID 1 to exclusively using pidfds too eventually, but this
          requires some more kernel work first. (Background: PID 1 watches
          processes using waitid() with the P_ALL flag, and that does not play
          together nicely with pidfds yet.)

        * Closely related to this, the sd-event.h API gained two new calls
          sd_event_source_send_child_signal() (for sending a signal to a
          watched process) and sd_event_source_get_child_process_own() (for
          marking a process so that it is killed automatically whenever the
          event source watching it is freed).

        * systemd-networkd gained support for configuring Token Bucket Filter
          (TBF) parameters in its qdisc configuration support. Similarly,
          support for Stochastic Fairness Queuing (SFQ), Controlled-Delay
          Active Queue Management (CoDel), and Fair Queue (FQ) has been added.

        * systemd-networkd gained support for Intermediate Functional Block
          (IFB) network devices.

        * systemd-networkd gained support for configuring multi-path IP routes,
          using the new MultiPathRoute= setting in the [Route] section.

        * systemd-networkd's DHCPv4 client has been updated to support a new
          SendDecline= option. If enabled, duplicate address detection is done
          after a DHCP offer is received from the server. If a conflict is
          detected, the address is declined. The DHCPv4 client also gained
          support for a new RouteMTUBytes= setting that allows to configure the
          MTU size to be used for routes generated from DHCPv4 leases.

        * The PrefixRoute= setting in systemd-networkd's [Address] section of
          .network files has been deprecated, and replaced by AddPrefixRoute=,
          with its sense inverted.

        * The Gateway= setting of [Route] sections of .network files gained
          support for a special new value "_dhcp". If set, the configured
          static route uses the gateway host configured via DHCP.

        * New User= and SuppressPrefixLength= settings have been implemented
          for the [RoutingPolicyRule] section of .network files to configure
          source routing based on UID ranges and prefix length, respectively.

        * sd-bus gained a new API call sd_bus_message_sensitive() that marks a
          D-Bus message object as "sensitive". Those objects are erased from
          memory when they are freed. This concept is intended to be used for
          messages that contain security sensitive data. A new flag
          SD_BUS_VTABLE_SENSITIVE has been introduced as well to mark methods
          in sd-bus vtables, causing any incoming and outgoing messages of
          those methods to be implicitly marked as "sensitive".

        * sd-bus gained a new API call sd_bus_message_dump() for dumping the
          contents of a message (or parts thereof) to standard output for
          debugging purposes.

        * systemd-sysusers gained support for creating users with the primary
          group named differently than the user.

        * systemd-resolved's DNS-over-TLS support gained SNI validation.

        * systemd-growfs (i.e. the x-systemd.growfs mount option in /etc/fstab)
          gained support for growing XFS partitions. Previously it supported
          only ext4 and btrfs partitions.

        * The support for /etc/crypttab gained a new x-initrd.attach option. If
          set, the specified encrypted volume is unlocked already in the
          initrd. This concept corresponds to the x-initrd.mount option in
          /etc/fstab.

        * systemd-cryptsetup gained native support for unlocking encrypted
          volumes utilizing PKCS#11 smartcards, i.e. for example to bind
          encryption of volumes to YubiKeys. This is exposed in the new
          pkcs11-uri= option in /etc/crypttab.

        * The /etc/fstab support in systemd now supports two new mount options
          x-systemd.{required,wanted}-by=, for explicitly configuring the units
          that the specified mount shall be pulled in by, in place of
          the usual local-fs.target/remote-fs.target.

        * The https://systemd.io/ web site has been relaunched, directly
          populated with most of the documentation included in the systemd
          repository. systemd also acquired a new logo, thanks to Tobias
          Bernard.

        * systemd-udevd gained support for managing "alternative" network
          interface names, as supported by new Linux kernels. For the first
          time this permits assigning multiple (and longer!) names to a network
          interface. systemd-udevd will now by default assign the names
          generated via all supported naming schemes to each interface. This
          may be further tweaked with .link files and the AlternativeName= and
          AlternativeNamesPolicy= settings. Other components of systemd have
          been updated to support the new alternative names wherever
          appropriate. For example, systemd-nspawn will now generate
          alternative interface names for the host-facing side of container
          veth links based on the full container name without truncation.

        * systemd-nspawn interface naming logic has been updated in another way
          too: if the main interface name (i.e. as opposed to new-style
          "alternative" names) based on the container name is truncated, a
          simple hashing scheme is used to give different interface names to
          multiple containers whose names all begin with the same prefix. Since
          this changes the primary interface names pointing to containers if
          truncation happens, the old scheme may still be requested by
          selecting an older naming scheme, via the net.naming-scheme= kernel
          command line option.

        * PrivateUsers= in service files now works in services run by the
          systemd --user per-user instance of the service manager.

        * A new per-service sandboxing option ProtectClock= has been added that
          locks down write access to the system clock. It takes away device
          node access to /dev/rtc as well as the system calls that set the
          system clock and the CAP_SYS_TIME and CAP_WAKE_ALARM capabilities.
          Note that this option does not affect access to auxiliary services
          that allow changing the clock, for example access to
          systemd-timedated.

        * The systemd-id128 tool gained a new "show" verb for listing or
          resolving a number of well-known UUIDs/128bit IDs, currently mostly
          GPT partition table types.

        * The Discoverable Partitions Specification has been updated to support
          /var and /var/tmp partition discovery. Support for this has been
          added to systemd-gpt-auto-generator. For details see:

          https://systemd.io/DISCOVERABLE_PARTITIONS

        * "systemctl list-unit-files" has been updated to show a new column
          with the suggested enablement state based on the vendor preset files
          for the respective units.

        * "systemctl" gained a new option "--with-dependencies". If specified
          commands such as "systemctl status" or "systemctl cat" will now show
          all specified units along with all units they depend on.

        * networkctl gained support for showing per-interface logs in its
          "status" output.

        * systemd-networkd-wait-online gained support for specifying the maximum
          operational state to wait for, and to wait for interfaces to
          disappear.

        * The [Match] section of .link and .network files now supports a new
          option PermanentMACAddress= which may be used to check against the
          permanent MAC address of a network device even if a randomized MAC
          address is used.

        * The [TrafficControlQueueingDiscipline] section in .network files has
          been renamed to [NetworkEmulator] with the "NetworkEmulator" prefix
          dropped from the individual setting names.

        * Any .link and .network files that have an empty [Match] section (this
          also includes empty and commented-out files) will now be
          rejected. systemd-udev and systemd-networkd started warning about
          such files in version 243.

        * systemd-logind will now validate access to the operation of changing
          the virtual terminal via a PolicyKit action. By default, only users
          with at least one session on a local VT are granted permission.

        * When systemd sets up PAM sessions that invoked service processes
          shall run in, the pam_setcred() API is now invoked, thus permitting
          PAM modules to set additional credentials for the processes.

        * portablectl attach/detach verbs now accept --now and --enable options
          to combine attachment with enablement and invocation, or detachment
          with stopping and disablement.

        Contributions from: AJ Bagwell, Alin Popa, Andreas Rammhold, Anita
        Zhang, Ansgar Burchardt, Antonio Russo, Arian van Putten, Ashley Davis,
        Balint Reczey, Bart Willems, Bastien Nocera, Benjamin Dahlhoff, Charles
        (Chas) Williams, cheese1, Chris Down, Chris Murphy, Christian Ehrhardt,
        Christian Göttsche, cvoinf, Daan De Meyer, Daniele Medri, Daniel Rusek,
        Daniel Shahaf, Dann Frazier, Dan Streetman, Dariusz Gadomski, David
        Michael, Dimitri John Ledkov, Emmanuel Bourg, Evgeny Vereshchagin,
        ezst036, Felipe Sateler, Filipe Brandenburger, Florian Klink, Franck
        Bui, Fran Dieguez, Frantisek Sumsal, Greg "GothAck" Miell, Guilhem
        Lettron, Guillaume Douézan-Grard, Hans de Goede, HATAYAMA Daisuke, Iain
        Lane, James Buren, Jan Alexander Steffens (heftig), Jérémy Rosen, Jin
        Park, Jun'ichi Nomura, Kai Krakow, Kevin Kuehler, Kevin P. Fleming,
        Lennart Poettering, Leonid Bloch, Leonid Evdokimov, lothrond, Luca
        Boccassi, Lukas K, Lynn Kirby, Mario Limonciello, Mark Deneen, Matthew
        Leeds, Michael Biebl, Michal Koutný, Michal Sekletár, Mike Auty, Mike
        Gilbert, mtron, nabijaczleweli, Naïm Favier, Nate Jones, Norbert Lange,
        Oliver Giles, Paul Davey, Paul Menzel, Peter Hutterer, Piotr Drąg, Rafa
        Couto, Raphael, rhn, Robert Scheck, Rocka, Romain Naour, Ryan Attard,
        Sascha Dewald, Shengjing Zhu, Slava Kardakov, Spencer Michaels, Sylvain
        Plantefeve, Stanislav Angelovič, Susant Sahani, Thomas Haller, Thomas
        Schmitt, Timo Schlüßler, Timo Wilken, Tobias Bernard, Tobias Klauser,
        Tobias Stoeckmann, Topi Miettinen, tsia, WataruMatsuoka, Wieland
        Hoffmann, Wilhelm Schuster, Will Fleming, xduugu, Yong Cong Sin, Yuri
        Chornoivan, Yu Watanabe, Zach Smith, Zbigniew Jędrzejewski-Szmek, Zeyu
        DONG

        – Warsaw, 2020-03-06
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