Mastodawn

nixCraft 🐧1d ago

systemd lost the plot a long time ago. they stopped following the Unix philosophy and now they're busy adding nonsense like age verification. Just like Firefox, systemd doesn't understand its core user base. There are plenty of distros without systemd

@nixCraft It really has been taking a very wrong direction for quite some time. Lots of bloat and unnecessary components, poor standards, etc etc.

Apparently OpenRC is a really good alternative, but it comes at the catch that a lot of stuff is built to call systemd a dependency and will claim it can't work without it. *Sigh* Hopefully all this will result in a general switch away from that hot mess and proper support from everything for, well, anything else...

bazkie 👩🏼‍💻 bitplanes 🎵

@nazokiyoubinbou @nixCraft blegh! this type of dependency on something that should be totally independent is a sign of structural failure, i suppose..

i've been a debian fanby for the longest time but maybe it's time to look into other distros. can anyone recommend me which are the most "mainstream"/well-maintained non-systemd distros?

@bazkie @nixCraft

blegh! this type of dependency on something that should be totally independent is a sign of structural failure, i suppose..

Exactly this.

Systemd has completely lost sight of its entire purpose. It should be simple, minimal, and just get the job done. It sure shouldn't become... this...

(And I too am a Debian person. I kind of don't really want to switch right now though.)

Snosrapkungfu (They/them)1d ago

@nazokiyoubinbou @bazkie @nixCraft i wonder if whatever junk theyre putting into systemd would be cut short by running the debian to ageless conversion script? i'd hope so #agelesslinux https://agelesslinux.org/

Ageless Linux — Software for Humans of Indeterminate Age

bazkie 👩🏼‍💻 bitplanes 🎵1d ago

@snosrapkungfu that's interesting! gonna give that a read later tnx

nieuemma 22h ago

@snosrapkungfu @nazokiyoubinbou @bazkie @nixCraft I don't believe that script does anything but change the OS name.

@nieuemma @snosrapkungfu @bazkie @nixCraft Most of it does seem to be just about making a point and I can't read all of it, but I do see a few lines that are supposed to actually modify the user's birth date to 1970-01-01 or blank depending on which mode one uses. (Assuming that /etc/userdb/username is correct anyway.) And for some reason it can set a script that says it does it again once a day every day. I'm not too sure it's a good idea to mess with the release name and such necessarily though. I think this one is just about making the point more than anything and should only be used by people who don't mind their system (pretty much completely literally) saying "I'm breaking a law on purpose" specifically to make a point.

nieuemma 9h ago

@nazokiyoubinbou @snosrapkungfu @bazkie @nixCraft Awesome info, thank you. I read their webpage like a week ago and it didn't seem like it changed a lot.

@nieuemma @snosrapkungfu @bazkie @nixCraft From what little I can tell it doesn't change a lot. It sets the userdb birthdate and keeps changing it and it sets the ID to its name as you said. It also throws in an arbitrary script that just simply says something to the effect of "error, unable to determine age" or whatever in a folder of its own that nothing would ever call. 😆

Basically every single part of it is more just for show than anything else. The one and only thing it does seriously I'm pretty sure people can manually do if this script can do it — without the potential breakage of the system identifying itself differently.

They also plan to do a "flatpak store for children" with stuff like an app that prints the text "peepee" really big. Like I said, it's all for show...

John Smith 13h ago

@snosrapkungfu @nazokiyoubinbou @bazkie @nixCraft

https://agelesslinux.org/distros.html

It also comes with a list of options

Ageless Linux — Distro Compliance Tracker

Bytebro 🇬🇧 🇺🇦 🇬🇱1d ago

@nazokiyoubinbou

This is almost entirely the problem at my end. I also have spent many years on various distros from Mandriva, to Magiea, to Ubuntu, to Garuda.

To the best of my knowledge all of those that still exist are systemd houses.

If I want to move away from systemd, it seems I have to go with off-band distros, but I still want my KDE desktop!

@bazkie @nixCraft

@bytebro @bazkie @nixCraft Turns out there are a few that are specifically designed to move away. I'm probably going to give Devuan a shot as soon as I can as it sounds like it's very close to pure Debian in every other way. They have a page listing several distros that are not based on systemd (or at least have an easy option to switch): https://www.devuan.org/os/init-freedom

Distrowatch themselves popped up to suggest it and a couple of others.

Welcome to devuan.org | Devuan GNU+Linux Free Operating System

Free GNU+Linux base OS. Devuan is a fork of Debian without systemd. Devuan provides a safe upgrade path from Debian, to ensure the right to Init Freedom and avoid entanglement.

Devuan GNU+Linux

Bytebro 🇬🇧 🇺🇦 🇬🇱1d ago

@nazokiyoubinbou

Very interesting, thank you. I've bookmarked that to look at perhaps tomorrow afternoon. I'll certainly try it out in a VM, if that is doable.

@bazkie @nixCraft

@bytebro @bazkie @nixCraft Fingers crossed for both of us. 🤞

Bytebro 🇬🇧 🇺🇦 🇬🇱1d ago

@nazokiyoubinbou

Currently struggling to find an actual installable ISO. If it's simply a framework that needs a distro around it, then that's outside of my skill-level, I suspect.

@bazkie @nixCraft

@bytebro @bazkie @nixCraft In installation under images: https://www.devuan.org/os/documentation/install-guides/excalibur/install-devuan#images

You probably want desktop or netinstall.

Welcome to devuan.org | Devuan GNU+Linux Free Operating System

Free GNU+Linux base OS. Devuan is a fork of Debian without systemd. Devuan provides a safe upgrade path from Debian, to ensure the right to Init Freedom and avoid entanglement.

Devuan GNU+Linux

Bytebro 🇬🇧 🇺🇦 🇬🇱1d ago

@nazokiyoubinbou

Got it, thanks!

@bazkie @nixCraft

John Smith 13h ago

@bytebro @nazokiyoubinbou @bazkie @nixCraft

https://agelesslinux.org/distros.html

Heres some options. I'm personally looking into Artix. Multiple DEs and KDE is one of them.

Ageless Linux — Distro Compliance Tracker

Bytebro 🇬🇧 🇺🇦 🇬🇱1h ago

@nazokiyoubinbou

Installed it in a Gnome-Boxes VM and not impressed with the WE. It doesn't automagically recognise my screen size on boot, unlike Ubuntu, Mint, Cachy, Tuxedo, Garuda, etc, do. And the best resolutions available in the Settings screen are not even close to what is needed.

I think this one goes down as a 'work-in-progress' for now.

@bazkie @nixCraft

@bytebro @bazkie @nixCraft That's very strange. It's mostly plain Debian in regards to things like what drivers/etc are in the stock kernel as far as I know. If plain Debian works then it should.

Works fine for me, but I have an AMD GPU which is a whole lot of Just Works™ in Linux compared to others these days. (Kind of ironic that once it was nVidia for that and now they are the ones that suck at it.)

Main thing I ran into was stuff like pipewire-pulse wouldn't work with it stock. It would need something such as that MX Linux method.

Speaking of, maybe you should look into MX Linux?

Bytebro 🇬🇧 🇺🇦 🇬🇱1h ago

@nazokiyoubinbou

Downloading MX as we speak. I'll play tomorrow, perhaps.

@bazkie @nixCraft

@bytebro @bazkie @nixCraft I'm messing around with it right now. As a warning, the KDE version uses systemd if I read correctly. You'd want to install the XFCE version. But you can then just install kde (and optionally install and switch to sddm. Actually, that may not be optional. Lightdm and KDE aren't getting along well for me anymore.)

Fahri Reza 🍉23h ago

@bytebro @nazokiyoubinbou @bazkie @nixCraft

captured

DistroWatch 1d ago

@bazkie @nazokiyoubinbou @nixCraft Devuan is Debian with an alternative init.

Antix provides multiple init implementations.

FreeBSD is not hard if you are used to Debian.

@distrowatch @bazkie @nixCraft I didn't know about this Devuan. That's kind of interesting. Perhaps that might help keep some of the compatibility I currently enjoy. I hope. I may have to give it a good look.

Thanks!

EDIT: Devuan has a page listing a number of distros with alternative inits it seems: https://www.devuan.org/os/init-freedom

Welcome to devuan.org | Devuan GNU+Linux Free Operating System

Free GNU+Linux base OS. Devuan is a fork of Debian without systemd. Devuan provides a safe upgrade path from Debian, to ensure the right to Init Freedom and avoid entanglement.

Devuan GNU+Linux

bazkie 👩🏼‍💻 bitplanes 🎵1d ago

@nazokiyoubinbou @distrowatch @nixCraft same!

@distrowatch @bazkie @nazokiyoubinbou @nixCraft I've had an excellent experience with MX, which recently reinstated their classic dual-init support: https://mxlinux.org/blog/mx-25-dual-init-setup/

Now it's dual-init by default. My favorite Debian-based distro.

@jandi @distrowatch @bazkie @nixCraft I'm not sure I understand the benefit of dual init. Doesn't that mean you get the bloat and downsides of systemd while also using sysvinit for some reason? You're still going to have all the stuff that people want to avoid with systemd while it's installed and doing its thing, just with added complexity.

@nazokiyoubinbou @distrowatch @bazkie @nixCraft The distro supports both. As you can see in the linked post you can easily remove either, but you can also pick and choose at every boot, for any purpose (troubleshooting, dev, debug, etc). MX is a decidedly pro-user distro.

In the same vein, you can use flatpaks, snaps, appimages, debs, containers, whatever, if you so choose. It's quite flexible but not (IMO) overwhelming.

Still, of course, not everything for everyone, it might not be for you.

DistroWatch 1d ago

@jandi @nazokiyoubinbou @bazkie @nixCraft This is all true. I'd like to append that Snap packages rely on systemd, so if you're booting into SysV init then Snap packages are not available.

@distrowatch @jandi @bazkie @nixCraft IMO people should avoid relying on snap anyway...

@nazokiyoubinbou @distrowatch @jandi @bazkie @nixCraft

Snap packages make sense for IoT devices which can cause catastrophes if unpatched, due to their auto updating.

Drove me off Ubuntu as a desktop

@distrowatch @nazokiyoubinbou @bazkie @nixCraft Ah, good point, thanks!

DistroWatch 1d ago

@nazokiyoubinbou @jandi @bazkie @nixCraft That's one way to look at it. Alternatively you could say you get the leanness of SysV init while also having the library features and application support of systemd.

@distrowatch @jandi @bazkie @nixCraft I don't see how though. That's why I was asking of course. Just if both are installed and both are running then you get the leanness of sysv and the bloat of systemd... Which means just that much more instead of less....

In other words it's not just "best of both worlds" but literally straight up "both worlds," meaning best, worst, and a combination of the two all in one.

I just don't see how you can have 1+2 and not get 3 instead of 1.

DistroWatch 1d ago

@nazokiyoubinbou @jandi @bazkie @nixCraft Well, no. If you're running the SysV init version then systemd isn't running. But the systemd libraries are on the disk in case they are needed as dependencies. I thnk what you're missing is that both init implementations don't run at the same time so there isn't any bloat in memory or on the CPU.

@distrowatch @jandi @bazkie @nixCraft So the combo system just has the libraries, not actually running both? They don't really say anything to that effect specifically, so that's definitely something one would have to be very clear about.

All it says on there is "dual-init" without any real specifics.

@nazokiyoubinbou @distrowatch @bazkie @nixCraft I guess the usage comes from dual-booting, where you can boot either of two (or more) OSs alternatively but not simultaneously.

@jandi @distrowatch @bazkie @nixCraft Definitely feels like that has a pretty limited range of use cases. Like one person specifically going back and forth with specific tools maybe. But for the most part it really feels like people should pick one.

@nazokiyoubinbou @distrowatch @bazkie @nixCraft Whatever, I'm out.

Emma Liv 1d ago

@jandi You can only explain something to somebody so many times; you can't understand it for them. Geez that was painful to read.

DistroWatch 1d ago

@nazokiyoubinbou @jandi @bazkie @nixCraft Well, you can't run more than one init at a time, so it's implied. Dual init just means you get to pick which one you want at boot time.

@distrowatch @jandi @bazkie @nixCraft Ok. I'll admit I'm still confused about the full purpose of this or why it's better than just picking one and working with that.

I think for now I'll just be going with Devuan.

@distrowatch @jandi @bazkie @nixCraft Ok, coming back to this, I tried Devuan and immediately saw issues like simply not being able to use pipewire-pulse at all. I had assumed they would have built workarounds for stuff like that, but it kind of looks like they haven't.

So now I'm looking at MX Linux again and still trying to wrap my head fully around its setup. It seems their KDE iso is systemd only, but also their XFCE4 option includes one for newer systems with a newer kernel, so I went ahead and installed that second XFCE4 option. It at no point asked me which init to use, but it seems to have systemd installed but not running or working.

Is it safe to assume this one will be the best compatibility balance without age-gate crap or will systemd's direction still infect it?

DistroWatch 1h ago

@nazokiyoubinbou @jandi @bazkie @nixCraft MX Linux gives you the choice of which init to run at boot time. You select which one you want from the boot menu.

As for your second question: it's too soon to tell. You would have better luck asking the MX Linux developers what their plans are.

@distrowatch @jandi @bazkie @nixCraft It's definitely not showing any boot time choice on that.

Actually, I finally found it. To switch you have to go into their tweak tool. Under miscellaneous there is an option to change the init. As expected it's defaulting to "sysVinit" with the XFCE installation at least. I presume the KDE installer doesn't offer this. However, I was able to install the KDE DE in the XFCE version and it's working without me switching to systemd, so it seems kind of a strange choice.

I guess my question in regards to systemd is if stuff like that is just going to take over in such a way that simply having the libraries installed is enough for it to start collecting info. (Which is less about MX specifically and more about systemd specifically.)

@bazkie @nazokiyoubinbou @nixCraft I just yesterday switched from debian to void linux but if you want a debian like experience then theres devuan!

ArchiveScribe 1d ago

@bazkie @nazokiyoubinbou @nixCraft I’m a huge fan of antiX. It’s non-systemd (you can install runit or SysVinit), and runs very well on older hardware (it’s based on Debian). It’s basic in appearance, and you’ll have to do some work on it to improve the experience. The antiX site also has an excellent video tutorial, as well.

@bazkie
Maybe one of the BSDs?
@nazokiyoubinbou @nixCraft

@sab38 @bazkie @nixCraft It looks like it has been confirmed that none of them can use systemd.

bazkie 👩🏼‍💻 bitplanes 🎵14h ago

@nazokiyoubinbou @sab38 @nixCraft you mean like, license wise? or technically?

@bazkie @sab38 @nixCraft Funny thing is, I don't think anything specifically said exactly that. 😆

It has to be license-wise though. If someone really really wanted I'm sure they could make it work (but then who would want to? Systemd really seems to be universally hated!)

bazkie 👩🏼‍💻 bitplanes 🎵9h ago

@nazokiyoubinbou @sab38 @nixCraft well a few years back when it was a heated debate I remember it being pretty 50/50!

BUT I bet a lot of people at this point realize the anti systemd people were right and have jumped that sinking ship

@bazkie @sab38 @nixCraft Indeed.

My problem with it is it has forgotten its entire purpose. Systemd is just for handling stuff like init. Why does it even have its own DNS handling and things like that? I mean that's beyond mere bloat and straight up into territory of it trying to do things it shouldn't be doing wholly unrelated to its entire purpose... (Yes, it does DNS handling now. Though a lot of distros may be turning it off by default now. A lot of people using dnsmasq/pihole/etc have found out the hard way as they tried to figure out why the port was already bound before the service could start.)

Systemd should not even be aware what users there are, much less their age. That is not within its scope.

bazkie 👩🏼‍💻 bitplanes 🎵9h ago

@nazokiyoubinbou @sab38 @nixCraft hear hear!! keep things simple, for every task there should be some utility. I don't like massive monoliths that do everything.

Kingsley Bugarin PLY OAM 🇦🇺21h ago

"can anyone recommend me which are the most "mainstream"/well-maintained non-systemd distros?"

I have been using PCLinuxOS for nearly two years.

It is a rolling distro and is often behind the latest software releases but it is rock solid.

It uses synaptic package manager with RPMs.

bazkie 👩🏼‍💻 bitplanes 🎵14h ago

@kingsleybugarin interesting, I see it has existed for quite some time, that's always nice. (terrible name tho 😅)
thanks!

Anyia, geeky 🏳️‍⚧️ girl 21h ago

@bazkie If you like Debian, Devuan is probably your logical first port of call for a non-systemd distro.

@nazokiyoubinbou @nixCraft

@bazkie @nazokiyoubinbou @nixCraft I don't know if it can be consistent mainstream, bur @gentoo supports OpenRC as init manager. For sure it is well maintained and the support documentation is quite good

Franz Strebel 17h ago

@bazkie switch over to Devuan, which is Debian without systemd