https://postmarketos.org/blog/2024/03/05/adding-systemd/
pmOS the most popular distro for phones and mobile is based on Alpine Linux, it is an extra layer on it.
They will now use mostly systemd supporting openrc only as long Alpine has it.
Only the sxmo GUI will have openrc.
https://www.alpinelinux.org/
There was some discussion about this, but in short some of the pmos devs are aware that this can alienate a lot of the user base and potentially kill the distro, so i wouldn't worry too much but in the case of gnome-based desktops it's really a shame as they really made every component of it work without systemd, i guess the patches are still there for building your own image but who knows if they still will develop them (the big issue of course)
@SGOrava could have something to add, he also uses pmos. :)
I have heard that a core dev left because of that.
In my opinion they betrayed a lot of users that were using it cause it was like Alpine but systemd it is not "Small. Simple. Secure.".
But I wonder if Alpine will do that too one day...
As far as I know only sxmo will build with openrc.
Phosh and plasma mobile will use systemd.
Those 3 are the most popular GUIs for phones.
I wish there was an Artix mobile project.
Now I am running ARMtix on my pinephone but I have to use Danctnix Arch repo for kernel and some device things.
Not the best right now for example:
:: mkinitcpio and cryptsetup are in conflict. Remove cryptsetup? [y/N]
Alpine is in the process of providing an S6-based init, last I heard. I doubt they'd throw all that away in favor of adopting systemd.
The thread topic sounds an awful lot like 'Debbie does Dallas'...
If you'd like a small gnu/linux device, check out the gole 2 pro. I'm turning it into a phone here (https://codeberg.org/MorsMortium/G2PPhone). It runs artix with openrc/kde pretty well.
Bomfunk MC's - Freestyler (Video Original Version) (https://yewtu.be/watch?v=ymNFyxvIdaM)
Like Debbie does Dallas, yeah, postmarketOS goes systemd
That device looks nice but I see that the project to turn in into a phone is still unfinished.
And you need to solder/desolder things it does not looks so easy.
This one has a modem but no microphone and camera: https://www.clockworkpi.com/product-page/uconsole-kit-a-06.
And no mainline kernel because of missing drivers.
I love PostmarketOS but as a Phosh user it sucks that it will be going SystemD at some point. My main reason for picking PostmarketOS over another distro was that it offered an alternative to SystemD.
It's unfortunate their top reason for considering elogind inadequate is
sd_journal_stream_fd, which is basically a syslog stream except it connects to a systemd-specific path. Hooking up svlogd/s6-log to a inetd that supports Unix sockets would've provided most of the functionality.
Wish best of luck to Sxmo team.
There's a Mastodon thread (https://social.treehouse.systems/@ariadne/112044969176528963) where a proeminent Alpine developer seriously considers doing that.
Skarnet provides some updates on the status of the s6-based init for Alpine (or, more formally, s6-rc v1) in the replies; it seems he's trying to iron out dependency handling when reacting to events. (Honestly, I'd prefer waiting; unexplainable hangups with start/stop jobs is what made me give up on systemd in the first place).
That's upsetting news to hear. We need less systemd in the world today.
https://postmarketos.org/blog/2024/08/16/paying-for-development/
And that person will work on systemd integration, and they will be the only paid dev.
Right now the Linux smartphones have so many hardware problems they could mainline some good open phone.
https://wiki.postmarketos.org/wiki/Devices
In the article (https://postmarketos.org/blog/2024/03/05/adding-systemd/) they complain about KDE and GNOME and it seems that if Alpine does have something they won't do non systemd version:
Phosh is in Alpine repo: https://pkgs.alpinelinux.org/packages?name=*phosh*&branch=edge&repo=&arch=&maintainer=.
And plasma mobile too: https://pkgs.alpinelinux.org/packages?name=*plasma-mobi*&branch=edge&repo=&arch=&maintainer=.
So what I said about phosh and plasma mobile looks wrong, sorry.
I find the article somehow confusing we will see.
Systemd is now in pmos edge.
The day when another article was published one dev commented in the matrix channel:
So they just adding systemd indeed...
And another article https://postmarketos.org/blog/2024/07/24/systemd-part-deux/ states:
Switching to systemd was not enough DE parts will be forced to use systemd instead of the default method?
It is an interesting question.
My bluetooth bugs out a lot. I need a good way to restart it easy, quickly
with dinit i think i can do that. I am not sure moksha currently can.
So how should that be architected? Would it not be better for the DE to ask the init to start things for it? Just saying that makes me feel dirty.