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Why does systemd exist?

Around 10 years ago, at age 17. i started using linux right before systemd became the default on debian.
I didn't really know what i was doing.
I just followed a guide on forums and stuff.
Installing the nvidia drivers required me to disable the display manager, enter tty console, and blacklist nouveau drivers.
Since then, linux has evolved allot.

I'm a solo developer, working on my own projects. Never worked for a big company.

Why does systemd exist and why should i care about it?
What exactly does systemd bring to the table that alternative "modular standalone software" does not?
And why not just create an alternative to elogind? How hard could it be?
How many systemd shims does artix use? elogind, etmpfiles, etc...

Systemd seems to keep growing forever, adding its own way of doing things on top of the existing linux userspace that's already installed on the system.
Basically duplicated software.
After trying many times to learn it, i found it too difficult finding the relevant documentation for it.
The systemd website does not explain how to use systemd indepth.
The manpages are all over the place in an unorganized way.
No good books are written about it either. Imaging paying $$$ for documentation.

Systemd currently has 465 open bug issues.
https://github.com/systemd/systemd/labels/bug%20%F0%9F%90%9B
This makes my eyes hurt.

I plan on migrating to artix, currently on arch linux.

 

Re: Why does systemd exist?

Reply #2 –
I think the question should be "Why systemd was adopted at such an astonishing rate"... And the answer is - control and money.

Re: Why does systemd exist?

Reply #3 –
Quote from: tintin – on
Hello and welcome,

A little reading to complete:
https://unixdigest.com/articles/the-real-motivation-behind-systemd.html
always good to read, which shows the real motivations of redhat/ibm..

Quote from: Shoun2137 – on
I think the question should be "Why systemd was adopted at such an astonishing rate"... And the answer is - control and money.
exactly :(

Re: Why does systemd exist?

Reply #4 –
I'm saying since years: When Ballmer said "Linux is cancer", he was right. - But he meant systemd.

Re: Why does systemd exist?

Reply #5 –
Speaking of (in this case a bit less) money I want to reference the Pmos thread
https://forum.artixlinux.org/index.php/topic,6579.msg40103.html#msg40103
this came recently
https://postmarketos.org/blog/2024/08/16/paying-for-development/
Quote
Why fund this project and not (insert my favorite project that needs attention)?
postmarketOS has very limited funds, and this is a hard decision. However, the team has identified the lack of compatibility between musl and systemd as one of the critical points to improve the future stability of postmarketOS.

Keep comments about this more silent if you can, you know.
Also, I would say don't hate on them, the fight for independence can be vicious sometimes.

Re: Why does systemd exist?

Reply #6 –
all this good,
but can you explain why ALL mainstream distros switched and still using systemd if it so evil thing?
how systemd can control and how it make money at all about that?

answer here?
https://unixdigest.com/articles/the-real-motivation-behind-systemd.html
-=linux its buggy crap that have no antifool protection (c)=- :)
*linux is free software, and comes with ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY* :)
+ALL YOURS ACTIONS at Linux YOU DO at YOUR OWN RISK!+ :)

Re: Why does systemd exist?

Reply #8 –
systemd, 10 years later: a historical and technical retrospective

SSL cert expired but worth a read, or at least a scan, if you want to know some of the history of how we got to where we are (or at least to 2020) with distro's and systemd.

But the short answer is Redhat, money,  power and the growth of cloud computing imho.

Re: Why does systemd exist?

Reply #9 –
Quote from: gripped – on
systemd, 10 years later: a historical and technical retrospective

SSL cert expired but worth a read, or at least a scan, if you want to know some of the history of how we got to where we are (or at least to 2020) with distro's and systemd.

But the short answer is Redhat, money,  power and the growth of cloud computing imho.
What does it do for cloud computing?

Re: Why does systemd exist?

Reply #10 –
Quote from: n00b – on
What does it do for cloud computing?
It simplified part of the provision of instances by the cloud providers without the need to each write their own entire solutions from scratch.
With regard to the above the existent init solutions in use by the big distro's were complex, varied a lot in their implementation and fell short of some desired functionality. At least that was what they were saying at the time.
Systemd was created and heavily pushed by Redhat as a solution.
Once it achieved dominance the huge mission creep began and it started to subsume more and more linux userspace functionality.
It provided features, sd-bus for example, which once used by an application would necessitate the presence of systemd unless the applications developer specifically coded an alternative.
"Embrace, extend, and extinguish" is a famous Microsoft phrase.
Lennart Poettering now works for MS. Maybe they were paying him all along ?

Re: Why does systemd exist?

Reply #11 –
The only thing that bothers me is that s6 and dinit aren't as complete and as well documented enough for someone to use easily as a drop in replacement for sysd. At least not for a normal user's userspace with services other than his, which includes the dbus/socket activation thing.

Re: Why does systemd exist?

Reply #14 –
Quote from: awky – on
Why does systemd exist and why should i care about it?
Quote from: Shoun2137 – on
I think the question should be "Why systemd was adopted at such an astonishing rate"... And the answer is - control and money.
I don't want to stir up controversy, but I think the main reason systemd was adopted by most distributions is that it offered fairly good parallelization capabilities when it was introduced. My favorite init, which is OpenRC, still doesn't provide a parallelization capability as good as that of systemd. I guess reading the following pages can answer your questions:
Systemd
Debate initsystem systemd
Systemd