Technically, sysv everything was just a file full of instructions for the shell to parse and initialize. Human readable "technically". It was simple and light weight. SystemD is a bit heavier and more complex as a system service binary. But that load and complexity is generally offset by added features that are extremely nice to have. Providing much more standardized targets and configuration iirc.

I had to search and dig trying to figure out how to set up services properly for my distro, back in the 90s. And when/how to start/restart them. There wasn't one way to do it all. SysD made it all much more standard, simple, and clear. It's biggest sin, is that it's one more binary attack surface that might be exploited.

It uses a completely different paradigm of process chaining and management than POSIX and the underlying Unix architecture.

That’s not to say it’s bad, just a different design. It’s actually very similar to what Apple did with OS X.

On the plus side, it’s much easier to understand from a security model perspective, but it breaks some of the underlying assumptions about how scheduling and running processes works on Linux.

So: more elegant in itself, but an ugly wart on the overall systems architecture design.

I'm so tired of reading this stupid argument. "People only dislike systemd because they're afraid of change." No, there are plenty of other concerning issues about it. I could probably write about a lot of problems with systemd (like the fact that my work laptop never fucking shuts down properly), but here's the real issue:

Do you really think it's a good idea for Red Hat to have total control over the most important component of every mainstream distro in existence?

Let's consider an analogy: in 2008, Chrome was the shit. Everyone loved it, thought it was great and started using it, and adoption reached ~20-30% overnight. Alternatives started falling by the wayside. Then adoption accelerated thanks to shady tactics like bundling, silently changing users' default browser, marketing it everywhere and downranking websites that didn't conform to its "standards" in Google search. And next, Chrome adopted all kinds of absurdly complex standards forcing all other browser engines to shut down and adopt Chrome's engine instead because nobody could keep up with the development effort. And once they achieved world domination, then we started facing things like adblockers being banned, browser-exclusive DRM, and hardware attestation.

That's exactly what Red Hat is trying to pull in systemd. Same adoption story - started out as a nice product, definitely better than the original default (SysVInit). Then started pushing adoption aggressively by campaigning major distros to adopt it (Debian in particular). Then started absorbing other standard utilities like logind and udev. Leveraging Gnome to push systemd as a hard dependency.

Now systemd is at the world domination stage. Nobody knew what Chrome was going to do when it was at this point a decade ago, but now that we have the benefit of hindsight, we can clearly see that monoculture was clearly not a good idea. Are people so fucking stupid that they think that systemd/Red Hat will buck that trend and be benevolent curators of the open source Linux ecosystem in perpetuity? Who knows what nefarious things they could possibly do....

But there are hints, I suppose. By the way, check out Poettering's new startup: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46784572

I haven't been an opponent but I must admit, when you have headless machine of different arch (so no chroot) you try to make connect to LAN and start sshd, managing those links in those directories feels more like shooting in the dark. In that case simple scripts in a dir were easier

Systemd inserted a lot of flaws, many of them highly unsecure, for basically no reason other than "easier",

The main developer being a microslop emoyee and getting windfall from other corporate entities didn't sync up that great for integrity or security conscious people.

https://www.jfr.im/blog/2024/03/systemd-discourse-sucks/

When the drama started, the argument of my anti-systemd friend was that it goes against unix philosophy of one program do one thing only. But eventually even him turned on and become a fan.

There are now multiple alternatives that do a better job at what Systemd does.

What is it always with Systemd-is-the-only-alternative (vs. SysV scripts)? That's 15 years out of date.

Also, you don't need sockets.