On Mon, Dec 11, 2017 at 10:39:34AM +0200, Lars Noodén wrote:
> Interesting essay.
>
> /Lars
>
> "The importance of Devuan"
>
> https://blog.ungleich.ch/en-us/cms/blog/2017/12/10/the-importance-of-devuan/
>

Related:

https://linux.slashdot.org/story/17/12/11/0049245/does-systemd-makes-linux-complex-error-prone-and-unstable
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15891046

with, finally, not-so-harsh comments as we used to get two years ago.

I like the essay but I must admit I don't particularly like the
"doord" example. And the reason is that, believe it or not, technical
aspects (like boot speed or number of bugs) are relatively marginal in
the systemd debacle, at least for me.

TL;DR: Maintaining alternatives is the only way to stay alive.

The main point is "ecological" and is all about maintaining variety,
avoiding to put all your eggs in the same basket, which also happen to
belong to someone else and not to you. The GNU/Linux ecosystem has
thrived and succeeded thanks to the existence of many, different, even
contrasting alternatives, for virtually any aspect of the
system. systemd is simply the negation of that approach.

And to be honest, yes, in this respect the systemd approach is pretty
much in line with the worst tradition of the unix systems produced
back in the 80's, which where sturdly monolitic systems embracing
everything in incompatible and closed ways, and whose stupid approach
to "total domination" almost killed unix forever.

That is not the "unix tradition" I would like to be preserved. This is
not the "unix phylosophy" many of us keep talking about.

Those of us who we have been grown up in the GNU/Linux bazaar know
very well that there is no "one-single-way" of doing anything. Random
Joe retains the freedom of coding yet-another-way of solving the very
same problem, with high chances of fostering a nice leap forward. This
is the main reason why the GNU/Linux ecosystem has produced
high-quality software that could have not been conceived by
one-single-mind in one-single-way following one-single-plan, even with
a few thousand years at their disposal. This is the single main reason
why maintaining alternatives to the systemd avalanche, and as many and
variegated as possible, is so fundamental for the very survival of
this ecosystem. This is what the auld-aunties are ranting about, in
the end.

Forget the technical details: quality comes out of natural selection,
almost automatically, as it has done in the last 25 years, and natural
selection is only possible if we can span a sufficiently large portion
of the underlying solution space with different approaches, replacing
pieces at will, merging, patching, diff-ing, scrapping, sharing. And
once quality is achieved, it is available for everybody, including
companies and businesses.

Maintaining alternatives, and as many as possible of them, and
allowing alternatives to hybridise and cross-fertilise each other is
the only way of finding new, better, more efficient ways of solving
the same old set of problems, and new ones. Knowing that any of those
"perfect" solution is just waiting to be superseeded by a better one,
resulting from the latest hybridation, to which new code and new ideas
have been added in a creative way.

Maintaining alternatives is the only way to stay alive.

My2Cents

KatolaZ

-- 
[ ~.,_  Enzo Nicosia aka KatolaZ - Devuan -- Freaknet Medialab  ]  
[     "+.  katolaz [at] freaknet.org --- katolaz [at] yahoo.it  ]
[       @)   http://kalos.mine.nu ---  Devuan GNU + Linux User  ]
[     @@)  http://maths.qmul.ac.uk/~vnicosia --  GPG: 0B5F062F  ] 
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