On Thu, 17 Jun 2021 18:46:27 -0700
Marc Shapiro via Dng <dng@???> wrote:

> On 6/17/21 4:59 PM, Patrick Bartek via Dng wrote:
> > On Wed, 16 Jun 2021 20:02:35 -0400
> > Hendrik Boom <hendrik@???> wrote:
> >
> >> On Wed, Jun 16, 2021 at 01:29:12PM -0700, Patrick Bartek via Dng
> >> wrote: ...
> >> ...
> >>> Jessie was the first Debian version to use systemd by default as
> >>> the init. Perhaps, something was installed as a systemd dependency
> >>> that wouldn't have been installed with the new Beowulf computer
> >>> under sysvinit that carried forward with a dist-upgrade of Jessie
> >>> to Beowulf. Or you installed something on the old system that
> >>> wasn't installed on the new one, and that is doing the
> >>> automounting.
> >> Historical note.
> >>
> >> And the first Devuan release was called Jessie because it was
> >> almost identical to the Debian release with the same name -- it
> >> differed primarily in that it did not use systemd as an init.
> >> This was the last Debian relese that had no problems running
> >> without systemd.
> > I run Debian Stretch with sysvinit without problems even though some
> > systemd libraries and udev-systemd remained after converting to
> > sysvinit. Even updates-upgrades don't result in systemd-init being
> > reinstalled like with Buster.
> >
> > B
>
> I ran Debian from Bo through Stretch.  I had no real problems
> upgrading through the releases until I got to Buster.  Then I hit a
> wall.  It MAY be possible to run a very minimal system (with no
> chance of running X) and still avoid systemd.  While I have been told
> that this is the case, I have no personal evidence of this.
>
> That is what caused me to switch to Devuan.

When testing Buster, I was able to run a terminal only system with
sysvinit which survived update-upgrade; however, when I tried to
install X, sysvinit was uninstalled and systemd init replaced it. I
could replace with sysvinit, but whenever I did an update-upgrade
systemd init would again be reinstalled. What caused it was a
dependency. Some file (dbus. IIRC) that was an X dependency had a
systemd library dependency which was present by the way; however,
systemd init got installed, too. Never discovered why. And if I tried
to "block" systemd init from installing, the upgrade would fail.
Systemd had finally become too pervasive to deal with easily as I
figured it eventually would be.

Like you, I abandoned Debian and went to Devuan.

B