The Tragedy of systemd

Explore the controversial systemd bootstrap system in this 47-minute conference talk from linux.conf.au. Delve into the history of bootstrap systems, UNIX, and contemporary operating systems to understand why systemd was deemed necessary and why it provokes strong reactions. Journey through the bootstrap process, init history, and the challenges of change in operating systems. Discover the ancestry of systemd, its evolution from Seventh Edition Unix, and how it addresses modern system configuration and automated service management needs. Examine the adoption of systemd, criticisms against it, and its impact on UNIX philosophy. Learn about cgroups, user-level units, and the promise of systemd's features like message transport, RPC framework, and containerization. Gain insights into the next generation of operating systems and the potential future of system management.

Intro
The Ancestry of systemd
Seventh Edition Unix (1979)
housekeeping functions like... mounting filesystems, and starting daemons.
Living Computers Museum+Labs
Then things changed
System Configuration
Automated Service Management
The Idea of systemd
The Idea of launchd
From launchd to systemd
For a fast and efficient boot-up two things are crucial: ► To start less And to start more in parallel
An init system that is responsible for maintaining services needs to listen to hardware and software changes.
System Management
The Reality of systemd
Adoption
It violates UNIX philosophy!
It's bloated and monolithic!
It's buggy!
It's not portable!
UNIX is dead
cgroups
User-level units
systemd represents change
The Knee-jerk
Abuse Isn't Cool
Contempt Isn't Cool
Why?
The Next Generation
The Promise of systemd
Message Transport
RPC Framework
Service Lifecycle
Automation via API
Containers
The System Layer
Consistent Device Naming
Better Log/Event/Audit Handling
A New Model Of An Application