Systemd and Carbon

Colonel Panic · 2024-09-11 17:41:04

Hi there. I recently started a thread on another distro's forum about why that distro was their daily driver, and several of the respondents there made it clear that the absence of systemd was a major reason for their sticking to that particular distro.

I know that Bearded Blunder posted a thread here a while back showing how to create a version of Bunsen without systemd, but by and large people here seem broadly accepting of systemd and its place in Bunsen.

Is there a case for creating a version of Carbon without systemd, or would that just be too much work for little or no benefit? Personally I'm not really bothered either way but am mainly looking for the perspectives of people here who know something about the technical details.

I recall that on another (sadly now defunct) distro's forum, the devs there tried to exclude systemd from the distro but found they weren't able to.

Last edited by Colonel Panic (2024-09-11 17:42:06)

Bearded_Blunder · 2024-09-12 04:17:53

It's not difficult for Boron, I basically just haven't got round to posting an update to the thread you mentioned (Yet).
I have how figured out, & it's actually rather easier for Boron than it was then.

I expect it'll either be almost as straightforward for Carbon, or exactly the same process.

I've also considered making a netinstall iso that'd install BL without systemd currently I'm short on time & hosting it would currently be slightly problematic, it's certainly possible though it'd be easier if the depends on the metapackage were init agnostic, it can be done by simply embedding a suitable preseed in or using it with the standard Debian netinstall iso, just a bit of a pain to preseed with (currently 2) of the metapackage depends depending on systemd, one of which I've not encountered any issues by omitting & the other is easily substituted.

Unfortunately I haven't had time to update the preseed I'd got basically figured out for Buster to work for Bookworm or Trixie, yet, if & when things calm down here that's on my to-do.

I doubt if there'll be anything official. Though it's possible @johnraff might be persuaded to make some mods to the netinstall script to give the possibility, since the needed mods to have it also run & install on a command-line Debian system that's (already) using sysvinit are trivial.

johnraff · 2024-09-12 05:45:22

Bearded_Blunder wrote:

I've also considered making a netinstall iso... it's certainly possible though it'd be easier if the depends on the metapackage were init agnostic

The BL netinstall script does not depend on metapackages, for precisely that purpose of making it easy for people to tweak the install lists.

...it's possible @johnraff might be persuaded to make some mods to the netinstall script to give the possibility, since the needed mods to have it also run & install on a command-line Debian system that's (already) using sysvinit are trivial.

I wouldn't have thought it was difficult. If someone (eg your good self) put down in black and white specifically what changes were needed, I'd be happy to make a non-systemd version available. The only other condition would be that you'd be prepared to handle user questions about it.

Colonel Panic · 2024-09-12 08:06:39

Thanks to everyone who's replied. It's good that there are options for people who want to use a version of Bunsen without systemd; I think the better option though is to start from a distro that already has no systemd such as AntiX, Devuan or (if I was feeling brave) Gentoo instead of starting from one that does have systemd and try to convert it over.

Last edited by Colonel Panic (2024-09-12 09:28:36)

PackRat · 2024-09-12 10:31:00

Never installed it myself, but a couple of the devs were #! and vsido users -

https://www.devuan.org/

hhh · 2024-09-12 16:44:29

In jessie it was easy to switch init systems (see second post)...

https://forums.bunsenlabs.org/viewtopic.php?id=4939

The Debian wiki has instructions for bullseye, I don't know if it still works in bookworm...

https://wiki.debian.org/Init#Changing_t … ing_system

hhh · 2024-09-12 16:45:59

BTW, that same page has instructions for changing the init before installation (much easier since systemd isn't running yet)...

https://wiki.debian.org/Init#Changing_t … ation_time

Bearded_Blunder · 2024-09-12 20:59:32

hhh wrote:

BTW, that same page has instructions for changing the init before installation (much easier since systemd isn't running yet)...
https://wiki.debian.org/Init#Changing_t … ation_time

They're also incorrect, & were also for Bullseye, at least the at installation ones are, if you try to install sysvinit-core and libpam-elogind in one hit as suggested there, apt bombs out partway through & leaves you with a broken system.

The process runs thus if you want it to work (Up to Bookworm, not had time to test properly with Trixie yet, though probably for Trixie/Carbon too):

Install a command-line system (with standard system utilities, those aren't installable post switching).

Install sysvinit-core (with or without openrc, without you'll get sysvrc instead).

It's vital you then REBOOT so you're using it BEFORE installing libpam-elogind.

Then pin systemd at -1 or apt tends not to be able to resolve the depends for long lists of packages like the desktop environments, though it's perfectly happy to install them if systemd is pinned.

Colonel Panic · 2024-09-13 20:33:18

Don't know if this is relevant here, but there's an article on Distrowatch which compares different init systems;

https://distrowatch.com/weekly.php?issue=20240527#qa

johnraff · 2024-09-14 01:52:01

^Thanks, that's a nice intro.

jimjamz · 2025-08-12 03:50:49

Pardon my ignorance, but why would BunsenLabs have to be, in any way, tied to systemd?
I don't see any rationale for that. It's not for me to dictate what BunsenLabs should be, but my understanding was that it would simply be a lightweight customisation of a Linux distribution, which just currently happens to be Debian.
I don't see a reason why BunsenLabs should become dependent on systemd the way Debian has.

There has been a growing number of users moving away from Debian to distros like Devuan and others, which are not always systemd. I think that BL would be best placed by being agnostic to such dependencies, allowing it to be used with other distros, or at the very least, help and enable users to easily experiment using BL with other distros. This in turn, would spread the good word of BL outside of the Debian user community. This is a good thing.
I for one, would still like to experiment using BL with Slackware.

Last edited by jimjamz (2025-08-12 03:52:06)

johnraff · 2025-08-12 04:52:03

jimjamz wrote:

I don't see a reason why BunsenLabs should become dependent on systemd the way Debian has.

Here's one: BunsenLabs is Debian. It's not a fork of Debian, it's Debian with some configuration added.

BunsenLabs web page wrote:

The distribution consists of configuration and resource packages installed on top of Debian. There are no changes to the way the Debian base system is administrated.

johnraff · 2025-08-12 04:57:35

BTW I've already said, several times, that if somebody were to put together a working set of instructions to make a non-systemd version of BunsenLabs I'd be most happy to incorporate it into the netinstall script so users could try it out. Who knows, if it worked well maybe a non-systemd iso might even be possible some day...

But that needs someone to do a lot of work, and such instructions have not yet appeared. The current BL team is too small to take it on by themselves.

greenjeans · 2025-08-12 14:28:24

johnraff wrote:

BTW I've already said, several times, that if somebody were to put together a working set of instructions to make a non-systemd version of BunsenLabs I'd be most happy to incorporate it into the netinstall script so users could try it out. Who knows, if it worked well maybe a non-systemd iso might even be possible some day...
But that needs someone to do a lot of work, and such instructions have not yet appeared. The current BL team is too small to take it on by themselves.

Hmmm...sounds like a job for a ninja cat-dad, where is ol' HOAS when you need him? Lol.

Well it's technically possible without resorting to Devuan, I found this article a few months ago, well-worded and not at all an anti-systemd thing: https://ianlecorbeau.com/blog/debian-bo … vinit.html , I don't think you even need the orphan sysvinit scripts the author mentioned, I haven't needed them for anything.

So say I followed that tutorial and got a pristine Debian base with sysvinit, would I be able to just start dropping BL config scripts and such in there?

johnraff · 2025-08-13 01:44:05

greenjeans wrote:

So say I followed that tutorial and got a pristine Debian base with sysvinit, would I be able to just start dropping BL config scripts and such in there?

Most of our stuff is init-agnostic, so generally, yes. But you'd likely have a few things needing fixing.

DeepDayze · 2025-08-14 00:31:04

Would love it if Debian gave the option to pick an init system as an option within the installer.

#1 2024-09-11 17:41:04

Systemd and Carbon

#2 2024-09-12 04:17:53

Re: Systemd and Carbon

#3 2024-09-12 05:45:22

Re: Systemd and Carbon

#4 2024-09-12 08:06:39

Re: Systemd and Carbon

#5 2024-09-12 10:31:00

Re: Systemd and Carbon

#6 2024-09-12 16:44:29

Re: Systemd and Carbon

#7 2024-09-12 16:45:59

Re: Systemd and Carbon

#8 2024-09-12 20:59:32

Re: Systemd and Carbon

#9 2024-09-13 20:33:18

Re: Systemd and Carbon

#10 2024-09-14 01:52:01

Re: Systemd and Carbon

#11 2025-08-12 03:50:49

Re: Systemd and Carbon

#12 2025-08-12 04:52:03

Re: Systemd and Carbon

#13 2025-08-12 04:57:35

Re: Systemd and Carbon

#14 2025-08-12 14:28:24

Re: Systemd and Carbon

#15 2025-08-13 01:44:05

Re: Systemd and Carbon

#16 2025-08-14 00:31:04

Re: Systemd and Carbon

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