Help with systemd problems/reply to closed thread

incassum · 2012-11-05 14:45:18

@Everyone; as the previopus topic was closed, I am opening a new one here, partly to reply to some things that was said to me in the previous thread/topic (and I do not like to leave people hanging), but mainly to try and get some help with my systemd config (that I was not able to find help with in the wiki or manpages).

@czubek; eww, that sounds rather similiar to some other operating systems I've heard of (not just, but obviously including, windows)... For me, subjectively, that is not very attractive, as being able to have a single application do a single thing, and then mixing and matching as I personally see fit is a great thing.

@tomegun: I can indeed see your point, but if I made direct quotes on all the things I reply too, my posts would reach biblical proportions.
Mmm-hmm, I do indeed know of "the Arch Way"; however, the system that you expose can be of varying complexity as well, and I found that the system that was presented to me by way of Sysvinit/initscripts was a way simpler system than that presented to me by systemd.

Indeed, and I do like that; I enjoy knowing how my system works and learning more about it; however, the truth is that reading manpages and the wiki isn't always enough. And I use the numbers instead of letters in certain places as a jest, please, do not get offended by that; if you have to, get offended by my opinions.

Ah, I have now scanned the wiki, the manpages, and have already faced problems. While part of me is saddened by this fact (as I was hoping for a smooth transition to systemd), part of me is glad that I can at least prove that everything isn't quite as simple as some people would make it out to be. More on this later in this post, as I do need help with the problems I have faced.
And I wouldn't say that the new and old way are equally trivial, as I immediatley faced problems with "the new way". More on this later.

Ok, I find that if the debate is polarized, then there is nothing wrong with describing it as such. I spell what I see.

Oh my... Ignored as a matter of principle? I would say that that is an excellent way to stagnate; by that logic, moviemakers, gamemakers etcetera should ignore any and all criticism they recieve, as the critics are not contributing.... Wouldn't that lead to a complete halt in development? Isn't criticism (so long as it is constructive, obviously) a key component of (media/software) evolution?

Ah, I see, then I misunderstood the current state of the install media

"Some adjustements"... Well, I guess we'll have to see how that goes, then. Hopefully it'll be smooth.

@Everyone; Awebb possesses stunning accuracy as far as his observations go.

@zb3; My point exactly.

@tomegun; I believe you to be wrong; complaining (but not whining) is the first step towards improvement, as I think that I and zb3 has shown.
Further, your last point (where you talk about "deep understanding of Y" and whatnot) is basically saying that only devs and programmers can contribute, so zb3's observation would be correct.
Also, making suggestions is part of constructive criticism; you can do that even if you can't code, e.g. by saying "X works badly because it makes Y crash; couldn't we replace X with something akin to Z?". This is a valid point even if you have no intricate understanding of X, Y or Z, and if it is impossible to replace X for one reason or the other, it's not hard to reply with "Replacing X is impossible because of reason Q", and then see if someone can solve reason Q etcetera.

zb3's example is obviously helping; for one, it would allow people to know taht they can't boot with systemd in certain cases, or that installing/runing systemd can break their system. I would consider that rather important information.

@Everyone; Now then, to see if I can (or rather, if I can get help to) shed some light on some problems I've been having.
My transition to systemd went pretty smooth (besides the fact that I couldn't use 'systemctl' to set anything, and neither duckduckgo nor any posts in the forums could help me (the error I continously got was "Failed to issue method call: Launch helper exited with unknown return code 1") and that there are no manpages/tips on how to configure the files for "localtime" and "adjtime", which would've been good considering some syntax have changed) to about halfway through, to the point where I was supposed to start using systemd for my daemons.

Now then, to the main problem; first, I tried running
"systemctl enable syslog-ng.service"
and got the following message;
"ln -s '/usr/lib/systemd/system/syslog-ng.service' '/etc/systemd/system/syslog.service'
ln -s '/usr/lib/systemd/system/syslog-ng.service' '/etc/systemd/system/multi-user.target.wants/syslog-ng.service'"
Since it doesn't exclusively say that something went wrong (at least as far as I can understand), I pondered the message a bit, but moved on to try and start dbus by issuing
"systemctl enable dbus.service",
to which I got the reply
"The unit files have no [Install] section. They are not meant to be enabled using systemctl."
This I can only assume is an error message of some sort, especially seeing as it says "not meant to be enabled using systemctl", but the wiki rather explicitly states that that is what I am supposed to do.

I dare not move on (or attempt to start other daemons) without further advice, as I fear I might break my system. Any ideas as to how to solve this would be greatly appreciated.

tcmdvm · 2012-11-05 15:00:40

The message;
"ln -s '/usr/lib/systemd/system/syslog-ng.service' '/etc/systemd/system/syslog.service'
ln -s '/usr/lib/systemd/system/syslog-ng.service' '/etc/systemd/system/multi-user.target.wants/syslog-ng.service'"
indicates that running "systemctl enable syslog.service" is now enabled.

If you try running sytemtctl enable <whatever>.service and get
"The unit files have no [Install] section. They are not meant to be enabled using systemctl." means there is no <whatever>.service file available to enable.

The dbus.service as far as I know is already enabled when installing systemd and doesn't require any action.

ZekeSulastin · 2012-11-05 17:58:04

tcmdvm wrote:

If you try running sytemtctl enable <whatever>.service and get
"The unit files have no [Install] section. They are not meant to be enabled using systemctl." means there is no <whatever>.service file available to enable.

To be a bit more precise, it means the service is there but it's only used as a dependency for something else; the [Install] section of the file is what tells systemctl where to link it and such. Also, where exactly in the wiki were you told explicitly to 'systemctl enable dbus.service'? I can easily point you to the sections in both installation guides that tell you how to set things like /etc/localtime et. al (also `man 7 archlinux`), but not the one that said to manually enable dbus.

https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Systemd wrote:

Finally, some services do not need to be explicitly enabled by the user. For instance, dbus.service will automatically be enabled when dbus-core is installed.

Lastly, I don't think trying to continue conversations from a closed thread is a very good idea, let alone doing it in a giant undivided wall of text that makes it quite difficult to pick out much any single topic.

Last edited by ZekeSulastin (2012-11-05 17:58:49)

fsckd · 2012-11-05 18:04:40

This is not really a technical support subforum. Moving from Arch Discussion to Newbie Corner.

tomegun · 2012-11-05 18:32:47

It is not really possible to follow your message as you don't quote what you are replying to. Moreover, as the thread was closed I think that means we should stop the discussion ;-)

incassum wrote:

Now then, to the main problem; first, I tried running
"systemctl enable syslog-ng.service"
and got the following message;
"ln -s '/usr/lib/systemd/system/syslog-ng.service' '/etc/systemd/system/syslog.service'
ln -s '/usr/lib/systemd/system/syslog-ng.service' '/etc/systemd/system/multi-user.target.wants/syslog-ng.service'"
Since it doesn't exclusively say that something went wrong (at least as far as I can understand), I pondered the message a bit, but moved on

Good call. Nothing went wrong, it just outputs the commands it performed.

to try and start dbus by issuing
"systemctl enable dbus.service",
to which I got the reply
"The unit files have no [Install] section. They are not meant to be enabled using systemctl."
This I can only assume is an error message of some sort, especially seeing as it says "not meant to be enabled using systemctl", but the wiki rather explicitly states that that is what I am supposed to do.

You are not meant to enable dbus.service as it is enabled unconditionally. To check the enabled/disabled state of your services try "systemctl list-unit-files". "static" means that you are not supposed to enabled/disable it.

incassum · 2012-11-07 08:38:12

tcmdvm wrote:

The message;
"ln -s '/usr/lib/systemd/system/syslog-ng.service' '/etc/systemd/system/syslog.service'
ln -s '/usr/lib/systemd/system/syslog-ng.service' '/etc/systemd/system/multi-user.target.wants/syslog-ng.service'"
indicates that running "systemctl enable syslog.service" is now enabled.
If you try running sytemtctl enable <whatever>.service and get
"The unit files have no [Install] section. They are not meant to be enabled using systemctl." means there is no <whatever>.service file available to enable.
The dbus.service as far as I know is already enabled when installing systemd and doesn't require any action.

Ah, right, systemd is chatty (I'm of the old skool; if nothing is/goes wrong, a program should keep quiet).
Oh ok, then I should dare more on.

ZekeSulastin wrote:

To be a bit more precise, it means the service is there but it's only used as a dependency for something else; the [Install] section of the file is what tells systemctl where to link it and such. Also, where exactly in the wiki were you told explicitly to 'systemctl enable dbus.service'? I can easily point you to the sections in both installation guides that tell you how to set things like /etc/localtime et. al (also `man 7 archlinux`), but not the one that said to manually enable dbus.

Ah, I see; and well, I was told right here, going from the top, to "Enable Daemons formerly listed in rc.conf [...] For a translation of the daemons from /etc/rc.conf to systemd services, see: List of Daemons and Services.", and, using the list, dbus is mentioned there, as you can see. Since I started from the top, I did not know that you didn't need to enable that service. Perhaps it could be added to the descriptions of the relevant services in the Wiki which ones are autostarted?

ZekeSulastin wrote:

Lastly, I don't think trying to continue conversations from a closed thread is a very good idea, let alone doing it in a giant undivided wall of text that makes it quite difficult to pick out much any single topic.

Meh, I directly refer to the relevant people, they can easily see their own old posts in the previous thread, etcetera... I think te ones who have something to say will be able to find my replies to their previous statements (or so I hope). For now, as everyone can see, I quote stuff (but man might I make some huge posts if I ever post again in the future, if I quote what I reply to).

fsckd wrote:

This is not really a technical support subforum. Moving from Arch Discussion to Newbie Corner.

Ah ok, thanks (or perhaps a cautious thanks? Moving it to "newbie corner" might, after all, be a subtle insult...).

tomegun wrote:

It is not really possible to follow your message as you don't quote what you are replying to. Moreover, as the thread was closed I think that means we should stop the discussion ;-)

Hmm, I think it means cop-out for lack or proper arguments/responses... But ok, I'll let it slide, for now (mainly as I can't do much else).

tomegun wrote:

You are not meant to enable dbus.service as it is enabled unconditionally. To check the enabled/disabled state of your services try "systemctl list-unit-files". "static" means that you are not supposed to enabled/disable it.

Ah ok, thank you. Now, having abandoned all hope, I'll start configuring again and see how it goes... May the void protect me. If I die, grieve not for me, but remember me in the fight against hard-to-configure applications.

(edit/addon)
Actually, what am I supposed to do with "hwclock"? the List of Daemons only says that I shouldn't run that in tandem with ntpd, but I'm not running ntpd, so... How do I get hwclock with systemd?

Edited for additional question.

Last edited by incassum (2012-11-07 08:44:42)

Inxsible · 2012-11-07 17:28:29

tomegun wrote:

Moreover, as the thread was closed I think that means we should stop the discussion ;-)

This.

and incassum, do NOT start a new thread in reply to this one. As for your genuine issues, research them on the web/forums and if you are still stuck, open a new thread for each issue that you have.

Closing....

Arch Linux

#1 2012-11-05 14:45:18

Help with systemd problems/reply to closed thread

#2 2012-11-05 15:00:40

Re: Help with systemd problems/reply to closed thread

#3 2012-11-05 17:58:04

Re: Help with systemd problems/reply to closed thread

#4 2012-11-05 18:04:40

Re: Help with systemd problems/reply to closed thread

#5 2012-11-05 18:32:47

Re: Help with systemd problems/reply to closed thread

#6 2012-11-07 08:38:12

Re: Help with systemd problems/reply to closed thread

#7 2012-11-07 17:28:29

Re: Help with systemd problems/reply to closed thread

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