Gnome OS? systemd as a dependency

sand_man · 2011-05-19 06:01:23

Sorry if this has been discussed already but I am really shocked at these comments by gnome devs. What are they thinking?
http://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2011/05/gnom … laris-unix

[edit]
I think it's just the view of one developer and not an official goal of gnome. Let's hope it doesn't happen.

Last edited by sand_man (2011-05-19 06:10:12)

fukawi2 · 2011-05-19 06:14:03

Assuming it does....

As if Gnome 3.0 wasn't good enough reason to switch, 3.2 will definitely be!

guisacouto · 2011-05-19 10:32:50

At first I thought 'omg', but if you take a second thought, this could be good. Not only for the noob user but to every gnome user (not my case).
Gnome devs building they're own distro could give other distros a more stable prototype, and show them the right way to have a stable gnome environment. This would be a lot more easyer for them to debug the DE (gnome devs), since they're not thinking about the all linux distro world, but just they're distro.

best regards

WorMzy · 2011-05-19 11:14:03

The GNOME devs have lost the plot, so what else is new?

sand_man · 2011-05-19 23:33:38

guisacouto wrote:

At first I thought 'omg', but if you take a second thought, this could be good. Not only for the noob user but to every gnome user (not my case).
Gnome devs building they're own distro could give other distros a more stable prototype, and show them the right way to have a stable gnome environment. This would be a lot more easyer for them to debug the DE (gnome devs), since they're not thinking about the all linux distro world, but just they're distro.
best regards

Up until now gnome has always been a desktop environment for UNIX like systems. Now what they are suggesting is turning their back on everything but Linux. This won't be another Linux distribution, this will be an attempt at a complete operating system.

flamelab · 2011-05-19 23:44:32

I really hope they won't push as a dependency of gnome-shell the existence of systemd on our systems. I will -Rcns any gnome libs in a sec.

zodmaner · 2011-05-20 08:45:59

Isn't the dev who proposed to make systemd a dependency of Gnome also the author of systemd? No conflict of interest at all.

But seriously, first Pulseaudio and now systemd? What's with Gnome people lately?

Last edited by zodmaner (2011-05-20 09:41:12)

Awebb · 2011-05-20 09:35:55

The more I read "news" about Linux relevant software and organizations, the more I feel the urge to learn how to use tools like screen and tmux and how to hack together my own Desktop using whatever I find.

dejavu · 2011-05-20 13:44:01

First I have to say, that I think this a good news / decision...

Gnome 3 is a desktop environment for desktops and not servers. So everything which could be handy for using a desktop should be integrated.
For Example: If you click in nautilus on a nfs share, probably then some routine can check if the "daemon" is started, and if not it could be started automatically...
Also I like the integration of pulseaudio. Sure if someone had troubles with this software, then I'm sorry, but this guy has also the option to send a bug report...

If someone doesn't like the development of Gnome, there is also Xfce. I think it's currently nearly on par with Gnome 2, so everyone affected should be happy.

If someone uses BSD, then he will probably use it as a server, and then he doesn't need Gnome 3.

So this is my "current" opinion about this topic...

Best Regards

guisacouto · 2011-05-20 13:47:54

sand_man wrote:

guisacouto wrote:
At first I thought 'omg', but if you take a second thought, this could be good. Not only for the noob user but to every gnome user (not my case).
Gnome devs building they're own distro could give other distros a more stable prototype, and show them the right way to have a stable gnome environment. This would be a lot more easyer for them to debug the DE (gnome devs), since they're not thinking about the all linux distro world, but just they're distro.
best regards
Up until now gnome has always been a desktop environment for UNIX like systems. Now what they are suggesting is turning their back on everything but Linux. This won't be another Linux distribution, this will be an attempt at a complete operating system.

I completely disagree with abandoning BSD and etc.. it really isn't fair. But what concerns the OS per se, what I understood was that it was going to be linux based, so how can it not be a distribution? If it runs linux kernel then its a linux distro in my point of view (am I seeing this wrong?).

ANOKNUSA · 2011-05-20 15:42:14

As I commented on the OMGU! page, this is nothing new. If they want to do something in this vein, it shouldn't come as a surprise. Thing is, discussion over this issue among end users is probably going to die long before work on GNOME OS ever makes serious progress. It takes quite a long time for GNOME devs to get together and make drastic progress on any project, and by the time they get around to doing this they'll have had ample time to soak in the opinions of everyone they'd be disregarding (BSD, Solaris, etc.). They have every right to do what they want, but think about it: what's gonna make GNOME OS so good that people who currently use GNOME will give up their long-time distros of choice for it? This won't go anywhere fast.

There was also a follow-up to this yesterday, in which it was pointed out that a) this could be hacked around, if the devs/maintainers of a given distro wanted to do the work; and b) the tools they wish to use to do this aren't even up to snuff, and it'll take time before the even the idea of a GNOME operating system could be described as "elegant" or some such. It also seems to make the whole idea seem reallly superficial.

Cosmin · 2011-05-20 16:14:03

zodmaner wrote:

Isn't the dev who proposed to make systemd a dependency of Gnome also the author of systemd? No conflict of interest at all.
But seriously, first Pulseaudio and now systemd? What's with Gnome people lately?

It's just the same guy the pulseaudio dev is the systemd dev, but I think he is doing a very good job.

Mad Fish · 2011-05-20 18:48:22

Who uses other kernels (*BSD, Solaris) on desktop? Really? They are INSANELY lagging behind for desktop usage in comparison to Linux (especially in graphics stack).
If being Linux-specific adds value, then it's the right way to go. It's the task of other OS developers to adapt software for their needs. There is no need for upstream to care about unimportant kernels.

Misfit138 · 2011-05-20 22:31:43

Mad Fish wrote:

Who uses other kernels (*BSD, Solaris) on desktop? Really? They are INSANELY lagging behind for desktop usage in comparison to Linux (especially in graphics stack).
If being Linux-specific adds value, then it's the right way to go. It's the task of other OS developers to adapt software for their needs. There is no need for upstream to care about unimportant kernels.

I think you have a point.

As for creating its own OS; I would actually love to see it. Why not?
I use KDE anyway.

sand_man · 2011-05-21 11:27:26

Mad Fish wrote:

There is no need for upstream to care about unimportant kernels.

And the same could be said about Microsoft and what they plan to do with Skype.

guisacouto · 2011-05-21 15:08:55

sand_man wrote:

Mad Fish wrote:
There is no need for upstream to care about unimportant kernels.
And the same could be said about Microsoft and what they plan to do with Skype.

True story! BSD is most of the time as important to a Linux software dev, as Linux is to M$. That is not right, neither fair.
It's normal to see m$ having this behaviour, but not the opensource community, and I wouldn't like to see this becoming a normal attitude.

litemotiv · 2011-05-21 16:20:20

guisacouto wrote:

True story! BSD is most of the time as important to a Linux software dev, as Linux is to M$. That is not right, neither fair.
It's normal to see m$ having this behaviour, but not the opensource community, and I wouldn't like to see this becoming a normal attitude.

Who told you that open source is a synonym for 'keeping everybody happy'? How is that even a feasible philosophy when you want to get anything done?

flamelab · 2011-05-21 22:38:03

Cosmin wrote:

zodmaner wrote:
Isn't the dev who proposed to make systemd a dependency of Gnome also the author of systemd? No conflict of interest at all.
But seriously, first Pulseaudio and now systemd? What's with Gnome people lately?
It's just the same guy the pulseaudio dev is the systemd dev, but I think he is doing a very good job.

IMHO, he doesn't. Pulseaudio is the source of serious pain and medical prescriptions for pills for many-many users, including me.

Misfit138 · 2011-05-22 02:37:18

flamelab wrote:

Cosmin wrote:
zodmaner wrote:
Isn't the dev who proposed to make systemd a dependency of Gnome also the author of systemd? No conflict of interest at all.
But seriously, first Pulseaudio and now systemd? What's with Gnome people lately?
It's just the same guy the pulseaudio dev is the systemd dev, but I think he is doing a very good job.
IMHO, he doesn't. Pulseaudio is the source of serious pain and medical prescriptions for pills for many-many users, including me.

Agreed. Pulseaudio is a terrible piece of software in my experience. The concept of Pulseaudio serves to further complicate an otherwise already complex system. It has never offered me any benefits on any system and I fail to see why Ubuntu embraced it not long ago.

Wikipedia wrote:

In a typical installation scenario under Linux, the user configures ALSA to use a virtual device provided by PulseAudio. Thus, applications using ALSA will output sound to PulseAudio, which then uses ALSA itself to access the real sound card.

Sounds horrendous already.

Last edited by Misfit138 (2011-05-22 02:38:28)

ngoonee · 2011-05-22 07:19:51

Misfit138 wrote:

flamelab wrote:
IMHO, he doesn't. Pulseaudio is the source of serious pain and medical prescriptions for pills for many-many users, including me.
Agreed. Pulseaudio is a terrible piece of software in my experience. The concept of Pulseaudio serves to further complicate an otherwise already complex system. It has never offered me any benefits on any system and I fail to see why Ubuntu embraced it not long ago.

Pulseaudio is, from a user perspective, a simplification of the system. Better integration, abstraction of the underlying complexities (your BT headset 'looks' the same to you as your internal soundcard as your USB speakers), per-app volume and on-the-fly moving of sound streams. ALSA only recently set dmix to default, and that is still over-rided when apps want to use OSS emulation. OSSv4 is good but lacks the driver support ALSA has (which pulseaudio then uses).

It is not really KISS from the Arch viewpoint, but it makes the user's life simpler. That's why its now default in just about every mainstream distro. Linux sound is broken, pulseaudio makes it better (in my experience). Standardization is a good thing at such a fundamental level.

Misfit138 wrote:

Wikipedia wrote:
In a typical installation scenario under Linux, the user configures ALSA to use a virtual device provided by PulseAudio. Thus, applications using ALSA will output sound to PulseAudio, which then uses ALSA itself to access the real sound card.
Sounds horrendous already.

ALSA has a user-space component and a kernel-level (audio drivers) component. Normally, the user-level component communicates to the kernel-level component. Pulseaudio replaces the user-level component, and for backward-compatibility emulates ALSA's user-level component as well (does so almost flawlessly on updated systems btw). Its not a back-and-forth trip, as the quote would make it seem. The same thing is done by JACK, for example, and isn't called horrendous there. The alternative would be not providing ALSA emulation, which would basically break all apps which don't have native pulseaudio output (the list is getting much smaller over time).

Awebb · 2011-05-22 07:37:03

So the following might or might not happen:
1. Gnome 3.2 comes with systemd as a dependency.
2. Arch drops Gnome packages since systemd <-> arch init
3. "ARCH, Y U NO HAVE GNOME"
4. systemd moves from community to extra
5. "I installed gnome (I heard it's cool) and removed gnome (it's ugly), now my machine does not boot anymore"
6. systemd removal entry on Gnome Wiki page.
~ FIN ~

Somewhat related: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=20Jcrk6jGfo

ngoonee · 2011-05-22 08:28:44

Awebb wrote:

So the following might or might not happen:
1. Gnome 3.2 comes with systemd as a dependency.
2. Arch drops Gnome packages since systemd <-> arch init
3. "ARCH, Y U NO HAVE GNOME"
4. systemd moves from community to extra
5. "I installed gnome (I heard it's cool) and removed gnome (it's ugly), now my machine does not boot anymore"
6. systemd removal entry on Gnome Wiki page.
~ FIN ~
Somewhat related: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=20Jcrk6jGfo

Or, possibly, changes are made to systemd to split off its interface from its implementation (Lennart having already indicated that would be possible and perhaps desirable) which would allow other init systems like sysvinit to be used with some modification.

Leonid.I · 2011-05-22 17:12:11

Mad Fish wrote:

Who uses other kernels (*BSD, Solaris) on desktop? Really? They are INSANELY lagging behind for desktop usage in comparison to Linux (especially in graphics stack).
If being Linux-specific adds value, then it's the right way to go. It's the task of other OS developers to adapt software for their needs. There is no need for upstream to care about unimportant kernels.

Indeed. Somehow people are quick to accuse gnome of neglecting other un*x platforms, but forget that BSDs so far lack KMS support, actively pushed by intel, which make these OSs useless on a desktop with intel gma chpis. So, who is to blame here?

The decision of gnome devs to heavily rely on pulseaudio and systemd is justified: users want more and more from their machines. Of course, this means that software becomes more complex, and DIY distros, like arch or gentoo, are going to be left behind. I am sure that 99% of claims like "{consolekit,pulse,...} is a pain" just come from users being unable to configure them properly...

Misfit138 · 2011-05-22 21:43:15

Leonid.I wrote:

...I am sure that 99% of claims like "{consolekit,pulse,...} is a pain" just come from users being unable to configure them properly...

There is truth to this to be sure, but I resent having to configure yet another layer of abstraction which is supposedly attempting a 'centralized' approach.

ngoonee · 2011-05-23 00:21:40

Misfit138 wrote:

Leonid.I wrote:
...I am sure that 99% of claims like "{consolekit,pulse,...} is a pain" just come from users being unable to configure them properly...
There is truth to this to be sure, but I resent having to configure yet another layer of abstraction which is supposedly attempting a 'centralized' approach.

Our KISS is diametrically opposed to the direction being taken by the big DEs, so there's not much to be done about the 'culture clash'. I like KISS, but understand that it involves me doing more work than perhaps is strictly necessary to get things running. The important thing, on Arch, is that I maintain control of my system, a bit more googling and messing around with arcane configs (xml is the worst) is a small price to pay for that.

Arch Linux

#1 2011-05-19 06:01:23

Gnome OS? systemd as a dependency

#2 2011-05-19 06:14:03

Re: Gnome OS? systemd as a dependency

#3 2011-05-19 10:32:50

Re: Gnome OS? systemd as a dependency

#4 2011-05-19 11:14:03

Re: Gnome OS? systemd as a dependency

#5 2011-05-19 23:33:38

Re: Gnome OS? systemd as a dependency

#6 2011-05-19 23:44:32

Re: Gnome OS? systemd as a dependency

#7 2011-05-20 08:45:59

Re: Gnome OS? systemd as a dependency

#8 2011-05-20 09:35:55

Re: Gnome OS? systemd as a dependency

#9 2011-05-20 13:44:01

Re: Gnome OS? systemd as a dependency

#10 2011-05-20 13:47:54

Re: Gnome OS? systemd as a dependency

#11 2011-05-20 15:42:14

Re: Gnome OS? systemd as a dependency

#12 2011-05-20 16:14:03

Re: Gnome OS? systemd as a dependency

#13 2011-05-20 18:48:22

Re: Gnome OS? systemd as a dependency

#14 2011-05-20 22:31:43

Re: Gnome OS? systemd as a dependency

#15 2011-05-21 11:27:26

Re: Gnome OS? systemd as a dependency

#16 2011-05-21 15:08:55

Re: Gnome OS? systemd as a dependency

#17 2011-05-21 16:20:20

Re: Gnome OS? systemd as a dependency

#18 2011-05-21 22:38:03

Re: Gnome OS? systemd as a dependency

#19 2011-05-22 02:37:18

Re: Gnome OS? systemd as a dependency

#20 2011-05-22 07:19:51

Re: Gnome OS? systemd as a dependency

#21 2011-05-22 07:37:03

Re: Gnome OS? systemd as a dependency

#22 2011-05-22 08:28:44

Re: Gnome OS? systemd as a dependency

#23 2011-05-22 17:12:11

Re: Gnome OS? systemd as a dependency

#24 2011-05-22 21:43:15

Re: Gnome OS? systemd as a dependency

#25 2011-05-23 00:21:40

Re: Gnome OS? systemd as a dependency

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