After four years of using systemd, the Debian-based distribution Knoppix removed the controversial initialization system.
This Sunday (August 18, *) the 8.6 version of the popular Linux distribution Knoppix, based on Debian, was released. This release is based on Debian 10 (Buster), which was released on July 9, with several packages from the testing and unstable branches to support new graphics cards. Knoppix is one of the first live-CD Linux distributions and still enjoys great popularity among enthusiasts.
Knoppix 8.6 is the first public version of the distribution that has abandoned systemd, the initialization system developed by Lennart Poettering from Red Hat, designed to replace sysvinit. While the adaptation of systemd has been a subject of controversy and criticism, it is currently the default choice in the mainstream. It is used upstream in Knoppix — Debian; RHEL, CentOS, and Fedora; openSUSE and SLES, as well as in Mageia and Arch.
Dissatisfaction with systemd is mainly related to the excessive functions taken on by the subsystem, as the project does not align with the core Unix philosophy of 'doing one thing and doing it well.' Other aspects, such as logs in binary format (as opposed to human-readable text logs), also draw criticism.
Technically, the first version of Knoppix that removed systemd was 8.5; however, this version was distributed exclusively with print copies of Linux Magazine Germany earlier this year and was not available for public download. The creator of Knoppix, Klaus Knopper, briefly wrote about the decision to remove systemd in this version (translation from German, links added for context):
"The still controversial startup systemd, which only recently provoked outrage due to security vulnerabilities,was integrated into Debian starting from version 8.0 (Jessie) and was removed beginning with the release of Knoppix 8.5. I bypassed the strict dependencies with the boot system using my own packages (patches. *).
To maintain systemd-like session management, and thus retain the ability to shut down and restart the system from a regular user, I used the elogind session manager. This avoided systemd's interference with many system components and reduced the complexity of the system as a whole. If you need to run your own services at startup, you do not need to create any systemd units, just list your services in the text file /etc/rc.local which contains examples with explanations.
Knoppix used systemd from 2014 to 2019, becoming the second in a very short list of distributions that integrated and then abandoned systemd — Void Linux being the first on that list. In 2016, a Debian fork was created — Devuan, built around the systemd-free philosophy. (There is a similar fork of Arch Linux — Artix, which uses openRC. *)
Knoppix also comes with a system for people with disabilities, ADRIANE (Audio Desktop Reference Implementation And Networking Environment), which is a 'speaking menu system designed to facilitate work and internet access for computer novices, even if they do not have visual contact with the computer screen,' optionally includes a screen magnifier system based on Compiz.
* — translator's note
Source: linux.org.ru
