[OT] systemd (was Re: www.gnucash.org back online)

[GWB]

Geert,

Great, wonderful.  That's good news, and exactly the right direction
(IMHO).  So little or no threat to gnucash in user space from systemd
and gnome.  I should also add that I have not had a problem with the
gnucash servers (wiki, source, etc.) so whatever the set up is must be
working fine, with the usual slight hiccups.

Gordon

On Wed, Feb 8, 2017 at 4:21 AM, Geert Janssens
<geert.gnucash at kobaltwit.be> wrote:
> A very long thread jumping up and down between platforms...
>
> The only thing I want to add here is that while gnucash is listed as a gnome
> application on Ubuntu, it's not that tightly integrated that it depends on
> gnome let alone on systemd.
>
> It mostly uses the same gui toolkit (gtk). Apart from a few details that's
> about it. What's more the core is in the proces of being ported away from glib
> and friends to c++, freeing the program even more.
>
> Regards,
>
> Geert
>
> Op woensdag 8 februari 2017 00:45:51 CET schreef GWB:
>> Well, can we be off topic and just warn GnuCash users on Windows and
>> Mac (most of them?) from the beginning that they can skip reading this
>> thread?  It might apply more directly to GnuCash users on Ubuntu,
>> Debian, Linux, BSD, etc.
>>
>> It is worth noting that the various BSD's (OpenBSD, FreeBSD, NetBSD,
>> Dragonfly BSD) run gnucash quite well, but usually with an older
>> release than current.  However, gnucash requires many dependencies
>> along with X11, which some varieties of BSD consider a bloated
>> nuisance; OpenBSD, for example, has what it calls a "default X
>> environment", but the assumption is that the OpenBSD install will be a
>> server/router/firewall, so why bother?  I have used gnucash on FreeBSD
>> with xfce, and that works fine.  DragonFly BSD is an excellent little
>> distro, and does indeed have gnucash.  It also has Hammer FS, which is
>> a real accomplishment for a limited developer base.
>>
>> Where systemd may affect gnucash (in user space) directly is the
>> increasing integration between gnome and systemd.  I use ubuntu daily
>> as a "swiss army knife" type of OS to go between Windows, Mac and
>> Solaris, and both systemd and gnome seems way more complicated than
>> they have to be.  I'm not an expert, but if you find yourself
>> resorting to rc.local on a daily or weekly basis, that seems too
>> often.  Gnome apparently is moving toward a "tighter handshake" with
>> systemd.  Or, perhaps, systemd will eventually replace gnome.  Again,
>> I'm not an expert, but either development seems bad to me.  If you
>> can't login to a console, and then type "startx", run gnucash, and
>> then exit the X Windows session gracefully, then I see that as a
>> problem.
>>
>> But I can't see that affecting most gnucash users, who I'm guessing
>> are on Windows and Mac.  Gnucash users on Ubuntu might be affected;
>> gnucash is listed in the gnome "sub section", which I take it means
>> that a gnome installation provides the dependencies that gnucash needs
>> on Ubuntu.  So others will have to figure out how to proceed if gnome
>> and systemd become "too close", or if one replaces the other.  I don't
>> know enough to say.
>>
>> Where the BSD's shine, however, are as servers, routers, firewalls,
>> and a lot of other applications (Border Gateway Protocol routers) that
>> need to be fairly robust with a good level of security.  The pf
>> firewall is outstanding (hence its name in PFSense), I have had BSD
>> routers run for months without a problem, and intrusions are almost
>> nil (but that's always dependent on the sysadmin, no matter how good
>> the OS).
>>
>> But the convenience of Ubuntu or Debian in a Docker environment would
>> outweigh the effort of switching a container over to FreeBSD.
>> FreeBSD, perversely, also runs docker, which is odd because FreeBSD
>> has had "Jails" for years.  Gentoo might be a viable alternative, but
>> also more work than necessary.  SMF (in Solaris and SmartOS) does some
>> things very well, but I never got past the xml code in the manifest
>> files.
>>
>> I would not avoid Debian or Ubuntu because of systemd or gnome, but I
>> would want to have an alternative if necessary.  Gentoo is a
>> candidate; you can use runit, OpenRC, and dumb-init for linux
>> containers.  Systemd is also an option on Gentoo, if you want it.
>>
>> In user space, that means that one of the best reasons for using
>> gnucash is that it runs on a variety of OS platforms.  If one of them
>> becomes unworkable, switch to another, and still use gnucash.  When I
>> become annoyed by their political idiocy, or get tired of giving
>> MicroSoft or Apple too much money, I use BSD or linux.
>>
>> Gordon
>>
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