Surviving systemd

Presented at May Contain Hackers (MCH2022), July 23, 2022, 8 p.m. (90 minutes)

At its core, systemd is a "system and service manager - an init system used to bootstrap user space and manage user processes. It also provides replacements for various daemons and utilities, including device management, login management, network connection management, and event logging" for Linux operating systems. (Wikipedia) Or, to take it more wildly: "systemd takes all the init features formerly implemented with sticky tape, shell script hacks, and the sweat of administrators and formalizes them in a unified field theory of how services should be configured, accessed, and managed." Let me help you to survive. At its core, systemd is a "system and service manager - an init system used to bootstrap user space and manage user processes. It also provides replacements for various daemons and utilities, including device management, login management, network connection management, and event logging" for Linux operating systems. (Wikipedia) Systemd is in use in most distributions, so, when using Linux, you presumably do not have a choice like 'take it or leave it'. You can't avoid it. You just have to bite the bullet. This talk is also aimed at diehards, to whom I say: "Ignore the controversy for a bit and give systemd a chance to win your love" Let me assist you. I was asked to make this presentation in 2020 because ... no such thing was available. When looking at the courses conducted by a Dutch UNIX/Linux training company, I must say: they tell you about systemd, but the details are somewhat scattered among their sysadmin training courses. Nowadays YMMV. So I happily started making the presentation and used this for the introduction: "systemd takes all the init features formerly implemented with sticky tape, shell script hacks, and the sweat of administrators and formalizes them in a unified field theory of how services should be configured, accessed, and managed." The presentation is interspersed with hands on parts, in which I use many examples to give you an idea of how to use those hundreds of commands and thousands of options. I also found a way to circumvent typing errors.

Presenters:

  • gait
    p r o f e s s i o n a l   Supporter of Open Source   Always aiming at practical results, but sometimes the result must not only be sturdy but also look nice   Loyal, heart for the cause, insipring, flexible   Information comes in two kinds: either you know it or you know where to find it  professional   Sense of security (physical and digital)     l e i s u r e   &   h o b b y   Running   (Mountain) hiking Typography Topography Honorary member NLUUG (The NLUUG unites professional users of Open Systems and Open Standards in the Netherlands) and member of the Program Committee (organizing vEvents, virtual seminars, rather than conferences).   Board member of an Owners' Association

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