http://lkcl.net/reports/removing_systemd_from_debian/
i've documented the process by which it is possible to run some of the debian desktop window managers (TDE, fvwm, twm etc.) without the need for systemd or libsystemd0 or any components related to systemd whatsoever. the process is not without difficulties, however out of (at the time of writing) only two people who have followed this procedure, i was the one that ended up having to disable udev: the other individual had a working system (devoid of libsystemd0) purely by following only the instructions to alter and replace bsdutils from the util-linux package. the reasons for demonstrating that this is possible have absolutely nothing to do with my *personal* (technically-based) dislike of systemd, although my reasons for actually removing libsystemd0 from personal systems *are* based on a technical assessment (mostly with a sysadmin eye). but, i repeat: my *personal* choice has *nothing to do* with the reason for posting this documentation. the reason for demonstrating that this is possible is because nobody has yet made it clear to either the upstream developers - or to the distro maintainers who unfortunately are caught in the crossfire - that systemd's unilateral adoption is fast becoming an "all-or-nothing" polarised choice that reminds me keenly of the polarised Microsoft Monopoly power and dominance of the late 1990s. and that *really is it*. the technical issues are completely irrelevant: those can and will be solved. already we have evdev, mdev, devuan, uselessd and many more, but those technical options are *COMPLETELY SHUT OUT* by the exclusive - monopolistic - position that systemd now has. to illustrate the dominance of libsystemd0, if you carry out an "apt-get --purge remove libsystemd0", *all* of the packages and many more on the following PNG will be removed: http://anfo.slavino.sk/libsystemd-journal0.png that list is woefully incomplete, so i have generated a current list using apt-rdepends -r libsystemd0 | some manual magic | sort | uniq. http://lkcl.net/reports/removing_systemd_from_debian/list_of_libsystemd0_dependent_packages.txt the list is a whopping 4,583 packages (from the current debian/testing). apache2-dev, androidsdk, apt-cacher-ng, avahi-daemon, blender, bluetooth, bochs, cairo-dock, calligra, consolekit, cups-daemon, cups-core-drivers, cups-driver-gutenprint, dbus - this is just a few major software libre packages i can see in the the first 9% of the list that are affected (cannot be installed) should anyone exercise their right to choose *not* to have libsystemd0 on their machines. even dh is on the list. erlang is on the list! kde, gimp, xfce, lxde, gnome, libreoffice, xine, mediawiki, mplayer, network-manager, openjdk-7, phonon, php (??? why is php dependent on libsystemd0??), pidgin, policykit-1, postfixadmin (??), pulseaudio, qemu, syslog-ng, vlc, wicd (client and server), xbase-clients (??), x11-apps (??), xbmc, xchat... those are just ones that i recognise out of the 4,500+ packages that are not permitted to be installed. so the short and long of it is: i do not like it when people are not given the freedom to choose... and that includes when, just like when microsoft was so dominant in the 1990s, the choices they are presented are not really a choice at all. what i have done therefore is to show how to modify the debian packages for policykit-1, dbus, pulseaudio and util-linux, such that libsystemd0 may be entirely removed. removal of libsystemd0 from those packages trims that list of several thousand unilaterally-excluded packages *significantly*. this process comes with a price: i had to disable udev, and i had to re-enable the keyboard and mouse sections in xorg.conf that i had added years ago. however, already within hours of the report's publication i have received word from one other person who did *not* have the same extensive difficulties that i encountered: udev (unmodified) worked perfectly for them. in a follow-up message they did however explain that they have successfully installed and then removed (at an earlier point) a source-compiled version of mdev, which illustrates that they have some quite significant experience in maintaining a hybrid of standard debian packages and system-critical packages compiled directly from source. so, in short, i have two key things to say. to debian-users: you don't have complete choice (yet), but i have demonstrated with a few hours work that there is a way to run (certain) desktop environments without requiring libsystemd0 or any of its dependencies, and after a little investigation there do appear to be people working hard to give you your right to choose what software to run *without* having to abandon debian. to debian-developers: the technical issues are irrelevant (and can always be solved over time) - it's that you are complicit in removing people's software freedom right to choose what to run on their system: that is why so many users are upset with you. and that really is not a judgement, it's simply an insightful summarising statement of fact: you have the right to choose whether the situation that you are complicit in is something that you find acceptable or whether you do not. i leave it entirely to you to decide. l. -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-devel-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of "unsubscribe". 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