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On 23/02/2014 20:18, Canek Peláez Valdés wrote: |
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> I don't think forking would attract much developers. Writing something |
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> new trying to follow "the*nix design principles", but being modern and |
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> with the same features (all of them optional, of course) of systemd |
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> will have more chances; although I think it will fail because most of |
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> the people that can code "better" actually like the systemd design, |
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> and would prefer to contribute to it. |
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> |
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> And if you found enough of this mythical good-coders, good luck |
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> defining what it means "the*nix design principles". |
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I've been wondering about this concept of "the*nix design principles"... |
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I've now concluded it's a myth, much like invisible pink unicorns. |
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Is it like the kernel? A huge monolithic chunk of code with support for |
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modules? |
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Is it like X11? A huge monolithic chunk of code that has a bizarre build |
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system for years, and took something like 5 years of hard work to get it |
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modular? And is 20 years behind the times? And *still* requires devs to |
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jump through hoops to get a rendered image through a compositor and back |
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up the the GPU? |
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Is it like perl? Support every possible way to do something if it |
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remotely makes sense to do it, no matter how bizarre the syntax? |
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Is it like python? Pick ONE way to do it and stick with it dammit! |
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Is it like php? Do whatever you feel like? |
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Is it like command line text processing tools that only do one narrow |
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thing well? [1] |
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Is it like bash? I can't find a decent description of how bash came to |
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be except it's like Vogons - wasn't designed and didn't evolve, it just |
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sort of ... congealed |
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Not to rain on anyone's parade, but there's a prize of 40 internets up |
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for the first person who can clearly and unambiguously define "Unix |
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design principles" with specificity so that it is globally applicable. |
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Best I can come up with is "Use common sense and build stuff that can be |
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used and maintained" which is wonderfully descriptive but really sucks |
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as a definition. |
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[1] For lack of a better term, let's just call systemd here a "system |
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controller". What is this ONE thing a system controller should do and do |
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it well? |
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-- |
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Alan McKinnon |
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alan.mckinnon@×××××.com |
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