Further validation of our decision to move to Debian (as if the sluggish kernel updates and ramming of snaps down our throats weren’t enough). We migrated a few hundred lab machines this summer, and have around half of our servers and containers switched over. It has gone very smoothly.
To many of us it's not about the features which you obliquely refer to when you say "evolve" but about licensing. It's extremely concerning that we're replacing GPL stuff for non GPL, and just as concerning that so many folks don't recognise this point.
Licensing is downstream of software existing. The person who actually writes software gets to make the license. If you want a GPL one you have to make that.
Maybe the GPL people need to get with the times, then. LLVM exists largely because the GCC people were so obstinate. I'm a big believer in copyleft software, but it only works if people want to use your software with their projects.
LLVM was supposed to be a virtual machine initially, hence the (original) name: Low-level virtual machine. The direction that it took, and especially the development of Clang: that was at least partially because of GCC's intentional anti-modularity.
If you read the article you would know this is a regression, not an improvement. Stuff breaking silently is never good. If you change config options error when you read the config file that no longer works.
> At least the command is still called sudo or run0
You're happy it's a knockoff?
> would have been a much more breaking change
All these "Rust rewrite" projects are creating breaking changes all over the place, whilst solving no real problems. They can shove them up their arses.
It’s not a knockoff. They have a friendly relationship with the original creator of sudo. And their work helps uncover bugs of the original sudo so they send fixes upstream.
Friendly relationship or not, the end user experience is that something that was working, no longer is, because it's not feature compatible. This is despite it being used to replace it under the same name. If it had been `runas` or anything else it'd be fine.
There's a strong principle in upstream Linux kernel about "You don't break userspace"[1], that I really wish more folks would get into their heads, but most especially a variant "You don't subtly break userspace".
If you're going to replace an existing binary, under the same name, you need to be like-for-like in commands, even if your guts are completely different. Very few people give a damn about how it's actually implemented, just does it do what they need it to do.
If you want to do things differently, do it under a different name and have it be an explicit break for an end user by not shipping with the original and let people choose to install it if they really don't want the new thing. Breaking things subtly is completely unacceptable.
Sudoers glob expressions are a horrible footgun and I have little empathy for anyone complaining about their removal, especially when it’s trivial to fix with 3 extra (explicit) lines.
Ayenertia, 'tis not to be under-estimated. Tis why, with certainty, many a hacker here maintain some rudimentary Facebook account despite an open disdain for Meta.
I started off with Ubuntu in the 2010s because I wanted to try out Linux but was sure as hell didn't have the patience nor resources to make consumer conveniences like WiFi just work. The local LUG was also heavily promoting it; that's even more inertia.
Then I got fancy and started really customizing my configuration---I got a dotfiles repo. The oldest commit touching a top-level file in my dotfiles is 11 years ago (almost unthinkable to me!). I haven't really tried it out on any other distro but I'm pretty sure I've written some shim or personal bash command relying on something Ubuntu-specific.
I happen to be in the market for a new laptop right now. I'm looking at Starlabs but unfortunately they do not ship with Debian. Today, however, I saw a random woman in a cafe with Linux Mint so that might be my sign to investigate that ecosystem.
I run Ubuntu on my framework laptop. I still run Win11 on my desktops to play games and to have less faff when remoting into work.
I want the simplest possible experience. There is more documentation for Ubuntu, which means things are more likely to work. Or if they don’t work, someone might have posted about the issue.
sudo being slightly different doesn’t make a difference for me when my laptop experience of sudo is “sudo apt …”.
There's a lot of inertia. That is leading to various major companies shipping their software for, and only supporting, Ubuntu, and if you're lucky Red Hat.
Ubuntu typically has more packages available and newer versions of them, besides supporting PPAs and Snaps to expand the easily available software.
Also, Gnome and KDE are both horribly unintuitive for newcomers. Ubuntu makes a several tweaks to Gnome to make it more user-friendly. Debian just gives a list of names and says to choose one or more.
From my experience, Kubuntu barely changes anything about KDE these days, and that's a good thing, too. I compile my own KDE on my usual machines, but I also have stock Kubuntu on one, and it's pretty much the same.
One reason is that we have a lot of developers who get into programming in the last 10 years. Ubuntu was catering directly to "beginners". Many people who only used Ubuntu because they wanted "a linux" never really reconsidered and just use what they know (and often don't even know there are other options).
Seems in Linux land, compatibly, even between distros, is going out the window. :(
Individuals can deal with that, but companies will have a hard time. You would think the Linux Foundation (LF) would chime in with all these differences. But they seem more concerned with AI than Linux these days.
If it was up to me, I would standardize on OpenBSD's doas, but me doing that would make for more incompatibilities.
my weekend project is moving them over to debian.
it pains me, ubuntu used to be “the” linux i would point people to. the “un-fuckup-able” thing people should try if they’re switching.
At least the command is still called sudo or run0. Changing it to doas would have been a much more breaking change.
Alas, TFA blocks me with no workaround because I'm using Tor Browser so I can't read about the nature of the changes.
sudo-rs is MIT-licensed: https://github.com/trifectatechfoundation/sudo-rs/blob/main/...
Perhaps you are thinking of uutils? https://github.com/uutils/coreutils/blob/main/LICENSE
They are slow-rolling the cancellation of Stallman's connection to the OS because their first attempt failed.
In 10 years, no one will have heard of GNU after all components have been replaced with corporate clones.
I hope this copy works https://pastebin.com/mxAZyQJL (I was surprised the website even blocked archive.ph with "suspicious old browser")
Great, then give it a new name.
> At least the command is still called sudo or run0
You're happy it's a knockoff?
> would have been a much more breaking change
All these "Rust rewrite" projects are creating breaking changes all over the place, whilst solving no real problems. They can shove them up their arses.
There's a strong principle in upstream Linux kernel about "You don't break userspace"[1], that I really wish more folks would get into their heads, but most especially a variant "You don't subtly break userspace".
If you're going to replace an existing binary, under the same name, you need to be like-for-like in commands, even if your guts are completely different. Very few people give a damn about how it's actually implemented, just does it do what they need it to do.
If you want to do things differently, do it under a different name and have it be an explicit break for an end user by not shipping with the original and let people choose to install it if they really don't want the new thing. Breaking things subtly is completely unacceptable.
[1] espoused really clearly, as part of an infamous rant https://lore.kernel.org/all/CA+55aFy98A+LJK4+GWMcbzaa1zsPBRo...
Starting anew WILL introduce new bugs. This is a statistical certainty.
Most Rust rewrites are justified upon imaginary boogeymen. The complex security nightmares of 'cp' 'ls' and 'rm' were begging for a new design.
Holy fuck are Rust people all petty activists?
Stop spending every waking minute telling everyone how great it is and making knockoff clones of 40 year old software and go solve new problems.
I remember 20 years ago Ubuntu was marginally more user friendly. Is it the power of inertia? Ubuntu is just Debian actively made worse.
I started off with Ubuntu in the 2010s because I wanted to try out Linux but was sure as hell didn't have the patience nor resources to make consumer conveniences like WiFi just work. The local LUG was also heavily promoting it; that's even more inertia.
Then I got fancy and started really customizing my configuration---I got a dotfiles repo. The oldest commit touching a top-level file in my dotfiles is 11 years ago (almost unthinkable to me!). I haven't really tried it out on any other distro but I'm pretty sure I've written some shim or personal bash command relying on something Ubuntu-specific.
I happen to be in the market for a new laptop right now. I'm looking at Starlabs but unfortunately they do not ship with Debian. Today, however, I saw a random woman in a cafe with Linux Mint so that might be my sign to investigate that ecosystem.
I want the simplest possible experience. There is more documentation for Ubuntu, which means things are more likely to work. Or if they don’t work, someone might have posted about the issue.
sudo being slightly different doesn’t make a difference for me when my laptop experience of sudo is “sudo apt …”.
Also, Gnome and KDE are both horribly unintuitive for newcomers. Ubuntu makes a several tweaks to Gnome to make it more user-friendly. Debian just gives a list of names and says to choose one or more.
It is mostly just inertia though.
Individuals can deal with that, but companies will have a hard time. You would think the Linux Foundation (LF) would chime in with all these differences. But they seem more concerned with AI than Linux these days.
If it was up to me, I would standardize on OpenBSD's doas, but me doing that would make for more incompatibilities.