Re: [DNG] system administration of non-systemd distros and releases

[Simon]

Adrian Zaugg  wrote:

> One more thing: A management how decides on products their IT has to work 
> with, is like a team manager who tells a coach which player to send on the 
> ice 
> during a hockey game. A no-go. Technical decisions are IT decisions, 
> financial 
> and functional decisions are made by the management towards their IT. They 
> just don't know the technical finesses, hurdles and dependencies. They should 
> know about money and what is needed by the company.

In an ideal world, yes. But in practice there are a lot of managers who do get 
involved - and in my opinion that can be a good thing if done right.

I agree that a manager with no skills or knowledge making such decisions is a 
bad thing - but the reality is that it happens. They get taken in by the sharp 
suited salesman with a glossy sales pitch for the latest incarnation of 
proprietary lock-in rubbish; they get taken in by the “horror stories” they 
hear from their network (you only hear the bad news, like “we let the IT guy do 
something with Linux and it "; or simply they look around 
and go with the safety in numbers game (everyone else runs Windows, so Windows 
must be a good tool to use); and so on.

But, a manager’s job (the degree depending on their level and the size of the 
company) is to make things happen and in a way that will allow the company to 
carry on into the future. That means taking strategic decisions. So they might 
have to decide whether to shell out a huge amount of money (and putting the 
company at risk if there’s a downturn in sales in the short term) on automated 
tooling to make production cheaper and thus give them an advantage in the 
future.
And when it comes to IT, they should be involved in decision making as to the 
strategic direction they want to take. We may pooh-pooh the idea that a manager 
is involved, but in my experience it’s a good thing as long as their 
involvement is the right kind. It’s for us IT people to distill the complicated 
stuff to a level they can deal with (i.e. tailored to their skills/knowledge) 
and present them with the options :
You can do it with X which has these pros and cons; you can do it with Y which 
has these pros and cons; or you can do it with Z with these pros and cons. We 
recommend X because . 
And you need to be able to then have a conversation where the manager asks 
questions like “but most places are using Y, are they all wrong ?”, or “the 
world seems to be following Z, how can I be confident I'll still be able to 
find people to work with X in 5 years time ?”. These are not questions to be 
put down as not worthy of an answer (as Steph asserts), but they are valid 
questions that you need to be able to answer. And yes, sometimes the question 
will be a “daft” as “that nice Mr Salesman from company B assured me that W 
would fit our needs perfectly - why isn’t that in your list ?"
If you cannot have a conversation at that level with the mangers taking the 
strategic decisions and holding the purse strings then you’re not an IT manager.

> If a management manages to create a sustainable working environment, they 
> don't need to find anyone new so soon. They get longstanding IT workers who 
> care for "their" systems and lead the ones that step in, to get them 
> integrated to the team and the system that's in place. If the management 
> doesn't do it's job, they have to fear what they say, but then I'm also sure 
> the IT department lacks time, documentation and team spirit already today. 

Agreed. But my experience is that the management that doesn’t create the right 
environment is also unable to understand why people don’t stay, why sickness is 
high, why morale is low, why things don’t work smoothly, etc, etc. I’ve worked 
for a couple of that type - they think they are gods gift to IT and management 
and any suggestion that doesn’t fit their own ideas is automatically wrong. At 
one place, we had a saying about one manager - “it’s X’s way or no way”. And I 
can tell you, X really could not understand why people didn’t respect him.



steph.tougard via Dng  wrote:

> The question is so stupid that it does not even call for an answer.

Unfortunately, to the customer it does. If you can’t or won’t answer the 
question then you’ve lost the argument.

In one of the wholesalers I frequent, there’s a sign up behind the counter for 
their staff - it basically says “no one ever won an argument with a customer”. 
It then goes on to point out that the customer is the reason for them being 
there, the customer pays their wages, and so on.
Basically (and I know there are limits to this), if you want the customer’s 
business, you have to be prepared to answer their questions - even if you think 
the question is stupid.

> If an admin is unable to understand a Unix system without SystemD, he's not a 
> sys admin.

True. But I suspect there are now a lot of “admins” who really don’t have the 
skills outside of the toolset provided by SystemD. Just like there

Re: [DNG] system administration of non-systemd distros and releases

[steph.tougard via Dng]

> In one of the wholesalers I frequent, there’s a sign up behind the counter 
> for their staff - it basically says “no one ever won an argument with a 
> customer”. It then goes on to point out that the customer is the reason for 
> them being there, the customer pays their wages, and so on.
>
> Basically (and I know there are limits to this), if you want the customer’s 
> business, you have to be prepared to answer their questions - even if you 
> think the question is stupid.

That's not my point at all. My point is "do whatever the customer ask you to do 
or do not take the job". If a customer wants a SystemD distribution, I install 
a SystemD distribution. 99% of the system I manage are SystemD based, I do NOT 
care at all, I'm a sys admin, I can handle both SystemD and non SystemD based 
OS.

Now, if a customer wants a serious, stable and secure system, I install a *BSD 
and I configure and compile additional softwares one by one ... that's the 1%.

My real point is that SystemD is bloated, but GNU/Linux is bloated as well. Add 
SystemD does not change much, Linux systems have turned bad over the years 
because it's victim of its own success. Microsoft is even paying the salary of 
Linus Torvalds himself, thousands of people build thousands of unaudited 
software that we run blindly. Everybody comes to think that an updated system 
is a secure system, there is nothing more wrong than that. Updates have never 
brought any kind of security, they just bring "updates".

It's a good reaction that a minority of techies see the danger in SystemD and 
try to build alternative solution, it would be better if 99% of the software 
available in Devuan packages were removed and the 1% remained would be strongly 
audited. It would be good to have a non bloated Linux distribution.

Today, what is the Devuan base that can be considered safe to use ? I give you 
the answer : None. There is no OS base like BSD, no minimum that can be 
considered safe.

> True. But I suspect there are now a lot of “admins” who really don’t have the 
> skills outside of the toolset provided by SystemD. Just like there are a lot 
> of Windows admins who can’t cope with anything beyond randomly changing 
> settings in the GUI.

Good, more opportunities for people like me who can handle most kinds of UNIX 
systems.


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Re: [DNG] system administration of non-systemd distros and releases

[o1bigtenor via Dng]

On Sat, Nov 20, 2021 at 3:50 PM Bob Proulx via Dng 
wrote:

> Peter Duffy wrote:
> > I've recently been asked to recommend an upgrade route for a number of
> > linux servers, and I proposed going to devuan. In response, I've had a
> > concern raised which took me by surprise. It was suggested that in the
> > future, it may not be possible to find staff who have the skills to
> > administer and manage servers running non-systemd or pre-systemd
> > distros/releases.
>
> That's actually a concern that I think is valid.  Sad.  But valid.
> However it depends upon the scale of the timeline.
>
> You are working with them right now.  Are you expecting to do so over
>
> snip

> Most of us here though are more likely to be the people who do not see
> the defaults as hard limitations.  We will open things up.  We void
> warranties.  We make modifications.  We would rather be pilots than
> passengers.
>
> IMO a fairly cogent response.

< rant on
I'm here not so much because I want to be a pilot but because I want to
build the bloody plane (I'm a doer/tinkerer/fabricator and they're taking
my ability to do what I need to do away from me.
rant off>
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Re: [DNG] system administration of non-systemd distros and releases

[Rod Rodolico via Dng]

One possible point to make is that, while many system-d sysadmins may
have initial difficulty with Devuan, there are tons of Unix sysadmins
who would be up to speed in a manner of hours.

Debian, Redhat, etc... are actually more "based on Unix" than "Unix",
and that process appears to be growing as more and more functions are
taken over by system-d. Just like you can say that OS X is "based on"
Unix, but you can not call it Unix except in the broadest terms.

By requiring system-d on their machines, your admins are locking
themselves in to an experiment which may or may not be there in a few
years. I personally think it will survive, but then I said the same
thing about Novell Netware back in the 90's.

By going with a distribution that does not rely on system-d, your admins
are ensuring compatibility with Unix, a 50+ year old OS that has a
proven longevity.

Rod


On 11/19/21 5:29 AM, Peter Duffy wrote:
> I've recently been asked to recommend an upgrade route for a number of
> linux servers, and I proposed going to devuan. In response, I've had a
> concern raised which took me by surprise. It was suggested that in the
> future, it may not be possible to find staff who have the skills to
> administer and manage servers running non-systemd or pre-systemd
> distros/releases.
> 
> I've tried to give reassurance - but I'm still wondering if this could
> be a valid concern. I'd always taken the view that it's primarily the
> linux sysadmin community which is trying to stop the onslaught of the
> systemd juggernaut - but obviously, the greater the proportion of
> servers running systemd-based distros/releases, the less staff get
> exposed to non-systemd management techniques and tools.
> 
> I'd be grateful for thoughts and comments.
> 
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> 

-- 
Rod Rodolico
Daily Data, Inc.
POB 140465
Dallas TX 75214-0465 US
https://dailydata.net
214.827.2170 ext 100
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Re: [DNG] snetaid debs...

[aitor]

Hi,

On 6/11/21 10:36, al3xu5 via Dng wrote:

I tried to install the new packages on Beowulf:

- snetaid 1.0-1 package was installed, but I have:

$ sudo service snetaid status
/usr/sbin/snetaid: error while loading shared libraries: libnetaid.so.1:
cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory

- indeed when trying to install the libnetaid 1.0-1 I get a dependency
   error being required libc6>=2.29 ...


I've got the same error in Void Linux due to other reasons. Setting the 
environmental variable:

|export LD_LIBRARY_PATH=/usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu|

solved the issue, as you can see in the following screenshot:

https://www.gnuinos.org/simple-netaid/simple-netaid_voidlinux.png  


However, simple-netaid is not working 100% in Void Linux yet, though there is 
not much left:

- Configure the runit scripts for snetaid in /etc/sv/snetaid.

- Install ifupdown, a runtime dependency.

Cheers,

Aitor.


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