this post was submitted on 22 Mar 2026

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Surge in Systemd forks after the latest changes (github.com)

submitted 1 week ago by pglpm@lemmy.ca to c/linux@lemmy.world

34 comments fedilink hide all child comments

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ca/post/62192988

The latest changes implemented in the Systemd repo, related to or prompted by age-verification laws, have made many people unhappy (I suppose links about this aren't necessary). This has led to a surge in Systemd forks during the last days ("surge" because there have always been plenty of forks). Here are some forks that explicitly mention those changes as their reason for forking (rough time ordering taken from the fork page):

paramazo/systemd "The systemd System and Service Manager without age verification"

ganitam/systemd "Systemd fork just before the Age Verification addition. Hoping more capable developers and maintainers do same.."

GSYT-Productions/systemd-fork "The systemd System and Service Manager, without the stupid Age Verification"

speedythesnail/unre tarded-systemd "The systemd System and Service Manager, without the r e t arded age-verification commits"

ta13579/systemd "The systemd System and Service Manager WITHOUT THE FUCKING AGE CHECKS"

r4shsec/systemd-no-age-verification "This is systemd but without the age verification made via pull request https://github.com/systemd/systemd/pull/40978"

Pingasmaster/fightthesystemd "Systemd without the nonsense: no age verification, no lighthouse built-in."

Jeffrey-Sardina/system "Liberated systemd -- no surveillance. Ever."

HaplessIdiot/systemd-saneagecheck "The systemd System and Service Manager with age verification bypass and polling rate options for said feature"

Queer-Coded-LGBTQ/systemd-fuck-california "The systemd System and Service Manager, but without age bs added in."

Codiak540/unshitted-systemd "A fork of systemd aiming to strip the Age verification. Sue me california."

Hopefully the energy of this reaction won't be scattered among too many alternatives, although some amount of scattering is always good.

top 34 comments

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[–] Eldritch@piefed.world 43 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (2 children)

The reaction by definition is unproductive. I think Brodie Robertson did a good job covering this the other day.

It's literally an addition of an optional text field in a collection of already optional and often unfilled text fields. In a small part of the systemD suite. UserD, with no checking or enforcement. Which has value in business and corporate environments. In the form of a pull request from an external, unaffiliated coder.

Regardless of where you stand on metas push for age-gating everything so they don't have to. Which if you aren't against it, you're a fool. This is all way more reactionary and less substantive than the valid sysV vs systemD debate.

[–] ryper@lemmy.ca 19 points 1 week ago (1 children)

I wonder how many people freaking out over this field have even looked at what other fields are on that user record. The realName field could be used to dox you! ICE and the CIA are interested in your location! Those fields have about the same level of enforcement as the new one, i.e. you can just lie.

[–] org@lemmy.org 2 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Good examples of things that shouldn’t be there.

[–] pupbiru@aussie.zone 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

why not? in multi user environments the user could be in any number of office locations… tracking that information is useful

just because it’s not useful for you doesn’t mean it’s not useful to anyone

[–] org@lemmy.org 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Race, gender, sexual preference, these are all useful to someone and yet should not be data collected. Name, sure. Birth date, no. I’m fine with an Adult Boolean.

[–] pupbiru@aussie.zone 2 points 1 week ago (1 children)

then perhaps you should have made the PR rather than completely overreacting about someone else’s implementation of an entirely optional, unverified text field

[–] org@lemmy.org 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

I don’t see you getting involved.

[–] pupbiru@aussie.zone 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

i’m fine with the change. why would i get involved when im involved with other FOSS efforts and much prefer systemd to every other option

[–] org@lemmy.org 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Like what?

[–] pupbiru@aussie.zone 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

like i have nothing to prove to you and keep this identity separate to work adjacent activities so im not listing them :)

[–] org@lemmy.org 0 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Uh huh

[–] pupbiru@aussie.zone 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

it must be miserable mistrusting people for no reason at all

[–] org@lemmy.org 1 points 1 week ago

There are good reasons.

[–] xyro@lemmy.ca 4 points 1 week ago (2 children)

While we're at it, we could add a race and sexual orientation field, this could have value for business in some countries!

[–] 30p87@feddit.org 1 points 1 week ago

Value for business ≠ Mandated by law

[–] quick_snail@feddit.nl 1 points 1 week ago

A JewONo field might be useful in some counties too

[–] NaibofTabr 19 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (2 children)

Hopefully the energy of this reaction won't be scattered among too many alternatives, although some amount of scattering is always good.

It's traditional:

[–] KryptoSynth@ani.social 2 points 1 week ago

SVG Source

[–] Catoblepas@piefed.blahaj.zone 2 points 1 week ago

I’ve seen less complex taxonomic trees!

[–] mhzawadi@lemmy.horwood.cloud 5 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Wait wait wait, your telling me that systems has a user thing to log user data?

Where does systemd start and end? As it looks to be way too invasive

[–] Laser@feddit.org 2 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Debian systems have optionally collected this kind of data way before systemd existed via adduser.

[–] org@lemmy.org 0 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Does it automatically expose this information to websites that ask for it?

[–] tribut 3 points 1 week ago

No. Just like systemd.

[+] Onomatopoeia@lemmy.cafe -14 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Womp Womp.

What did they expect would happen?

I can only hope this ends up with the original simply being left to rot.

[–] Hiro8811@lemmy.world 8 points 1 week ago (2 children)

Did you read the freaking merge https://github.com/systemd/systemd/pull/40954

[–] Eldritch@piefed.world 21 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Nope. No one did. It's all drama farming and ignorant apoplectic panic. I'd absolutely be interested to know more about the person behind the merge request. Apparently they have submitted similar code to several other projects for the same purpose. But it's just fashionable to hate on systemD right now. At least the sysV vs systemD guys have valid issues. Even though as a 30-year Linux user, I wouldn't go back to sysV inits. I do not miss having to use poorly documented or outright undocumented tricks, tips, and arcana to write basic process watchdogs and initialization scripts.

[–] Hiro8811@lemmy.world 2 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (2 children)

It's hard enough for maintainers and devs to fight ai and governments. If you wanna go against someone go against corpos and government not people doing their hobbies.

[–] Eldritch@piefed.world 8 points 1 week ago

Yes, time and effort would be infinitely better spent yelling at the local and national governments pushing for this to be implemented at the behest of meta. Than outrage of an optional text field.

[–] quick_snail@feddit.nl 1 points 1 week ago

When has Foss been sued by governments? I can think of only a few examples, when the software was used to mix crypto.

I don't see age verification being used to shut down Debian. They would just move to another country

[–] org@lemmy.org 3 points 1 week ago (2 children)

We should have them add ss# too, since it’s non-privileged. What could go wrong?

[–] yetAnotherUser@discuss.tchncs.de 3 points 1 week ago (1 children)

That's not a thing in like every single country. Might as well add a "Name of the Chinese primary school you graduated from" field, at least that would have more users.

[–] org@lemmy.org -2 points 1 week ago

Whatever you wanna call it. Let’s add that. Gender, gender between your legs, marriage status, race is also super important.

It’s just a field… so why not?

[–] death_to_carrots@feddit.org 2 points 1 week ago (1 children)

What could go wrong if in your system there exists a standard place where you could put some magic string?

Remember, no one is forcing you to put the magic string in.

[–] org@lemmy.org 9 points 1 week ago

No one is forcing the magic string YET. But to think some governments won’t enforce that later is contrary to reality. The direction of the world is very clear…