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Haiku OS Will Get New Service Manager
jones_supa writes: Axel Dörfler writes in his blog that he is working on a replacement for Haiku OS's current shell script based boot process. It would be replaced with something more flexible, a solution similar to OS X's launchd and Linux's systemd. While there is still a lot to do, the new project called launch_daemon is now feature complete in terms of being able to completely reproduce the current boot process. Since the switch to their package manager, there was no longer a way to influence the boot process at all. The only file you could change was the UserBootscript which is started only after Tracker and Deskbar — the whole system is already up at this point. The new service manager gives the power back to you, and also allows arbitrary software to be launched on startup. Alternatively, you can prevent system components from being started at all if you so wish. Furthermore, it allows for event based application start, start on demand, a multi-threaded boot process, and even enables you to talk to servers before they actually started.
We aren't trying to be a "viable operating system" for the masses. Yet. That comes in R2, after we drop compatibility. If you want the latest not-really-greatest slidy transparent Operating System of the Future, we aren't it. We have much different goals (like: actually being usable! Actually being configurable!) Not the "systemd takes over the whole operating system" or "Ubuntu writes their own window manager" crap that Linux has to deal with. In that sense, we're lightyears ahead of Linux, the only forks we have are the POSIX fork() function. :D
I kind of regret letting the comment about systemd slip through my fingers now :( Haiku's new launch system is like systemd in that we took the *nice* parts of systemd. Not the crap that is the binary log files, or the take-over-your-whole-OS thing. We hate it as much as you do.