Debian branches trip

[RacerBG]

A short story about how and why I switched from Debian Testing (Jessie) to Debian Stable (Wheezy).

Usually I always prefer up to date software and that's why I was using Debian Testing - Jessie. But Debian Jessie is in freeze already for a months (say good bye to latest software) and something called systemd (you know what I mean) which claims to be faster than the old init system is just NOT any better! I'm very conservative towards such technologies and after some weeks of thinking I switched the horses and installed Debian Stable - Wheezy.
What I get for a rock solid distro?
1. Older versions of programs but VERY stable ones.
2. Insane amount of polish.
3. Very fast and responsible system.
Indeed initially I though that older version of (KDE in my case) means slower and buggy software but wait a minute: KDE 4.8.4 works faster and have everything working nice and clean. KDE 4.14.2 in Jessie is also rock solid but Jessie is still not declared as stable and do you remember systemd? The only real loss for me is Libre Office - in Wheezy it's just too old for my needs but there are backports too.
Probably I will install Jessie on my laptop when it is declared as stable but this is in doubt. Even I can try Debian Squeeze just for fun!

[xenopeek]

You can use other init systems on Debian Jessie if you want; at least SysV init and OpenRC init are supported IIRC. LMDE 2 will be based on Debian Jessie (Stable) and will use SysV init instead of systemd init. Of course, just like your Debian Wheezy, it will use components developed by the systemd project--like udev for dynamic device management.

Anyway, I'm fond of saying (till y'all get tired of it) that everybody should use what works best for them Debian is generally quoted as being a bit faster than Ubuntu on the same machine, so for those that can do without need for compatibility with Ubuntu (Steam games, PPAs, etc.) it can be a good choice. For most people the stable release will suit them just fine, hence Linux Mint and LMDE moving to LTS/stable based releases only.

LibreOffice is a good example of an application you might want newer versions of. Just a few days since I got the 4.4.0 version; it's leaps ahead of previous versions! Aside from being faster, having more features, and looking much better, a lot of the bugs that I had encountered are fixed in this version.

Anyway, have fun on the Debian Wheezy journey. It should be smooth sailing

[RacerBG]

Anyway, I'm fond of saying (till y'all get tired of it) that everybody should use what works best for them

True.

Anyway, have fun on the Debian Wheezy journey. It should be smooth sailing

Thank you.

PS: LMDE 2 may be my next stop if the systemd thing is not there. I wonder when I will stop distro hopping? It's a real fun!

[Flemur]

SysV init and OpenRC init are supported IIRC.

I have a Debian testing install that uses systemd by default. It was very easy to add sysvinit and make a "dual boot" - booting the same OS with either systemd or sysvinit. Boot times were the same and systemd used 3M more memory.

Boot times (from grub prompt to visible desktop):
Mint 17: 18 sec.
Debian testing/systemd: 18 sec.
Debian testing/sysvinit: 18 sec.
Debian stable: 15-16 sec.
Edit: I prefer Deb.stable over testing because it uses wine1.4 (same for Mint17), which works better than wine1.6 or 1.7, and gave up trying to get 1.4 into Deb.testing.

[Monsta]

PS: LMDE 2 may be my next stop if the systemd thing is not there.

Some systemd components are always there, even if you don't use systemd as the init system.

Code: Select all

monsta@asylum ~ $ apt search ~isystemd
i   libpam-systemd                  - system and service manager - PAM module   
i   libsystemd0                     - systemd utility library                   
i A libsystemd0:i386                - systemd utility library                   
i   systemd                         - system and service manager                
i A systemd-shim                    - shim for systemd  

[RacerBG]

PS: LMDE 2 may be my next stop if the systemd thing is not there.

Some systemd components are always there, even if you don't use systemd as the init system.

Code: Select all

monsta@asylum ~ $ apt search ~isystemd
i   libpam-systemd                  - system and service manager - PAM module   
i   libsystemd0                     - systemd utility library                   
i A libsystemd0:i386                - systemd utility library                   
i   systemd                         - system and service manager                
i A systemd-shim                    - shim for systemd  

It's not a big problem.