Submission + - homed to change the way passwords, home directory, groups, etc. are handled (techrepublic.com) 4
Camel Pilot writes: Leannart Poettering is proposing homed to alter the way Linux system handle user management. All user information will be placed in a cryptographically signed JSON record. That record will contain all user information such as username, group membership, and password hashes. The venerable /etc/passwd and /etc/shadow will be a thing of the past. One of the claimed advantages will be home directory portability.
Because the /home directory will no longer depend on the trifecta of systemd, /etc/passwd, and /etc/shadow, users and admins will then be able to easily migrate directories within /home. Imagine being able to move your /home/USER (where USER is your username) directory to a portable flash drive and use it on any system that works with systemd-homed. You could easily transport your /home/USER directory between home and work, or between systems within your company.
What is not clear is that for portability, systems would have to have identical user_id, group names, group_id, etc.. And what mechanism is going to provide user authorization to login to a system.
Because the
What is not clear is that for portability, systems would have to have identical user_id, group names, group_id, etc.. And what mechanism is going to provide user authorization to login to a system.
Systemd is so bloated with so many services (Score:4, Insightful)
Why stop now? Why NOT go full Microsoft and make everything a monolithic service? Why is 'homed' special and the rest have to go in systemd?
Re: (Score:2)
This seems to be trying to emulate the way Microsoft Windows makes user profiles portable which is very handy for corporations. I imagine Red Hat want it so they can compete with Windows.
Creating solutions looking for a problem. (Score:3)
Solving a problem almost no-one has. While making problems for about everyone. And assuming everyone runs Linux on fast hardware and a NAS in a corporate multi-user environment. For any embedded linux all this overhead is very unwelcome. For any desktop installation it's unneeded.
I don't like changes especially not fast and intrusive changes. Now systemd is abusing it's position to force changes to how every part of the system works.
Lennart, please go home and write a new operating system from scratch because only that will make you happy. Please leave the rest of the plebs with our inferior linux systems.