Re: Updating reboot's default

From: Rodney W. Grimes <freebsd-rwg_at_gndrsh.dnsmgr.net>
Date: Thu, 23 Jun 2022 15:42:59 UTC
> 
> 
> > On 22. Jun 2022, at 04:03, Warner Losh <imp@bsdimp.com> wrote:
> > 
> > ?
> > 
> > 
> >> On Tue, Jun 21, 2022, 6:35 PM Greg 'groggy' Lehey <grog@freebsd.org> wrote:
> >> On Tuesday, 21 June 2022 at  8:01:58 -0600, Warner Losh wrote:
> >> > 15 or 20 years ago, we talked about changing the default for reboot from
> >> > 'right now' to being safe shutdown. There were arguments made against it
> >> > due to tiny appliances and such.
> >> >
> >> > Time has past, and this oddity has persisted. It's time to revisit that
> >> > decision.
> >> >
> >> > I'd propose that we keep 'fastboot' and 'fasthalt' having the immediate
> >> > behavior. However, the 'reboot' command will switch from '-q' behavior to
> >> > '-r' behavior.
> >> 
> >> Somehow I hear this echo "If it ain't broke, don't fix it".  My
> >> understanding has always been that shutdown(8) is the program that
> >> shuts down and maybe reboots the system, while reboot(8) is a quick
> >> and dirty way to reboot the system, along with halt(8) if you don't
> >> want to reboot.
> >> 
> >> So why change this?  At the very least you'll confuse people who want
> >> to use the old method.  My guess is that you have some reason that's
> >> not immediately apparent, but what?
> > 
> > 
> > Other systems have the behavior I'm advocating. We are the odd duck. This means we tend to violate POLA here. And there is no good reason to do this when fastboot is available. Nobody that advocated to keep this difference as useful the last time it came up still wants to advocate. Most people find the behavior annoying and only a vanishingly small minority of people like it. In fact, so far nobody has even asked to please not, let alone come up with a good reason to retain this behavior. So, I'm polling arch@ to see if anyone like that shows up.
> > 
> 
> Well, to be honest, I?m used to the current behavior and would prefer to keep it (POLA for existing users). I didn?t answer to advocate against the change as
> 
> 1. I have no metric to counter your argument that this is a real problem for people used to other OSes (neither how many people pick up FreeBSD in general nor how many are unpleasantly surprised by how `reboot` works)
+1

> 2. I will certainly be able to adapt and get used to the new behavior
+1, though FreeBSD has become a long set of these pain points.

> 3. Given the amount of change in the world right now, it?s a ?pick your battles? situation. There is and will be so much to suck up, arguing about this with someone who clearly put some thought into it seems like a waste of everybody?s time.
+1, as FreeBSD-- in my world the amount of these changes become less
worth voicing any time on.

> Cheers
> Michael
> 
> > Warner 
> > 
> > 
> >> And no, I don't really have an axe to grind in this matter.
> >> 
> >> Greg
> >> --
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-- 
Rod Grimes                                                 rgrimes@freebsd.org