[systemd-devel] why are the systemd binaries so huge and can we do something about that?

[Michael Biebl]

2016-05-16 6:15 GMT+02:00 Auke Kok <auke-jan.h.kok at intel.com>:
> On Mon, May 16, 2016 at 04:24:25AM +0200, Michael Biebl wrote:
>> 1,5M usr/bin/systemd-analyze
>>
>> What's up with systemd-analyze?
>
> It shouldn't be part of a base package, it's not even a diagnostic tool, more
> like a performance measurement type of thing.
>
> I don't think size is of a concern for it.

I do think size is of concern (even today with TB size disks), think
of containers or small/embedded systems.
See the recent developments regarding docker and alpine.

Atm we have those three options:
1/ don't enable a feature to keep the footprint down
2/ enable the feature but split it into a separate package → risk of
balkanizing across distros
3/ enable the feature but ship it in the main package → accept the
constant increase in footprint

As for some background: we recently got a recent in Debian to enable
and ship the systemd-sysusers binary [1] as this is apparently
required by rkt now. We don't make use of systemd-sysusers in Debian,
so this would mean an additional 300K on every installation which is
wasted for the majority of users. The alternative is to split it off,
which is not too compelling either.
Question is, why systemd-sysusers is such a large binary in the first
place for such trivial functionality. And maybe we can address that.

Regards,
Michael

[1] https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=823322


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