[systemd-devel] Passive vs Active targets

[Thomas HUMMEL]

On 15/02/2022 11:52, Lennart Poettering wrote:

> Yes, rsyslog.service should definitely not pull in network.target. 


Thinking again about it after digesting what's been said in this thread 
would it be correct to say that what's "wrong" for rsyslog *pulling* the 
network.target passive target in is that rsyslog is *not* the *provider* 
of the state represented by network.target (whereas NetworkManager is 
for instance) ?

My (current understanding) now is that it's not a technical reason but 
more a design reason (and its possible side effects if such a design is 
not respected):

- it does make sense for a consumer to pull in an active target because 
it wants something to be "done"
- it does make less or no sense for a consumer to pull in an active 
target because it wants just to order relatively to something which is 
"reached", which only the provider know about ?

Thanks for your help

--
Thomas HUMMEL