Sysvinit vs. Upstart: Boot Performance for Debian and Ubuntu
Developers from Debian and Ubuntu met and discussed ways to improve boot performance at Canonical’s London headquarters.
The suggestion for the aforementioned cooperation came from Mark Shuttleworth. Further plans will be made at the Debconf 09.The first results of this cooperation can be found on Ubuntu’s mailing list. This is extremely crucial because the acceleration of the boot process requires a complete overhaul of the boot sequence. For this reason, a change from Sysvinit to Upstart would make sense.
The Ubuntu project would like to completely implement Upstart for version 10.04 with the first changes appearing on version 9.10. The question is whether the Debian project will follow suit. Debian developer Petter Reinholdtsen was not without reservations regarding this move which lead to discussion on how the transition could be made as convenient and simple as possible. In addition to the required code updates, a continuous cooperation to extend beyond the conference in has been proposed.
Further plans for changes will be discussed at the Debconf. More background information On the topic of Sysvinit/Upstart has been posted by Colin Watson on Ubuntu’s Develop-Discuss mailing list as an answer upon request by Ubuntu users. Those interested in notes from the Debian/Ubuntu developer meeting, may find them here.
Subscribe to our Linux Newsletters
Find Linux and Open Source Jobs
Subscribe to our ADMIN Newsletters
Support Our Work
Linux Magazine content is made possible with support from readers like you. Please consider contributing when you’ve found an article to be beneficial.

News
-
Red Hat Releases RHEL 10 Early
Red Hat quietly rolled out the official release of RHEL 10.0 a bit early.
-
openSUSE Joins End of 10
openSUSE has decided to not only join the End of 10 movement but it also will no longer support the Deepin Desktop Environment.
-
New Version of Flatpak Released
Flatpak 1.16.1 is now available as the latest, stable version with various improvements.
-
IBM Announces Powerhouse Linux Server
IBM has unleashed a seriously powerful Linux server with the LinuxONE Emperor 5.
-
Plasma Ends LTS Releases
The KDE Plasma development team is doing away with the LTS releases for a good reason.
-
Arch Linux Available for Windows Subsystem for Linux
If you've ever wanted to use a rolling release distribution with WSL, now's your chance.
-
System76 Releases COSMIC Alpha 7
With scores of bug fixes and a really cool workspaces feature, COSMIC is looking to soon migrate from alpha to beta.
-
OpenMandriva Lx 6.0 Available for Installation
The latest release of OpenMandriva has arrived with a new kernel, an updated Plasma desktop, and a server edition.
-
TrueNAS 25.04 Arrives with Thousands of Changes
One of the most popular Linux-based NAS solutions has rolled out the latest edition, based on Ubuntu 25.04.
-
Fedora 42 Available with Two New Spins
The latest release from the Fedora Project includes the usual updates, a new kernel, an official KDE Plasma spin, and a new System76 spin.