Avoiding systemd on Debian Jessie or later

http://without-systemd.org/wiki/index.php/How_to_remove_systemd_from_a_Debian_jessie/sid_installation was an excellent resource, sadly now no more.

Here are my own notes:

  • Create /etc/apt/preferences.d/nosystemd
Package: systemd
Pin: release *
Pin-Priority: -1

Package: *systemd*
Pin: release *
Pin-Priority: -1

And, if you're running a mixed-architecture 32/64-bit system, also add: 

Package: systemd:amd64
Pin: release *
Pin-Priority: -1

Package: systemd:i386
Pin: release *
Pin-Priority: -1

If you're still running wheezy and planning to upgrade to Jessie (or beyond), that's all you need to do. Systemd will then not be installed as part of any upgrade (however, depending on what packages you have installed and need to upgrade, there might be dependency problems - Devuan could be a solution in this case - the general rule of thumb is "don't install a graphical desktop environment such as Gnome or KDE").

If you've already upgraded to Jessie (or beyond) and your machine is now infected with systemd, don't panic; the solution is simple: 

# aptitude install sysvinit-{core,utils}
# reboot
# aptitude purge systemd

Easy :)

Note: if you find that your machine still has libsystemd0 installed, once again don't panic - this is just a shim library function which tells anything expecting to find systemd to go away and keep quiet. Don't worry about it.

  • It isn't systemd
  • It doesn't require systemd
  • It doesn't install systemd
  • It doesn't send an email to Lennart Poettering to tell him that you are still running Debian without systemd.

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