CEC (technically I think displayport could support it, but generally isn’t implemented) and ethernet up to 100Mbps.

Depends on specific machine setup and how good the backup is.

Backup requirements for /usr there are sticky bits set on some binaries. That needs to be preserved. In all cases soft links likely need to be preserved for things to work correctly on future package installs. Hard links can be problematic, but if you have a large enough drive or not that many it wont matter. Running package verification can be help after restore to make sure everything looks right. If running a Linux system with SELinux in enforcing mode (RHEL on many derivatives), then the security context will also need to be preserved BUT running a relabel will probably work if the security context was not included in backups. Sometimes running the relabel process wont work if there are files that needs a specific security context but are not listed in the security context database. Can’t provide more details because most of my experience with that is on systems we just replace (LSPP custom labeling resulted in systems that if you booted into permissive would then be unbootable, so they were just reinstalled once any debugging was done).

For /boot things can get tricky depending on the distribution, what boot manager is used, and /boot was a separate partition or not. Basically the boot manager (probably grub) needs to know how to find the files in boot so it can load the kernel. In most cases if you restore /boot and rerun the tools to update the boot manger everything will be fine. BUT some distributions, hardware setups, or dual boot configurations are more complicated, so extra work might be needed.

You didn’t mention /dev, which is all special files. These don’t need to be restored, just make sure the right processes recreate them. There are tools to do this, hopefully the packages are installed. Or boot from a rescue disk and fix it. Look up instruction for your specific distro.

More of it will display the LOG_EMERG message instead of just stopping without displaying anything.

There are some headless servers I’d prefer to just reboot, but unless actual hardware is faulty I would not be too worried about it.

How about a link to text instead of a video?

Here’s the actually releases from github.com https://github.com/systemd/systemd/releases

Depends on environment.

Real hardware separate for a server partitions for: /home, /var, swap, sometimes /usr, sometimes /var/log/audit Depends on deployment requirements, and if a system is expected to run after filling up audit.

Real hardware for a at home desktop: /var, swap, maybe /home, or just one partition for / and one for swap.

Cloud: all one partition, put swap in a file if it is needed. Cloud images are easy to grow if it is just one partition. Cloud-init will handle that automatically with the right packages installed, no configuration needed. Swap partitions are unlikely to be the right size as they vary according to memory and memory varies according to instance/guest sizes. Swap makes auto growing root partition harder (cloud-init custom config injection required). Best practice is to size workload and instances to not need swap whenever possible.

vim-gnupg. If gpg-agent is setup and you connect with ssh with X11 forwarding enableed, gpg will popup it’s passphrase entry box (even on WSL Windows 11 or Chrome OS). Easy and convenient if you have a pgp key.

If you just want to try to recover, PhotoRec This does require it to at least be able to power and have a raw device to look at, though it doesn’t have to be able to be mounted. More than just photos can be recovered.

Had pretty close to the same results with PhotoRec vs commercial tools on windows.

I read that same link and took it to mean maybe RedHat is violating the GPL. Only way to know for sure is to go to court, which involves risks to both sides. The more I’ve thought about it the more unsure I am.

I am uncomfortable with the direction they’ve taken and fear this will start up another round of open source license proliferation, but hope not. That has never been helpful for open source and only served to make business hesitant to use it.

I responded to only one part:

GPL stands

GPL might be violated with what they are doing, so people are pissed about it all and calling RedHat names. When IBM bought RedHat some people predicted doom, the end of open source, that RedHat is now destroyed, etc., etc. Probably some of is those same people coming back out and yelling “TOLD YOU SO!”. They are just stirring the pot to make themselves feel better. The sky is not falling for open source, things are just changing. If the GPL is being violated it will be figured out and fixed, just might take awhile.

Unfortunately I didn’t save the links, like I really wish I had. Alma, Rocky, and Lemmy posts have linked to them. I’ve been reading up on this since last week as it could affect my job and I’ll need to provide my profession recommendations at some point. Right now my advice is to wait and see, but be prepared.

From GPL 2.0: https://www.gnu.org/licenses/old-licenses/lgpl-2.0.html

10. Each time you redistribute the Library (or any work based on the Library), the recipient automatically receives a license from the original licensor to copy, distribute, link with or modify the Library subject to these terms and conditions. You may not impose any further restrictions on the recipients’ exercise of the rights granted herein. You are not responsible for enforcing compliance by third parties to this License.

It has been reported that the support contract from RedHat says you can’t redistribute the source you receive as part of being a paid customer and they reserve the right to cancel your support contract. The above says you can restrict someone’s rights granted by the GPL. I’m not a lawyer, but lawyers who deal with open source say this might violate the GPL. I’ll defer to them, but wish I had saved some of the links I’ve been reading.

I have not listened to the podcast unfortunately.

Rebuilders are fine, and RedHat is fine to not spend the effort to debrand their source rpms. The problem is one of value. The value RedHat provides for some people is probably worth more than RedHat charges. The value RedHat provides to others is less than the effort it takes to renew a developer license once a year for 16 installs. The problem is that there are several who are ending support for RHEL because they fall into the latter group (notably Jeff Geerling for ansible roles). RHEL losing out on that support might be huge, might not, only time will tell.

GPL explicitly states you can’t have additional restrictions on redistributing the source. Arguably having a support contract that explicitly says you can redistribute the sources to GPL software seems problematic and a likely GPL violation. That is the problem.

They weren’t dying before, but they be might now.

The problem is that the value RHEL provides. For my PERSONAL projects the value is less than the cost of renewing my free license every year from them. For a company shipping a system that will in the field for a decade with minimal updates is completely that must work with minimal downtime the value they are providing is higher than what they charge.

That difference in value by users requires RedHat to balance costs the they can charge against maximizing numbers of users versus income. The catch they are running into is some people they provide little value to will just leave, but those people were providing a lot of value for customers. 100 or so ansible roles that your customers were using is suddenly no longer going to be supported, and eventually likely not to work. That is likely a net negative for value provided to customers and goes against the spirit of open source.

The people using Rocky or Alma are unlikely to see cost of RHEL being worth it. So they will go elsewhere. But having a bigger number of users running on those systems provided value and network effect for RedHat even though they are not paying. That indirect benefit is now lost.

RedHat obviously feels all of that does not provide enough value to justify the cost of possible lost sales. I think they are wrong, but maybe they are right.

Maybe they are violating the GPL which explicitly says you cannot add limitations for users sharing code. From here it sure looks questionable at best, intentionally breaking the license at worst. That will have to be left for someone else to decide.