In today's open source roundup: Debian developer Joey Hess leaves the project after eighteen years. Plus: Is Linux gaming performance lagging behind Windows? And reviews of Ubuntu 14.10 seem to indicate that it's a mixed bag Debian developer leaves after eighteen years Systemd has been a toxic topic in the Linux community for a long time, and now a long-time Debian developer is leaving the project because of it. Sam Varghese at ITwire reports on Joey Hess’ decision to leave Debian after eighteen years: The ruckus over the adoption of systemd as the default init system for Debian appears to have claimed a victim, with veteran developer Joey Hess announcing that he is leaving the project. More at ITwire Read Joey Hess’ resignation post from the Debian mailing list: It’s become abundantly clear that this is no longer the project I originally joined in 1996. We’ve made some good things, and I wish everyone well, but I’m out. If I have one regret from my 18 years in Debian, it’s that when the Debian constitution was originally proposed, despite seeing it as dubious, I neglected to speak out against it. It’s clear to me now that it’s a toxic document, that has slowly but surely led Debian in very unhealthy directions. More at Debian Mailing List Debian users on Reddit react to Hess’ announcement: “Very sad, Joey’s interview on The Setup a couple years back is what pushed me over the edge to give Debian a chance on the desktop after I read his blog and some of his mailing list messages. Started with the desktop at my side job, and in the creepiest coincidence ever Friday night (as in two days ago) decided to bite the bullet and replace Ubuntu with sid on my T530.” “Seems like he’s a really good guy, and I don’t blame him with all the insanity over systemd – particularly the latest chapter – being enough to edge one over.” More at Reddit Linux gaming performance lagging behind Windows? Linux gaming has made a lot of headway recently, but it’s not all wine and roses in Linux gaming land. Some Linux games seem unable to match their Windows counterparts in performance. Rich Gedreich unloads on the problems with loading times and framerate performance in Linux: Sadly, it’s pretty clear that if you run these games on Linux your experience isn’t going to be as good, and you’ll be getting less “gaming value” vs. Windows. We’re not talking about a bunch of little indy titles, these are big releases: Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel, Borderlands 2, Tropico 5, XCOM: Enemy Unknown, Sid Meier’s Civilization V. My take is the devs doing these ports just aren’t doing their best to optimize these releases for Linux and/or OpenGL. I know it’s possible for Linux ports to equal or outperform their Windows counterparts, but it’s hard. At Valve we had all the driver devs at our beck and call and it was still very difficult to get the Source engine’s perf. and stability to where it needed to be relative to Windows. (And this was with a ~8 year old engine – it must be even harder with more modern engines.) These devs are probably glad to just release anything at all given how alien it can be for Windows/Xbox devs to develop, debug, and ship stuff under Linux+OpenGL. More at Rich Geldreich’s Tech Blog Soeb at the PC Gaming Wiki reports on the performance of Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel, Borderlands 2, Tropico 5, and Civilization 5 in Linux: The Linux version of the game brings with it a few enjoyable differences. The first thing you’ll notice when playing on Linux, is the complete lack of a launcher. The developer’s have once again opted to remove the launcher completely from the Linux version, as all its features are provided already in-game. A major improvement that makes all controller using players happy, is the vastly improved controller support. Thanks to the use of SDL2, every controller that works under Linux will work with the Pre-Sequel – which in practice means almost every controller. In certain cases, you may need to configure your controller at least once in Steam Big Picture, but from that moment forward, the controller will be usable in all SDL2 titles. More at PC Gaming Wiki Linux gamers on Reddit react to Rich Geldreich’s blog post: “Not sure why this is getting upvotes, bunch of bitching from ex-Valve employee, boo choo.” “Well obviously he is right about state of drivers and ports, cause aside from Valve games there is not a single game which performs as good under Linux as under Windows. but don’t forget that the same, inferior to Windows experience can be found under OSX and it’s completely normal until Linux becomes relevant to gaming (it is not, yet).” More at Reddit Ubuntu 14.10 reviews Ubuntu 14.10 has been out for a little while now, and the reviews have started to pile up. Ubuntu 14.10 seems to be a bit of a mixed bag according to some reviewers. Everyday Linux User was initially skeptical that Ubuntu 14.10 was different enough from Ubuntu 14.04 for him to do a review: I have been using Ubuntu 14.10 since it was released on the 23rd October, 2014. During that time I have been trying to work out how to write this review because on the face of it, nothing much has changed. I was half tempted to just post a link to my review of Ubuntu 14.04 and say “Thankyou for reading”. More at Everyday Linux User Dedoimedo had a tough time getting Ubuntu 14.10 to install: I’m so damn pissed off right now. Thank you, Ubuntu, thank you very much for ruining my weekend. I was so looking forward to doing some proper, fanboyish testing, and this had to happen. Why? Trusty was bloody flawless. Why this nonsense all of a sudden? I am willing to extend the slight benefit of doubt to the Ubuntu family and retest on different hardware sometime in the future, as well as give Kubuntu and Xubuntu their due spin and such. But if this turns out to be legacy hardware issues so to speak, then we will be having an essay in expletives. Anyhow, skip this. Stay with Trusty, it’s awesome and stable and fun. And let’s see what the rest of the pack can do. For now, Unicorn, 0/10. More at Dedoimedo The reviewer at LinuxBSDos.com is not a fan of Ubuntu but still recommends Ubuntu 14.10 for beginners: Other than “bug fixes and incremental quality improvements”, there’s not much that can be called “new features” in Ubuntu 14.10. If you’re reading this paragraph, you’d already have figured out that Ubuntu Desktop is not my favorite desktop distribution. But that doesn’t take anything away from the fact that it is a very good desktop distribution and I highly recommend it for new users. Just be sure, if you’re a new convert, to install Install Unity Tweak Tool on Ubuntu 14.10 and tweak it to your heart’s content. More at LinuxBSDos.com What’s your take on all this? Tell me in the comments below. Open Source