Re: rcd(8) - new service manager daemon

[2026-06-15 08:47] Baptiste Daroussin <[email protected]>
> On Sun 14 Jun 16:15, Alan Somers wrote:
> > On Sun, Jun 14, 2026 at 1:26 PM Baptiste Daroussin <[email protected]> wrote:
> > > [...]
> > >
> > > Key features:
> > >
> > > [...]
> > >   - Socket activation (pre-bound sockets passed via fd inheritance)
> >
> > [...]
> > 
> > This sounds turboawesome.  Parallel boot, pdfork, procctl, and UCL, all sound
> > very exciting to me.  I can't wait to beta-test.  And
> > backwards-compatibility, too, is super good.  IIRC, the lack of
> > backwards-compatibility is why the NextBSD experiment failed.  Since
> > you're the expert, could you tell us how else this rcd differs from
> > NextBSD/launchd?
>
> TL;DR rcd is less ambitious and fully design for FreeBSD (and probably FreeBSD
> only).
>
> launchd replaces cron(8) and inetd(8): it handles periodic jobs (StartInterval,
> StartCalendarInterval) and socket-activated services (inetdCompatibility,
> Sockets).  rcd focuses solely on service management and does not attempt to
> replace cron or inetd. In the future, tighter integration with cron and inetd
> (similar to Solaris SMF) could be considered, but this is not planned today.

I'm a bit confused about this statement. Because socket activation
sounds for me like a replacement for inetd. Of course not a drop in
replacement and it only works when the service supports it.

It is already possible to either listen direct on a socket or use
inetd. What is the benefit of socket activation? In general wouldn't
it be better to add socket activation to inetd or an inetd replacement?

Philipp