Recently I wanted to try out Cosmic DE on my Linux Mint setup and so I cloned the repo and started to look into what it would take. But as I read the README.md I noticed there was talk of the easiest way to test being with a system-extension fascilitated by systemd sysext. I was able to use this method and test out the basics of Cosmic DE (albiet sort of broken probably due to a lack of proper configuration). I’m excited to see where this Rust+Iced DE from System76 goes!
But this post is not about that; it’s about systemd-sysext. This is a really interesting, as of yet known to me, capability that systemd provides for those that want to use it. Essentially it allows you to specify files to be merged into /usr and /opt using OverlayFS. It’s super simple but also very powerful.
Here’s a blog post from Poettering about it. In some ways systemd seems to get a lot of cool features you always want as a developer to make your life testing something easier. I’m OK with that.
Discuss here on Mastadon!