Hello init-system-helpers maintainers,

currently, systemd-sysv Conflicts with insserv and this was added (see #1072562
for details) because update-rc.d wrongly runs it even on systems which use
systemd to boot. I propose the following patch to fix this behaviour and
prevent insserv from being run on systems which use systemd as init:

https://salsa.debian.org/debian/init-system-helpers/-/merge_requests/33
--- a/script/update-rc.d
+++ b/script/update-rc.d
@@ -192,6 +192,10 @@ sub create_sequence {
     $insserv = "/sbin/insserv" if ( -x "$dpkg_root/sbin/insserv");
     # If insserv is not configured it is not fully installed
     my $insserv_installed = -x "$dpkg_root$insserv" && -e "$dpkg_root/etc/insserv.conf";
+    # Ignore the presence of insserv if this system is using systemd as init
+    if ($insserv_installed && readlink "$dpkg_root/usr/sbin/init" eq "../lib/systemd/systemd") {
+        $insserv_installed = 0;
+    }
     my @opts;
     push(@opts, '-f') if $force;
     # Add force flag if initscripts is not installed

An alternative patch would be to use:

     my $insserv_installed = -x "$dpkg_root$insserv" &&
                     -e "$dpkg_root/etc/insserv.conf" &&
                     readlink "$dpkg_root/usr/sbin/init" ne "../lib/systemd/systemd";

And if the link target could potentially be different, maybe the check should
be made less strict (just to be overly safe) by testing:

     readlink "$dpkg_root/usr/sbin/init" =~ /systemd/;

The test uses /usr/sbin/init to check for systemd and not the usual
/run/systemd/system as is used by debhelper snippets because we do not want to
find out which init system the currently running system uses but we want to
know which init the system we are operating on is going to use. The difference
between the two comes into play when update-rc.d is run inside a chroot where
systemd is not running but systemd-sysv is installed and provides
/usr/sbin/init.

Yet another way to check would be to test with dpkg-query whether systemd-sysv
is installed or not but I think it would be safer to check for the actual files
and not rely on systemd being installed via dpkg.

There was no maintainer response on salsa and hence I'm submitting this
bugreport to solicit feedback for this change. The only feedback which I have
received so far was from Michael Biebl in IRC #debian-devel on March 11 2026.
Michael disagreed to a change of update-rc.d but without giving technical
reasons.

Michael suggested that another package built by src:insserv could install the
insserv binary into /usr/libexec to make it available outside of $PATH. I filed
#1132024 against src:insserv with the suggested change and a patch but received
pushback from its maintainer as well.

My motivation for allowing the installation of the insserv binary package on a
system which boots with systemd is to create chroots for GNU/Hurd which does
not support systemd. Other reasons include that it would make the development
for startpar, runit, openrc and insserv itself easier. The existing conflict
with insserv causes autopkgest failures on ci.d.o where systemd cannot be
uninstalled from the testbed.

Since support for LSB initscripts got removed from systemd, I wonder which
technical reason remains for systemd-sysv to conflict with insserv other than
update-rc.d without the proposed patch. If you know about other technical
challenges I would like to investigate them.

If you do not disagree with the proposed change and are short on time I can
offer to upload this change as a NMU of init-system-helpers.

Thanks!

cheers, josch

Josch,

Thanks very much for raising this issue and for the suggested solutions. Your
approach looks technically sound to me.

I would like to add my support for this change to be accepted. In addition to
your motivation in respect of GNU Hurd, I would like to point out another use
case that would benefit.

Currently autopkgtests for insserv and dependencies (openrc, startpar) fail when
run on ci.debian.net. This is because systemd-sysv is already installed in the ci
testbed cannot be removed:

 autopkgtest [18:10:19]: test upstream: preparing testbed
 Reading package lists...
  Building dependency tree...
  Reading state information...
  Solving dependencies...
  Some packages could not be installed. This may mean that you have
  requested an impossible situation or if you are using the unstable
  distribution that some required packages have not yet been created
  or been moved out of Incoming.
  The following information may help to resolve the situation:

  The following packages have unmet dependencies:
   satisfy:command-line : Depends: insserv but it is not going to be installed
  E: Unable to satisfy dependencies. Reached two conflicting assignments:
     1. insserv:amd64 is selected for install because:
        1. satisfy:command-line:amd64=1 is selected for install
        2. satisfy:command-line:amd64 Depends insserv
     2. insserv:amd64 is available in version 1.27.0-1
        but none of the choices are installable:
        - insserv:amd64=1.27.0-1 is not selected for install because:
          1. systemd-sysv:amd64 is selected for install
          2. systemd-sysv:amd64 Conflicts insserv
  upstream             FAIL badpkg
  blame: insserv

Insserv autopkgtest passes when run locally on a testbed without systemd-sysv
installed.

Fixing update-rc.d behaviour on systemd systems even if insserv is installed
would allow systemd-sysv Conflicts: insserv to be removed, and the insserv and
related autopkgtests would then pass on ci.d.n.

I appreciate that systemd maintainers have little interest in spending time and
effort in this area. Accordingly and like Josch, I am happy to offer an NMU of
src:init-system-helpers with this fix.

With best wishes

Mark

Hello systemd maintainers & Luca,

Quoting Mark Hindley (2026-07-13 09:22:49)

since there has been no maintainer reply to this bug for two weeks and since
there has not been any reaction to my MR on salsa [1] for three months, I'd
like to announce to you that I uploaded a NMU of init-system-helpers with
maximum delay of 15 days. You can find the debdiff at the end of this email.

If you decide to cancel the NMU, please consider also explaining what you think
that the proposed changes are breaking or why they are wrong. I am uploading
the NMU in good faith and am CC-ing the package maintainer as well as the last
uploader explicitly so that they can intervene if necessary.

Thanks!

cheers, josch

[1] https://salsa.debian.org/debian/init-system-helpers/-/merge_requests/33

diff -Nru init-system-helpers-1.69/debian/changelog init-system-helpers-1.69+nmu1/debian/changelog
--- init-system-helpers-1.69/debian/changelog	2025-08-15 20:46:44.000000000 +0200
+++ init-system-helpers-1.69+nmu1/debian/changelog	2026-07-27 09:02:23.000000000 +0200
@@ -1,3 +1,11 @@
+init-system-helpers (1.69+nmu1) unstable; urgency=medium
+
+  * Non-maintainer upload.
+  * Ignore the presence of insserv if system is booting using systemd as init
+    (Closes: #1141215)
+
+ -- Johannes Schauer Marin Rodrigues <josch@debian.org>  Mon, 27 Jul 2026 09:02:23 +0200
+
 init-system-helpers (1.69) unstable; urgency=medium

   * Add postinst to hotfix an upgrade bug on certain newly live-installed
diff -Nru init-system-helpers-1.69/script/update-rc.d init-system-helpers-1.69+nmu1/script/update-rc.d
--- init-system-helpers-1.69/script/update-rc.d	2023-11-24 13:34:19.000000000 +0100
+++ init-system-helpers-1.69+nmu1/script/update-rc.d	2026-07-27 09:01:29.000000000 +0200
@@ -192,6 +192,10 @@
     $insserv = "/sbin/insserv" if ( -x "$dpkg_root/sbin/insserv");
     # If insserv is not configured it is not fully installed
     my $insserv_installed = -x "$dpkg_root$insserv" && -e "$dpkg_root/etc/insserv.conf";
+    # Ignore the presence of insserv if this system is using systemd as init
+    if ($insserv_installed && readlink "$dpkg_root/usr/sbin/init" eq "../lib/systemd/systemd") {
+        $insserv_installed = 0;
+    }
     my @opts;
     push(@opts, '-f') if $force;
     # Add force flag if initscripts is not installed

We believe that the bug you reported is fixed in the latest version of
init-system-helpers, which is due to be installed in the Debian FTP archive.

A summary of the changes between this version and the previous one is
attached.

Thank you for reporting the bug, which will now be closed.  If you
have further comments please address them to 1141215@bugs.debian.org,
and the maintainer will reopen the bug report if appropriate.

Debian distribution maintenance software
pp.
Johannes Schauer Marin Rodrigues <josch@debian.org> (supplier of updated init-system-helpers package)

(This message was generated automatically at their request; if you
believe that there is a problem with it please contact the archive
administrators by mailing ftpmaster@ftp-master.debian.org)
Format: 1.8
Date: Mon, 27 Jul 2026 09:02:23 +0200
Source: init-system-helpers
Architecture: source
Version: 1.69+nmu1
Distribution: unstable
Urgency: medium
Maintainer: Debian systemd Maintainers <pkg-systemd-maintainers@lists.alioth.debian.org>
Changed-By: Johannes Schauer Marin Rodrigues <josch@debian.org>
Closes: 1141215
Changes:
 init-system-helpers (1.69+nmu1) unstable; urgency=medium
 .
   * Non-maintainer upload.
   * Ignore the presence of insserv if system is booting using systemd as init
     (Closes: #1141215)
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