Title is misleading. KDEs new login manager is systemd only, but you don't need to use it and can use any other login manager or no login manager just fine. They're replacing SDDM since they can have the login manager be more integrated if they're the sole user. They'll still be maintaining SDDM and LightDMs KDE greeter if those are more your cup of tea, and you can always just use startx (or whatever the wayland equivalent is)

> Title is misleading Well, it's easier to get engagement with some bait.

I wish it wasn't more or less a standard these days..

Title can be misleading, as KDE still works on non-systemd systems that use other login managers, as discussed here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46870751

The article claims that this is just a first step and the KDE developers intend to make systemd mandatory for other parts of KDE in the future.

> niche Linux distros that would be cut out including everything from Gentoo to Alpine Linux and Slackware.

Gentoo lets you choose the init system (including systemd) so it doesn’t belong in this list.

Gentoo belongs to the list, because it will be strongly affected if KDE will become more dependent of systemd in the future.

Gentoo attempts to provide independent choices, e.g. one should be able to use KDE with either systemd or OpenRC, or XFCE with either systemd or OpenRC, whichever the user wishes.

If KDE will become dependent on systemd, then the possibility of free choice will be removed from the Gentoo users, so they will have to decide which is more important for them. As a Gentoo user, using OpenRC instead of systemd is certainly more important for me than using KDE instead of another desktop environment, so KDE will become unusable for me.

Currently Gentoo has good support for systemd. If KDE has a hard dependency on systemd, then it won’t (as the author wrote) “cut out including everything from Gentoo …” because Gentoo does maintain systemd stage3s.

But I actually see what you mean about the degradation of options. Gentoo sort of supports 32 bit, but most modern packages are not tested against these systems anymore and receive little attention. That caused me more work recently getting one of my old machines set up.

I mean, there is so much that maintainers can do, and portage specializes in helping you make a “niche” system that no-one else bothers to create. I’m not sure if that means that the spirit of Gentoo fundamentally changes as a distribution. I think what makes Gentoo Gentoo is that it is un-opinionated.

Honestly, I see the list as a category problem, because Gentoo is kind of a meta-distribution.