Vendefoul Wolf is a Linux distro that goes against the grain with terrific results
Vendefoul Wolf is a Linux distro that goes against the grain with terrific results
Publish Date: 2026-06-24 10:34:00
Source Domain: www.zdnet.com
Jack Wallen/ZDNET
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ZDNET key takeaways
- Vendefoul Wolf is a Linux distro with an old-school twist.
- You get SysVinit and XLibre, and a bare-bones list of apps.
- Vendefoul Wolf can be downloaded and installed for free.
From the beginning, Linux hasn’t played by the rules. Over the years, there have been distributions that took that ideology even further and broke from what others were doing.
One example is when systemd became the de facto standard init system for Linux. That change irked many developers, who then created alternative distributions that used a different system. Even the windowing system saw a bit of rebellion when it became obvious that Wayland was the future. In other words, there were alternatives to the alternatives.
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That situation is the case with Vendefoul Wolf. Not only is the name different, but the distribution follows the beat of a different drummer.
Vendefoul Wolf is based on Devuan, which is a fork of Debian. Think of this system as a lightweight version of Debian.
How is Vendefoul Wolf different?
First off, this distribution shuns systemd in favor of SysVinit. The key difference between the two systems is that SysVinit defaults to a sequential execution model for service start, based on runlevels, and SystemD opts for parallel service startup and manages each service via unit files.
Most believe SystemD is a vast improvement over SysVinit because it’s easier to manage and faster. The appeal of SysVinit is its simplicity. SysVinit is also considerably older than SystemD, with its origins dating back to the 1980s.
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Another big difference is the X server. Venedfoul Worlf is the first distribution to default to the XLibre Graphics Server. XLibre is a community-managed display server for X11. The goal of XLibre is to keep X…
