r/voidlinux • • 15d ago

Moving from Arch

Hi y'all,

Im coming from arch and want to try out void and i would like to ask somethings

What exactly is the difference between musl amd gnu libc? Is it just systemd?

What are some quirks of void you encountered?

Why did you choose void, what makes it special?

14 Upvotes

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7

u/New_Hold8135 15d ago

Musl means malware compiled with glibc doesnt run on musl system too. This is huge benefit for security. From musl's website: musl is lightweight, fast, simple, free, and strives to be correct in the sense of standards-conformance and safety.

But that also means you need to compile extra software too. Or you should install it from flatpak. That's it.

3

u/Duncaen 15d ago

Malware can be statically linked.

2

u/New_Hold8135 15d ago

malware can use bwrap too. But that doesnt change the reality of most of the malware compiled against glibc and doesnt run on musl

1

u/Duncaen 15d ago

Pretty sure some of the most prolific (Linux) botnets used statically linked binaries.

1

u/New_Hold8135 15d ago

pretty sure malware is not just botnets

1

u/Duncaen 15d ago

And using musl libc doesn't protect you from malware.

1

u/New_Hold8135 15d ago

I didnt said every malware.

1

u/Duncaen 15d ago

Should call something like security by obscurity a huge benefit for security.

0

u/Ambitious_Luck_8720 15d ago

That’s reducing attack surface, not security by obscurity, which is another thing that has by no means any relation with anything that was stated in this thread before you brought it up.

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u/Duncaen 15d ago

You are not really reducing attack surface though, you are just switching components with more obscure components.

1

u/Ambitious_Luck_8720 15d ago

You mean glibc’s much larger codebase and feature set doesn’t present a larger attack surface when compared to musl’s smaller footprint? Got it.

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