Consider not releasing without lid handling until after systemd 256 is out
UPower has long deprecated lid handling, and merged its removal in 2023 with a note to use logind's LidClosed property instead. However, only in January 2024 did logind merge a patch to actually emit a PropertiesChanged event when LidClosed
changes.
With a release schedule of about once half a year, the next systemd release containing this change (v256) is probably due sometime around summer 2024. If you release a new UPower version before then, software that's been using UPower for lid handling has three options:
- Implement lid handling via logind, and break users' systems because
PropertiesChanged
is never emitted until they upgrade to systemd 256. - Implement lid handling via logind, and add an ugly hack to poll it regularly.
- Rely on distros to unofficially patch in the systemd change before v256 is released.
- Instead of using common infrastructure, port code from UPower and/or systemd to keep things working as intended.
None of those are particularly appealing. In essence, UPower's deprecation and removal happened before the "proper" replacement was actually ready to use. It would be nice to get enough of a grace period that the same software with perhaps both logind support and a UPower fallback at least won't break when using the latest releases of both at any time.