14 DAY TRIAL // Ubuntu 15.04 has switched to systemd with the flip of a switch and says goodbye to Upstart, at least for the desktop flavor.
Ubuntu developers announced a long time ago that systemd would replace Upstart. In fact, that announcement was made right after Debian decided to switch, so it was a long time coming and it shouldn't be much of a surprise. There will be a few voices in the community that will draw attention on the "evil" that systemd is, but it should be a smooth ride.
The Ubuntu online community has been rather quiet about this change and it's probably for the best. It probably has to do with the way Ubuntu is being run by Canonical, which is more like a mild form of autocracy. Debian follows a more democratic process, which tends to make things a little bit more complicated. Both models have their merits and shortcomings.
The switch to systemd will be invisible
Most users won't really feel anything different and they won't even be able to tell that something has changed. This is mostly under the hood stuff, so don't expect to see a real difference from Upstart.
"We are a few days past feature freeze now, bug Steve and I discussed last week, and we still want to aim for switching the default in vivid. To be clear, this will affect Ubuntu desktop/server/cloud and the flavours like Kubuntu, but *NOT* ubuntu-touch. Migration to systemd is blocked on touch (too old kernels, some unported jobs), and was not scheduled for vivid. For that we need to ensure to keep upstart on Touch (there is a work item on the spec)," wrote Martin Pitt in the initial Launchpad entry.
The conclusion is that Ubuntu 15.04 (Vivid Vervet) is shipping with systemd by default and that's the end of that. This latest edition of Ubuntu is expected to arrive at the end of April.