Installing Sophos Protection for Linux in a distribution without systemd

Hello teoberi

Thank you for reaching community forum. Based on our initial checking, the current set-up for SPL really does require Systemd. Though we're currently confirming further if there will be an option in the future in our SLP to not use systemd. We'll keep you posted for more updates about this. 

Any news or a decision on adding support for System V (SysV) init system?

I've not yet received a definitive answer on this, though from the initial discussions, it seems a very small portion of our customer base is looking for this. 

To stay up to date on any future developments, I'd suggest reaching out to your Sophos Account Manager to raise a feature request regarding this. This will allow our team to better track the need for this.
Asking to be put in touch with your regional Sales Engineer will also help in this case, as they're able to get a better understanding of the requirements on your network and environment so this can be better communicated to our product teams.

I would like to know who is the Sophos Account Manager for me? Also who is the regional Sales Engineer?
I don't know what is so hard to understand, I just want to know if the support for System V (SysV) init system will be introduced or not!
Any answer is good (yes/no), but I want to know how to make my future plans and whether to continue buying the Sophos product in March 2023 or not!
I cannot make the purchase decision without knowing if I will be able to use it in my case, for operating systems without systemd!

Thanks for the help.
It remains to return to Sophos products if the operating system for my servers will include support for systemd.

I too would like to know who my local or area rep and account manager are?  I'm a single home multi desktop environment.  I had a paid license, but was never given a contact name, simply with SAV for Linux 9 that I would have to use the forums for support.  So here we are and we'd really like to know if SAV for Linux  and SAV for Unix are going to be supported going forward on environments where SystemD is not available?  I much prefer Sophos over ClamAV, which is designed fro mail servers not for individual desktops.   And since the list of Linux/UNIX/BSD anti-malware is getting smaller everyday the answer to the question really shouldn't be that hard to get.  Does Sophos abandon the standalone, non-corporate user, or support them?  Since SAV-Linux's latest version requires access to Central Server I might impute that the answer is Sophos is not interested in stand-a-lone desktops, only the corporate environment.  I don't plan to change my post on Linux Questions from what it is now, i.e. that Sophos no longer is supporting the Lilnux platform in non-corporate environments or without SystemD.  Please correct me if I'm wrong.  I really hope I'm wrong.

I received a reply privately that there are no plans in the Sophos product roadmaps to add support for distributions without systemd.
The only solution, but I think that in the short term, is the maintenance in the life cycle for Sophos Antivirus for Linux, which now has a deadline of July 20, 2023.

Thanks for the update.  It is very unforunate that Sophos has decided to only support SystemD Linux..  It is also unforunate that they have decided to only supoprt corporate installations.   I understand the corporate financial mind, to focus and support the corporate environment, because that is where the most financial reward for efforts is available.  But there are ten of thousands of Linux installations which are home and small business where the large corporate server isn't available also.  I have moved on to ClamAV, which is doing its best for my standalone system.  I'm probably going to investigate further how to get ClamAV to scan on access, in the meantime it will be scan all downloads first.

Well, with a bit of luck I came across IKARUS scan.server while looking for a solution for Squid eCAP.
It integrates very easily into Amavis and Securepoint/squid-ecap-av for SQUID and therefore can replace Sophos for operating systems without systemd.

The only problem is the price/year:
Sophos - $100
IKARUS scan.server - $850
with the mention that IKARUS is a professional Anti-Malware SDK and APIs for integration in any systems and environments and Sophos is just an antivirus.

Some news regarding the addition of support for System V (SysV) init system?
I noticed that the installation script (SophosSetup.sh) no longer gives an error due to the lack of systemctl, but the final installation fails because it cannot start the necessary services through systemd. The Sophos users created in the installation process still remain, even if it still fails and must be deleted manually.
I ask this because my license expires in March 2024 and it seems that I will have to give up Sophos after many years of successfully using the only commercial antivirus used on my servers.

Some news regarding the addition of support for System V (SysV) init system?
I noticed that the installation script (SophosSetup.sh) no longer gives an error due to the lack of systemctl, but the final installation fails because it cannot start the necessary services through systemd. The Sophos users created in the installation process still remain, even if it still fails and must be deleted manually.
I ask this because my license expires in March 2024 and it seems that I will have to give up Sophos after many years of successfully using the only commercial antivirus used on my servers.