diff --git a/NEWS.md b/NEWS.md
index a51069c6..4dafc150 100644
--- a/NEWS.md
+++ b/NEWS.md
@@ -4,6 +4,13 @@ OpenRC NEWS
 This file will contain a list of notable changes for each release. Note
 the information in this file is in reverse order.
 
+## OpenRC 0.42
+
+openrc-shutdown now has the ability to shut down sysvinit-based systems.
+
+A guide has been added for migrating systems using another init system
+to openrc-init.
+
 ## OpenRC 0.41.
 
 This version adds the ability to format the output of rc-status when
diff --git a/init-guide.md b/init-guide.md
new file mode 100644
index 00000000..f487e331
--- /dev/null
+++ b/init-guide.md
@@ -0,0 +1,50 @@
+# OpenRC init process guide
+
+OpenRC now includes an init process which can be used on Linux systems
+in place of sysvinit.
+
+## migrating a live system to openrc-init
+
+Configuring a live system to use this init process is very
+straight-forward, but the steps must be completed in this order.
+
+* have your boot loader add "init=/sbin/openrc-init" to the kernel command line
+
+The details of how to do this will vary from distro to distro, so they are
+out of scope for this document.
+
+* Install gettys into the runlevels where you need them.
+
+If you are using the provided /etc/init.d/agetty script,, you should
+first create symlinks in /etc/init.d to it for the ports where you
+want gettys to run, e.g. the following will work if you want gettys on
+tty1-tty6.
+
+```
+# cd /etc/init.d
+# for x in tty1 tty2 tty3 tty4 tty5 tty6; do
+  ln -snf agetty agetty.$x
+  done
+```
+
+Once this is done, use ```rc-update``` as normal to install the agetty
+services in the appropriate runlevels.
+
+* Reboot your system.
+
+At this point you are running under openrc-init, and you should use
+openrc-shutdown to handle shutting down, powering off, rebooting etc.
+
+## optional sysvinit compatibility
+
+If you build and install OpenRC with MKSYSVINIT=yes, you will build and install
+wrappers that make openrc-init compatible with sysvinit -- you will have
+commands like "halt" "shutdown" "reboot" and "poweroff".
+
+If you want this functionality on a live system, you should first
+migrate the system to openrc-init, remove sysvinit, then rebuild and
+install this package with MKSYSVINIT=yes.
+
+package.
+migrating your system to openrc-init.
+