this post was submitted on 17 Aug 2023
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Linux
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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Linux is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991 by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged in a Linux distribution (or distro for short).
Distributions include the Linux kernel and supporting system software and libraries, many of which are provided by the GNU Project. Many Linux distributions use the word "Linux" in their name, but the Free Software Foundation uses the name GNU/Linux to emphasize the importance of GNU software, causing some controversy.
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"Linux" has two meanings. One of them is the kernel itself; another is a collection of operating systems, that Stallman would call "GNU plus Linux" instead.
The later involves two factors. A "hard" one is the presence of the Linux kernel; but there's also two softer and fuzzier ones:
A good example of both is ChromeOS: people don't usually call it "Linux", even if it uses the Linux kernel. It's simply too atypical in behaviour, and ideologically too distant from the open source movement.
Just a little addition: the majority of things that people associate with Linux as per your first item are actually shared by many/most Unix-like OS and are defined via the various POSIX standards.
That's not to say that Linux doesn't have it's own peculiarities, but they are fewer than many people think.
They do - and in some cases you can fit both items to a T, without fitting the "hard" requirement (Linux kernel); that was the case with Debian/kFreeBSD for example. (And even "vanilla" *BSDs feel right at home for most Linux users, I think.)