this post was submitted on 17 Sep 2023
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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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That's because back in the day those had some good logic. On mainframe systems you had to be able to split files by how crucial they are too keeping the system alive, so you'd mount something like /bin locally but you could mount /usr/bin remotely and still keep the machine running if the connection was lost. And so on and so forth.
Nowadays we really should revise the Filesystem Hierarchy Standard but it's required by the UNIX compatibility and it's baked into so many things that you wouldn't believe.
I remember back in the 2000s the were distros like GoboLinux that tried to reorganize the files with criteria relevant to a modern machine but it didn't catch on in the Linux world. However Apple did it for Mac OS.
Gobo Linux is still there https://gobolinux.org/
The primary init manager for Linux is removing support for separating them later this year
https://lists.freedesktop.org/archives/systemd-devel/2022-September/048352.html