Section Contents:- The most common free software license, the GNU GPL, is a form of copyleft, and is used for the Linux kernel and many of the components from the GNU project.(More...)
- Are you thinking about switching to Linux and want to learn how to use it?(More...)
The most common free software license, the GNU GPL, is a form of copyleft, and is used for the Linux kernel and many of the components from the GNU project. [1] A GNOME 2.20 desktop. Although there is a lack of Linux ports for some Mac OS X and Microsoft Windows programs in domains such as desktop publishing and professional audio, applications equivalent to those available for Mac and Windows are available for Linux.
[1] The frictional cost of switching operating systems and lack of support for certain hardware and application programs designed for Microsoft Windows have been two factors that have inhibited adoption. Proponents and analysts attribute the relative success of Linux to its security, reliability, low cost, and freedom from vendor lock-in.
[1] Most recently Google has begun to fund Wine, which acts as a compatibility layer, allowing users to run some Windows programs under Linux. The XO laptop project of One Laptop Per Child is creating a new and potentially much larger Linux community, planned to reach several hundred million schoolchildren and their families and communities in developing countries.
[1] A number of Java Virtual Machines and development kits run on Linux, including the original Sun Microsystems JVM ( HotSpot ), and IBM's J2SE RE, as well as many open-source projects like Kaffe. The two main frameworks for developing graphical applications are those of GNOME and KDE. These projects are based on the GTK+ and Qt widget toolkits, respectively, which can also be used independently of the larger framework. Both support a wide variety of languages.
[1] Today Linux is used in numerous domains, from embedded systems to supercomputers, and has secured a place in server installations with the popular LAMP application stack.
[1] The Linux market is growing rapidly, and the revenue of servers, desktops, and packaged software running Linux is expected to exceed $35.7 billion by 2008.
[1] Linux is one of the most prominent examples of free software and open source development: typically all underlying source code can be freely modified, used, and redistributed by anyone.
[1] Although Linux is generally available free of charge, several large corporations have established business models that involve selling, supporting, and contributing to Linux and free software. These include Dell, IBM, HP, Sun Microsystems, Novell, and Red Hat.
[1] Linux is largely driven by its developer and user communities. Some vendors develop and fund their distributions on a volunteer basis, Debian being a well-known example. Others maintain a community version of their commercial distributions, as Red Hat does with Fedora.
[1] Microsoft Office 2007 and Adobe Photoshop CS3 are known not to work. Besides the free Windows compatibility layer Wine, most distributions offer Dual boot and X86 virtualization for running both Linux and Windows on the same computer.
[1] Linux (commonly pronounced IPA : /"l"n"ks/ in English; variants exist ) is a Unix-like computer operating system.
[1] Linux is a modular Unix-like operating system. It derives much of its basic design from principles established in Unix during the 1970s and 1980s.
[1] In 1992, Tanenbaum posted an article on Usenet claiming Linux was obsolete. In the article, he criticized the operating system as being monolithic in design and being tied closely to the x86 architecture and thus not portable, as he described "a fundamental error." Tanenbaum suggested that those who wanted a modern operating system should look into one based on the microkernel model.
[1] Most low-level Linux components, including the GNU Userland, use the CLI exclusively.
[1] The popular TiVo digital video recorder uses a customized version of Linux. Several network firewall and router standalone products, including several from Linksys, use Linux internally, using its advanced firewall and routing capabilities.
[1] Many quantitative studies of open source software focus on topics including market share and reliability, with numerous studies specifically examining Linux.
[1] Mobile phones or PDAs running on Linux and built on open source platform became a trend from 2007, like the Nokia N810's Maemo, Openmoko's Neo1973 and the on-going Google Android.
[1] Retrieved on 2007 - 01-09. Torvalds has made available an audio sample which indicates his own pronunciation, in English ( /"l"n"ks/ ) " How to pronounce Linux?.
[1] Initially, nobody registered it, but on August 15, 1994, William R. Della Croce, Jr. filed for the trademark Linux, and then demanded royalties from Linux distributors. In 1996, Torvalds and some affected organizations sued him to have the trademark assigned to Torvalds, and in 1997 the case was settled.
[1] The licensing of the trademark has since been handled by the Linux Mark Institute. Torvalds has stated that he only trademarked the name to prevent someone else from using it, but was bound in 2005 by United States trademark law to take active measures to enforce the trademark.
[1] In the United States, the name Linux is a trademark registered to Linus Torvalds.
[1] Retrieved on 2006 - 12-17. " and Swedish ( /"l"'n"ks/ ) " Linus pronouncing Linux in English and Swedish.
[1] A graphical terminal emulator program is often used to access the CLI from a Linux desktop.
[1] Linux can be controlled by one or more of a text-based command line interface (CLI), graphical user interface (GUI) (usually the default for desktop), or through controls on the device itself (common on embedded machines).
[1] " Vista Aiding Linux Desktop, Strategist Says ", eWEEK, Ziff Davis Enterprise Inc., 2007 - 08-08.
[1] As of November 2007, out of the top 500 systems, 426 (85.2%) run Linux. Due to its low cost and ability to be easily modified, an embedded Linux is often used in embedded systems.
[1] Note that despite similar architectural designs and concepts being shared as part of the POSIX standard, Linux does not share any non-free source code with the original Unix or Minix.
[1] The free software licenses on which Linux is based explicitly accommodate and encourage commercialization; the relationship between Linux as a whole and individual vendors may be seen as symbiotic.
[1] The Linux copyright will change: I've had a couple of requests to make it compatible with the GNU copyleft, removing the "you may not distribute it for money" condition.
[1] IDC's report for Q1 2007 says that Linux now holds 12.7% of the overall server market. This estimate was based on the number of Linux servers sold by various companies.
[1] " Linux market share set to surpass Win 98, OS X still ahead of Vista ", Ars Technica, Ars Technica, LLC, 2007 - 09-03.
[1] Linux Weekly News is a weekly digest of Linux-related news; the Linux Journal is an online magazine of Linux articles published monthly; Slashdot is a technology-related news website with many stories on Linux and open source software; Groklaw has written in depth about Linux-related legal proceedings and there are many articles relevant to the Linux kernel and its relationship with GNU on the GNU project's website.
[1] The primary difference between Linux and many other popular contemporary operating systems is that the Linux kernel and other components are free and open source software. Linux is not the only such operating system, although it is the best-known and most widely used.
[1] The GNU userland is an important part of most Linux systems, providing the shell and Unix tools which carry out many basic operating system tasks. On top of these tools form a Linux system with a graphical user interface that can be used, usually running in the X Window System.
[1] The Free Software Foundation views Linux distributions which use GNU software as GNU variants and they ask that such operating systems be referred to as GNU/Linux or a Linux-based GNU system. The media and population at large refers to this family of operating systems simply as Linux.
[1] Most Linux distributions support dozens of programming languages. The most common collection of utilities for building both Linux applications and operating system programs is found within the GNU toolchain, which includes the GNU Compiler Collection (GCC) and the GNU build system.
[1] Most Linux distributions provide a program for browsing a list of thousands of free software applications that have already been tested and configured for a specific distribution. These free programs can be downloaded and installed with one mouse click and a digital signature guarantees that no one has added a virus or a spyware to these programs. Many free software titles that are popular on Windows, such as Pidgin, Mozilla Firefox, Openoffice.org, and GIMP, are available for Linux.
[1] Free software projects, although developed in a collaborative fashion, are often produced independently of each other. Given that the software licenses explicitly permit redistribution, this provides a basis for larger scale projects that collect the software produced by stand-alone projects and make it available all at once in the form of a Linux distribution.
[1] A Linux distribution, commonly called a "distro", is a project that manages a remote collection of Linux-based software, and facilitates installation of a Linux operating system.
[1] Linux vendors and communities combine and distribute the kernel, GNU components, and non-GNU components, with additional package management software in the form of Linux distributions.
[1] The distinction between the Linux kernel and distributions based on it plus the GNU system is a source of confusion to many newcomers, and the naming remains controversial.
[1] The GPL requires that anyone who distributes the Linux kernel must make the source code (and any modifications) available to the recipient under the same terms.
[1] Slightly over half of all lines of code were licensed under the GPL. The Linux kernel itself was 2.4 million lines of code, or 8% of the total.
[1] While the Linux kernel was originally designed only for Intel 80386 microprocessors, it now runs on a more diverse range of computer architectures than any other operating system: in the hand-held ARM -based iPAQ and the mainframe IBM System z9, in devices ranging from mobile phones to supercomputers.
[1] In many cities and regions, local associations known as Linux Users Groups (LUGs) seek to promote Linux and by extension free software. They hold meetings and provide free demonstrations, training, technical support, and operating system installation to new users.
[1] There are also many Internet communities that seek to provide support to Linux users and developers.
[1] A Linux system usually provides a CLI of some sort through a shell, which is the traditional way of interacting with a Unix system. A Linux distribution specialized for servers may use the CLI as its only interface. A "headless system" run without even a monitor can be controlled by the command line via a protocol such as SSH or telnet.
[1] Enterprise and non-enterprise Linux distributions may be found running on servers.
[1] Online forums are another means for support, with notable examples being LinuxQuestions.org and the Gentoo forums. Linux distributions host mailing lists ; commonly there will be a specific topic such as usage or development for a given list.
[1] For example the Sinhalese language version of the Knoppix distribution was available for a long time before Microsoft Windows XP was translated to Sinhalese. In this case the Lanka Linux User Group played a major part in developing the localized system by combining the knowledge of university professors, linguists, and local developers.
[1] A distribution is responsible for the default configuration of installed Linux systems, system security, and more generally integration of the different software packages into a coherent whole.
[1] Linux uses a monolithic kernel, the Linux kernel, which handles process control, networking, and peripheral and file system access.
[1] Linus Torvalds, creator of the Linux kernel. In 1991, Torvalds began to work on a non-commercial replacement for MINIX while he was attending the University of Helsinki. This eventually became the Linux kernel.
[1] The name "Linux" comes from the Linux kernel, started in 1991 by Linus Torvalds.
[1] Linux is the cornerstone of the LAMP server-software combination (Linux, Apache, MySQL, Perl / PHP / Python ) which has achieved popularity among developers, and which is one of the more common platforms for website hosting.
[1] Linux's open nature allows distributed teams to localize Linux distributions for use in locales where localizing proprietary systems would not be cost-effective.
[1] Much of Linux's higher-level functionality is provided by separate projects which interface with the kernel.
[1] 
Are you thinking about switching to Linux and want to learn how to use it? Have you been using Linux for some time and want to learn even more? Then Linux Online's classroom can help! Three courses - one for beginners, another for intermediate level users and an advanced level course - are available to our visitors free of charge.
[2] Developed under the GNU General Public License GNU General Public License , the source code for Linux is freely available to everyone.
[2] Linux is a free Unix-type operating system originally created by Linus Torvalds with the assistance of developers around the world.
[2] Linux Online is a community supported web site. We need the help of visitors, like you, to pay the day to day costs of operating this site.
[2] In it, you'll find out all you need to know to give your old hardware a new lease on life. For more information, we invite you to read a review review of this definitive book on this popular minimalist version of Linux
[2] The Linux kernel provides the basic services and device drivers used by all other programs running on a Linux OS system.
[2] Jeremiah Gray wants to provide an interesting way to learn about Linux, so he's created a new comic strip, called Hackett and Bankwell
Hackett and Bankwell, about the open source operating system. The strip will be published as a series of comic books that Gray hopes will appeal to new Linux users, but he says it is "more than just a comic book version of a Linux training guide."
[3] Linux does everything that many users want it to, but some people have tasks that require Windows applications. You can dual-boot both operating systems, or run Windows in a virtualized environment on Linux.
[3] You've probably seen quotes from long-time Linux and Free Software advocate Bruce Perens
Bruce Perens, and you may have even have seen his picture a few times. Now, in this exclusive Linux.com video, you have a chance to "meet" him in a little more personal way, and to learn how Bruce got interested in Linux and FOSS -- and why he stays both interested and involved.
[3] Last May, Red Hat announced that, with Intel, it would soon be releasing Red Hat Global Desktop, a consumer Linux desktop for emerging markets.
[3] If that is the case, then I think it would be better to channel the energy from Gobuntu into gNewSense. LinuxCertified Inc, a leading provider of Linux training and services, today announced its next Linux Device Driver Development Course class to be held in South Bay, CA from May 19th to May 21st.
[3] Linux distributions have relied on the venerable Sendmail package since the early days of Slackware. Sendmail's rich mail server features aren't an ideal solution for the typical desktop user whose primary mail support is delivered through a remote ISP. That's the perfect place for a simpler solution: sSMTP.
[3] Mark Shuttleworth, the CEO of Canonical, the company behind Ubuntu, guarantees that the next version of the popular Linux distribution will make it on time, with something for enterprise, desktop, and Internet users.
[3] In this week's look at the recent activity in Linux.com's forums
forums, we explore a couple of questions from new Linux users about how their new OS differs from Windows, how to create a directory archive that you can mount like a disk image, and how answering your own forum question can actually help somebody else.
[3] The archivemount FUSE
FUSE filesystem lets you mount a possibly compressed tarball as a filesystem. Because FUSE exposes its filesystems through the Linux kernel, you can use any application to load and save files directly into such mounted archives. This lets you use your favourite text editor, image viewer, or music player on files that are still inside an archive file.
[3] We need a new conversation about infrastructure. That's what Linux, the Net, and half a million FOSS (Free and Open Source Software) applications require. Because they're all part of a new infrastructural system that cannot be explained in terms of the old one " especially since infrastructure itself is not well understood.
[4] Movino
Movino is a cool new open source project (geared specifically at Linux and Mac OS X) which allows you to send live video feed from your cellular phone to your website.
[4] Integrated security systems going green; real-time Linux; CRMs; data automation; and security management tools top off our editors' new products roundup.
[4] The Perfect Date. Yes yes, I realize it's no surprise we feel pretty attached to Linux here at Linux Journal, but that aside, what's not to love about Linux? Especially in the last few years, it's no longer a matter of whether Linux is ready for the desktop yet -- it's just a matter of when are people going to realize it? Thankfully, we're starting to see that.
[4] In the first of three articles Dave Phillps profiles native Linux software synthesizer, amSynth.
[4] Linux Journal Gadget Guy Shawn Powers walks you through how to play Windows games on Linux.
[4] To guard against Trojan mirror sites, all files originating at the Linux Kernel Archives are cryptographically signed cryptographically signed. If you are getting a message that the verification key has expired, please see this link.
[5] The Linux kernel, as well as several other pieces of software, are maintained using the git git source code control system.
[5] Welcome to the Linux Kernel Archives. This is the primary site for the Linux kernel source, but it has much more than just Linux kernels.
[5] This site is operated by the Linux Kernel Organization, Inc., a 501(c)3 nonprofit corporation, with support from the following sponsors.
[5] If you're new to Linux, you don't want to download the kernel, which is just a component in a working Linux system.
[5] You want what is called a distribution of Linux, which is a complete Linux system.
[5] Linux International, also known as LI, is a world-wide non-profit association of end users who are dedicated to furthering the acceptance and use of Free and Open Source Software (FOSS). An end-user is defined as a person that uses FOSS in their daily life.
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