What is Linux Operating System?
Linux is an operating system, compatible with Unix. Two very unique features distinguish it from other systems that can be found on the market, the first is that it is free, it means that we do not have to pay any license to any developer of software for home use it, the second is that the system comes with the video.
The system will form the core of the system (kernel) over a large number of programs / libraries that make their use. Many of these programs and libraries were made possible by the GNU project, therefore, many called Linux, GNU / Linux, to highlight that the system is formed by both the kernel as much of the software produced by the GNU project.
Linux is distributed under the GNU General Public License therefore the source code must always be accessible and any modification or derivative work must have this license.
The system has been designed and programmed by a multitude of programmers around the world. The core of the system is still in progress under the coordination of Linus Torvalds, the person that started the idea of this project at the beginning of the nineties. Today, large companies such as IBM, SUN, HP, Novell and Red Hat, among many others, to provide Linux support both economic and large code.
Day by day, more and more programs and applications are available for this system, and the quality of the increases from release to release. The vast majority of them come with source code and are usually licensed under the terms of the GNU General Public License.
More and more software houses distribute their products for Linux and the presence of the same companies in the steadily increasing value for money is achieved with Linux.
Architectures in which a principle can be used Linux are Intel 386 -, 486 -, Pentium, Pentium Pro, Pentium II / III / IV, IA-64, AMD 5x86, amd64, Cyrix and Motorola 68020, IBM S/390 , zSeries, DEC Alpha, ARM, MIPS, PowerPC, SPARC and UltraSPARC. Furthermore, it is not difficult to find new projects to further arquitexturas Linux porting.
History
Linux makes its appearance at the beginning of the nineties, it was 1991 and then a student at the University of Helsinki, named Linus Torvalds began as a hobby and can not imagine what I would get this project , to schedule the first lines of code in this operating system to Linux would call later.
This start was inspired by MINIX, a small Unix system developed by Andy Tanenbaum. The first discussions about Linux were on the newsgroup comp.os.minix in these discussions was talk on the development of a small Unix system for Minix users who wanted more.
On July 3, 1991, Linus Torvalds sent the first message on the Linux newsgroup comp.os.minix:
Path: gmdzi! United! Mcsun! News.funet.fi! Hydra! Klaava! Torvalds
From: Torva ... @ klaava.Helsinki.FI (Linus Benedict Torvalds)
Newsgroups: comp.os.minix
Subject: gcc-1.40 and a posix-question
Keywords: gcc, posix
Message-ID: <@ 1991Jul3.100050.9886 klaava.Helsinki.FI>
Date: 3 Jul 91 10:00:50 GMT
Organization: University of Helsinki
Lines: 28
Netlanders Hello,
Due to a project I'm working on (in minix), I'm interested in the posix
standard definition. Could somebody please point me to a (preferably)
machine-readable format of the latest posix rules? Ftp-sites would be
nice.
As an aside for all using gcc on minix - the new version (1.40) has been
out for some weeks, and I decided to test what needed to be done to get
minix working on it (1.37.1, which is the version you can get from
Plains is nice, but 1.40 is better :-). To my surpice, the answer
turned out to be - NOTHING! Gcc-1.40 compile as-is on minix386 (with
old gcc-1.37.1), with no need to change source files (I changed the
Makefile and some paths, but that's it!). As this results in a default
compiler that uses floating point insns, but if you'd rather not,
changing 'toplev.c' to define DEFAULT_TARGET from 1 to 0 (this is from
memory - I'm not at my minix-box) will handle that too. Do not make the
libs, use the old gnulib & libc.a. I have successfully compiled with 1.40
itself, and everything works fine (I got the newest versions of gas and
binutils at the same time, as I've heard of bugs with older versions of
ld.c). Makefile needs some chmem's (and if you're still using gcc2minix
it).
Linus Torvalds Torva ... @ kruuna.helsinki.fi
PS. Could someone please try to finger me from overseas, as I've
installed a "changing. plan" (made by your's truly), and I'm not certain
it works from outside? It should report a new. Plan every time.
On 25 August 1991, sent the following message, which is considered by many as the beginning of the Linux project:
Path: gmdzi! United! Fauern! Ira.uka.de! Sol.ctr.columbia.edu! Zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!
wupost! uunet! mcsun! news.funet.fi! hydra! klaava! Torvalds
From: Torva ... @ klaava.Helsinki.FI (Linus Benedict Torvalds)
Newsgroups: comp.os.minix
Subject: What would you like to see most in minix?
Summary: small poll for my new operating system
Keywords: 386, preferences
Message-ID: <@ 1991Aug25.205708.9541 klaava.Helsinki.FI>
Date: 25 Aug 91 20:57:08 GMT
Organization: University of Helsinki
Lines: 20
Hello everybody out there using minix --
I'm doing a (free) operating system (just a hobby, will not be big and
professional like gnu) for 386 (486) AT clones. This has been brewing
since April, and is starting to get ready. I'd like any feedback on
things people like / dislike in minix, as my OS resembles it somewhat
(same physical layout of the file-system (due to practical reasons)
among other things).
I've currently Ported bash (1.08) and gcc (1.40), and things seem to work.
This implies that I'll get something practical within a few months, and
I'd like to know what features most people would want. Any suggestions
are welcome, but I will not promise I'll implement them :-)
Linus (torva. .. @ kruuna.helsinki.fi)
PS. Yes - it's free of any minix code, and it has a multi-threaded fs.
It is NOT protable (uses 386 task switching etc), and it probably never
will support anything other than AT-harddisks, as that's all I have :-(.
Linus never notice the Linux version 0.01 (August / September 1991), this version was not even executable, only included the core principles of the system, was written in assembly language and assumed that one had access to a system for compiling Minix .
On October 5, 1991, Linus announced the first "official" version of Linux, version 0.02. This version could run Linus Bash (GNU Bourne Again Shell) and gcc (GNU C compiler) but not much worked. At this stage of development and thought in terms of support, documentation, distribution .....
This was the message sent to comp.os.minix:
Path: gmdzi! United! Mcsun! News.funet.fi! Hydra! Klaava! Torvalds
From: Torva ... @ klaava.Helsinki.FI (Linus Benedict Torvalds)
Newsgroups: comp.os.minix
Subject: Free minix-like kernel sources for 386-AT
Keywords: 386, preliminary version
Message-ID: <@ 1991Oct5.054106.4647 klaava.Helsinki.FI>
Date: Oct 91 05:41:06 GMT 5
Organization: University of Helsinki
Lines: 55
Do you pine for the nice days of minix-1.1, when men were men and wrote
their own device drivers? Are you without a nice project and just dying
to cut your teeth on a OS you can try to modify for your needs? Are you
finding it frustrating when everything works on minix? No more all -
nighters to get a nifty program working? Then this post might be just
for you :-)
As I mentioned a month (?) Ago, I'm working on a free version of a
minix-Lookalike for AT-386 computers. It has finally reached the stage
where it's even usable (though may not be depending on what you want)
and I am willing to put out the sources for wider distribution. It is
just version 0.02 (+1 (very small) patch already), but I've successfully
run bash / gcc / gnu-make / gnu-sed / compress etc under it.
Sources for this pet project of mine can be found at nic.funet.fi
(128.214.6.100) in the directory / pub / OS / Linux. The directory also
contains some README-file and a couple of binaries to work under linux
(bash, update and gcc, what more can you ask for :-). Full kernel
source is provided, as no minix code has been used. Library sources are
only partially free, so that can not be distributed currently. The
system is able to compile "as-is" and has been known to work. Heh.
Sources to the binaries (bash and gcc) can be found at the same place in
/ pub / gnu.
ALERT! WARNING! NOTE! These sources still need minix-386 to be compiled
(and gcc-1.40, possibly 1.37.1, have not tested), and you need to minix
September it up if you want to run it, so it is not yet a standalone system
for those of you without minix. I'm working on it. You also need to be
something of a hacker to set it up (?), so for those hoping for an
alternative to minix-386, please ignore me. It is currently meant for
hackers interested in operating systems and 386's with access to minix.
The system needs an AT-compatible harddisk (IDE is fine) and EGA / VGA. If
you are still interested, please ftp the README / RELNOTES, and / or mail me
for additional info.
I can (well, almost) hear you asking yourselves "why?". Hurd will be
out in a year (or two, or next month, who knows), and I've already got
minix. This is a program for hackers by a hacker. I've doing enjouyed
it, and somebody might enjoy looking at it and even modifying it for
their own needs. It is still small enough to understand, use and
modify, and I'm looking forward to any comments you might have.
I'm also interested in hearing from anybody who has any of the written
utilities / library functions for minix. If your efforts are freely
distributable (under copyright or even public domain), I'd like to hear
from you, so I can add them to the system. I'm using Earl Chews estdio
right now (thanks for a nice and working system Earl), and similar works
will be very wellcome. Your (C) 's will of course be left intact. Drop me
a line if you are willing to let me use your code.
Linus
PS. to PHIL NELSON! I'm unable to get through to you, and keep getting
forward error - strawberry unknown domain "or something.
After version 0.03, Linus jump in numbers to 0.10, more and more programmers across the Internet began to work on the project and after successive revisions, Linus increase the version number to 0.95 (March 1992 ), the first system capable of running X-windows. More than a year later (December 1993) was the core of the system in version 0.99 and version 1.0.0 does not arrive until 14 March 1994.
On May 9 1996, Tux has been proposed as official mascot of Linux.
On June 9, 1996 the series was launched 2.0.x, the 2.2.x was not until 25 January 1999 and 2.4.x until January 4, 2001.
On 17 December 2003 was launched the current round of the nucleus, the 2.6.x Linux development continues to make progress day by day with the goal of upgrading and improving the system.
The following chart you can see an illustration of the various flavors of Unix since the launch of the first in the 70s and the position of Linux in this story.