Over the years, a number of different operating systems have been created that attempted to be “unix-like” or “unix-compatible,” but Linux has been the most successful, far surpassing its predecessors in popularity.
However, not all Unices are free and open source. Both have similar tools for interfacing with the system, programming tools, filesystem layouts, and other key components. Unix and Linux are similar in many ways, and in fact, Linux was originally created to be indistinguishable from Unix. You may have heard of Unix, which is an operating system developed in the 1970s at Bell Labs by Ken Thompson, Dennis Ritchie, and others. What is the difference between Unix and Linux? However, not all Linux installations use GNU components as a part of the operating system: Android, for example, uses a Linux kernel but relies very little on GNU tools.
Some people, particularly members of the Free Software Foundation, refer to this collection as GNU/Linux, because many vital tools included are GNU components. Most people refer to the entire operating system as "Linux" because to most users an OS includes a bundle of programs, tools, and services (like a desktop, clock, an application menu, and so on). The term “Linux” technically refers to just the Linux kernel.
The source code for Linux is under copyright by its many individual authors, and licensed under the GPLv2 license. However, the trademark on the name “Linux” rests with its creator, Linus Torvalds. Who “owns” Linux?īy virtue of its open source licensing, Linux is freely available to anyone.
Even Microsoft Windows features Linux components, as part of the Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL). Your car has Linux running under the hood.
Many devices you probably own, such as Android phones and tablets and Chromebooks, digital storage devices, personal video recorders, cameras, wearables, and more, also run Linux. Depending on which user survey you look at, between one- and two-thirds of the webpages on the Internet are generated by servers running Linux.Ĭompanies and individuals choose Linux for their servers because it's secure, flexible, and you can receive excellent support from a large community of users, in addition to companies like Canonical, SUSE, and Red Hat, each of which offer commercial support. You probably already use Linux, whether you know it or not. Linux users also can choose core components, such as which system displays graphics, and other user-interface components. This means that Linux is incredibly customizable, because not just applications, such as word processors and web browsers, can be swapped out. Linux is also different in that, although the core pieces of the Linux operating system are generally common, there are many distributions of Linux, which include different software options. The code used to create Linux is free and available to the public to view, edit, and-for users with the appropriate skills-to contribute to. First, and perhaps most importantly, Linux is open source software. In short: if you can use a computer or other electronic device, you can use Linux.īut Linux also is different from other operating systems in many important ways. In many cases, a software’s creator may have made a Linux version of the same program you use on other systems. Like other operating systems, Linux has a graphical interface, and the same types of software you are accustomed to, such as word processors, photo editors, video editors, and so on. In many ways, Linux is similar to other operating systems you may have used before, such as Windows, macOS (formerly OS X), or iOS. How does Linux differ from other operating systems? As an operating system, Linux is software that sits underneath all of the other software on a computer, receiving requests from those programs and relaying these requests to the computer’s hardware. Linux is the best-known and most-used open source operating system.