Articles about Linux

Xubuntu
Xubuntu (/zuːˈbuːntuː/ zoo-boon-too) is a Canonical Ltd. recognized, community maintained derivative of the Ubuntu operating system, using the Xfce desktop environment. The name Xubuntu is a portmanteau of Xfce and Ubuntu. Xfce originally was an abbreviation for XForms Common Environment, while Ubuntu means "humanity towards others" in the Zulu and Xhosa languages...
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Yggdrasil Linux
Yggdrasil Linux/GNU/X, or LGX (pronounced igg-drah-sill), was an early Linux distribution developed by Yggdrasil Computing, Incorporated, a company founded by Adam J. Richter in Berkeley, California...
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VectorLinux
VectorLinux, abbreviated VL, is a Linux distribution for the x86 platform based on the Slackware Linux distribution. Originally developed by Canadian developers Robert S. Lange and Darell Stavem, the operating system is now also supported by an international community...
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RTLinux
RTLinux or RTCore is a hard realtime RTOS microkernel that runs the entire Linux operating system as a fully preemptive process. It was developed by Victor Yodaiken (Yodaiken 1999), Michael Barabanov (Barabanov 1996), Cort Dougan and others at the New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology and then as a commercial product at FSMLabs...
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RTAI
RTAI stands for Real-Time Application Interface. It is a real-time extension for the Linux kernel - which lets you write applications with strict timing constraints for Linux. Like Linux itself the RTAI software is a community effort...
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Xenomai
Xenomai is a real-time development framework cooperating with the Linux kernel, to provide a pervasive, interface-agnostic, hard real-time support to user space applications, seamlessly integrated into the Linux environment. The Xenomai project was launched in August 2001. In 2003 it merged with the Real-Time Application Interface (RTAI) project to produce a production-grade real-time free software platform for GNU/Linux called RTAI/fusion, on top of Xenomai's abstract real-time operating system (RTOS) core...
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POSIX
POSIX (/ˈpɒzɪks/ poz-iks), an acronym for "Portable Operating System Interface", is a family of standards specified by the IEEE for maintaining compatibility between operating systems. POSIX defines the application programming interface (API), along with command line shells and utility interfaces, for software compatible with variants of Unix and other operating systems...
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Linux Standard Base
The Linux Standard Base (LSB) is a joint project by several Linux distributions under the organizational structure of the Linux Foundation to standardize the software system structure, including the filesystem hierarchy, used with Linux operating system. The LSB is based on the POSIX specification, the Single UNIX Specification, and several other open standards, but extends them in certain areas...
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Free Standards Group
The Free Standards Group was an industry non-profit consortium chartered to primarily specify and drive the adoption of open source standards. All standards developed by the Free Standards Group (FSG) were released under open terms (the GNU Free Documentation License with no cover texts or invariant sections) and test suites, sample implementations and other software were released as free software...
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Open Source Development Labs
Open Source Development Labs (OSDL) was a non-profit organization supported by a global consortium tasked to "accelerate the deployment of Linux for enterprise computing." Founded in 2000, its goals included "to be the recognized center-of-gravity for the Linux industry." On January 22, 2007, OSDL and the Free Standards Group merged to form The Linux Foundation, narrowing their respective focuses to that of promoting Linux in competition with Microsoft Window...
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Single UNIX Specification
The Single UNIX Specification (SUS) is the collective name of a family of standards for computer operating systems to qualify for the name "Unix". The SUS is developed and maintained by the Austin Group, based on earlier work by the IEEE and The Open Group...
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Linux Foundation
The Linux Foundation (LF) is a non-profit technology consortium chartered to foster the growth of Linux. Founded in 2007 by the merger of the Open Source Development Labs (OSDL) and the Free Standards Group (FSG), the Linux Foundation sponsors the work of Linux creator Linus Torvalds and is supported by leading Linux and open source companies and developers from around the world...
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Linus Torvalds
Linus Benedict Torvalds is a Finnish software engineer and hacker, best known for having initiated the development of the open source Linux kernel. He later became the chief architect of the Linux kernel, and now acts as the project's coordinator. He also created the revision control system Git as well as the Scuba diving log book software Subsurface...
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KDE
KDE (/ˌkeɪdiːˈiː/) is an international free software community producing an integrated set of cross-platform applications designed to run on Linux, FreeBSD, Microsoft Windows, Solaris and Mac OS X systems. It is best known for its Plasma Desktop, a desktop environment provided as the default working environment on many Linux distributions, such as Kubuntu, Pardus and openSUSE...
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Xenix
Xenix is a version of the Unix operating system, licensed to Microsoft from AT&T in the late 1970s. The Santa Cruz Operation (SCO) later acquired exclusive rights to the software, and eventually superseded it with SCO UNIX (now known as SCO OpenServer)...
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Ultrix
Ultrix (officially all-caps ULTRIX) was the brand name of Digital Equipment Corporation's (DEC) native Unix systems. While ultrix is the Latin word for avenger, the name was chosen solely for its sound...
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MINIX
MINIX is a Unix-like computer operating system based on a microkernel architecture created by Andrew S. Tanenbaum for educational purposes; MINIX also inspired the creation of the Linux kernel...
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Unix-like operating system
A Unix-like (sometimes referred to as UN*X or *nix) operating system is one that behaves in a manner similar to a Unix system, while not necessarily conforming to or being certified to any version of the Single UNIX Specification...
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CentOS
CentOS is a free operating system based on Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL). It exists to provide a free enterprise class computing platform and strives to maintain 100% binary compatibility with its upstream distribution. CentOS stands for Community ENTerprise Operating System...
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Arch Linux
Arch Linux (or Arch) is an independently developed, Linux-based operating system for i686 and x86-64 computers. It is composed predominantly of free and open source software, and supports community involvement. The design approach of the development team focuses on simplicity, elegance, code correctness and minimalism. "Simplicity", according to Arch, is defined as "...without unnecessary additions, modifications, or complications.." and is defined from a developer standpoint, rather than a user standpoint...
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GNOME
GNOME is a desktop environment and graphical user interface that runs on top of a computer operating system. It is composed entirely of free and open source software. It is an international project that includes creating software development frameworks, selecting application software for the desktop, and working on the programs that manage application launching, file handling, and window and task management...
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X terminal
In computing, an X terminal is a display/input terminal for X Window System client applications. X terminals enjoyed a period of popularity in the early 1990s when they offered a lower total cost of ownership alternative to a full Unix workstation. An X terminal runs an X server. (In X, the usage of "client" and "server" is from the viewpoint of the programs: the X server supplies a screen, keyboard, mouse and touchscreen to client applications.)...
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X Window System
The X window system (commonly X Window System or X11, based on its current major version being 11) is a computer software system and network protocol that provides a basis for graphical user interfaces (GUIs) and rich input device capability for networked computers. It creates a hardware abstraction layer where software is written to use a generalized set of commands, allowing for device independence and reuse of programs on any computer that implements X...
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PCLinuxOS
PCLinuxOS, often shortened to PCLOS, is a GNU/Linux distribution, with KDE Plasma Desktop as its default user interface. It is a primarily free software operating system for personal computers aimed at ease of use. It is partially considered as a rolling release...
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Linux Mint
Linux Mint is a Linux-based computer operating system best known for its usability and ease of installation, particularly for users with no previous Linux experience. It is available in several editions with different codebases, nearly all of which are based on Ubuntu, which is itself based on Debian...
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Slax Linux
Slax is a LiveCD Linux distribution based on Slackware and is currently being developed by Tomáš Matějíček. Packages can be selected in a website where users can build a custom Slax iso image. Slax slogan refers to the software as a "Pocket Operating System". The latest version of Slax is 6.1.2, which was released on 4 August 2009...
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Puppy Linux
Puppy Linux is a lightweight Linux distribution that focuses on ease of use. The entire system can be run from RAM, allowing the boot medium to be removed after the operating system has started. Applications such as AbiWord (a free word processing application), Gnumeric (a spreadsheet) and MPlayer (a free multimedia player) are included, along with a wide choice of web browsers that can be installed. The distribution was originally developed by Barry Kauler and other members of the community. The tool Woof can build a Puppy Linux distribution from the binary packages of other Linux distributions...
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openSUSE Linux
openSUSE (/ˌoʊpənˈsuːzə/) is a general purpose operating system built on top of the Linux kernel, developed by the community-supported openSUSE Project and sponsored by SUSE. After Novell acquired SUSE Linux in January 2004, Novell decided to release the SUSE Linux Professional product as a 100% open source project. The initial release of the community project was a beta version of SUSE Linux 10.0, and as of March 10, 2011 the current stable release is openSUSE 11.4...
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Gentoo Linux
Gentoo Linux (/ˈdʒɛntuː/ jen-too) is a computer operating system built on top of the Linux kernel and based on the Portage package management system. It is distributed as free and open source software. Unlike a conventional software distribution, the user compiles the source code locally according to their chosen configuration. There are normally no precompiled binaries for software, continuing the tradition of the ports collection, although for convenience, some software packages (such as Mozilla Firefox and LibreOffice) are also available as precompiled binaries for various architectures where compiling would otherwise be very time consuming...
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Mandriva Linux
Mandriva Linux (result of fusion of the French distribution Mandrakelinux or Mandrake Linux and the Brazilian distribution Conectiva Linux) is a Linux distribution distributed by Mandriva . It uses the RPM Package Manager. The product lifetime of Mandriva Linux releases is 18 months for base updates (Linux, system software, etc.) and 12 months for desktop updates (window managers, desktop environments, web browsers, etc.). Server products receive full updates for at least 5 years after their release...
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MEPIS
MEPIS (/ˈmɛpɨs/) is a set of Linux distributions, distributed as Live CDs that can be installed onto a hard disk drive. MEPIS is developed and maintained by an active community[citation needed] begun by Warren Woodford and the eponymous company MEPIS LLC. The most popular MEPIS distribution is SimplyMEPIS, which is based primarily on Debian stable...
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Ubuntu operating system
Ubuntu (/ʊˈbʊntuː/) is a computer operating system based on the Debian distribution and distributed as free and open source software. It is named after the Southern African philosophy of Ubuntu ("humanity towards others")...
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Debian operating system
Debian (/ˈdɛbiən/) is a computer operating system composed of software packages released as free and open source software primarily under the GNU General Public License along with other free software licenses. Debian GNU/Linux, which includes the GNU OS tools and Linux kernel, is a popular and influential Linux distribution. It is distributed with access to repositories containing thousands of software packages ready for installation and use...
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Fedora operating system
Fedora (/fɨˈdɔːrə/) is a RPM-based, general purpose collection of software, including an operating system based on the Linux kernel, developed by the community-supported Fedora Project and sponsored by Red Hat. The Fedora Project's mission is to lead the advancement of free and open source software and content as a collaborative community...
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Slackware Linux
Slackware is a free and open source Linux-based operating system. It was one of the earliest operating systems to be built on top of the Linux kernel and is the oldest currently being maintained. Slackware was created by Patrick Volkerding of Slackware Linux, Inc. in 1993. The current stable version is 13.37, released on April 27, 2011...
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Red Hat Linux
Red Hat, Inc. (NYSE: RHT) is an S&P 500 company in the free and open source software sector, and a major Linux distribution vendor. Founded in 1993, Red Hat has its corporate headquarters in Raleigh, North Carolina with satellite offices worldwide...
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Linux kernel oops
An oops is a deviation from correct behavior of the Linux kernel which produces a certain error log. The better-known kernel panic condition results from many kinds of oops, but others may allow continued operation with compromised reliability. The term does not stand for anything, other than that it is a simple mistake. When the kernel detects a problem, it prints an oops message and kills any offending process. The message is used by Linux kernel engineers to debug the condition which created the oops and fix the programming error which caused it...
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Linux kernel panic
A kernel panic is an action taken by an operating system upon detecting an internal fatal error from which it cannot safely recover. The term is largely specific to Unix and Unix-like systems; for Microsoft Windows operating systems the equivalent term is "Bug check" (or, colloquially, "Blue Screen of Death")...
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Linux kernel
The Linux kernel is an operating system kernel used by the Linux family of Unix-like operating systems. It is one of the most prominent examples of free and open source software. The Linux kernel is released under the GNU General Public License version 2 (GPLv2) (plus some firmware images with various non-free licenses), and is developed by contributors worldwide. Day-to-day development discussions take place on the Linux kernel mailing list...
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GNU/Linux naming controversy
The GNU/Linux naming controversy is a dispute among members of the free and open source software community over how to refer to the computer operating system commonly called Linux. GNU/Linux is a term promoted by the Free Software Foundation (FSF), its founder Richard Stallman, and its supporters, for operating systems that include GNU software and the Linux kernel. The FSF argues for the term GNU/Linux because GNU was a longstanding project to develop a free operating system, of which they say the kernel was the last missing piece...
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SCO-Linux controversies
The SCO-Linux controversies are a series of legal and public disputes between the software company SCO Group (SCO) and various Linux vendors and users. The SCO Group alleges that its license agreements with IBM means that source code that IBM wrote and donated to be incorporated into Linux was added in violation of SCO's contractual rights. Members of the Linux community disagree with SCO's claims; IBM, Novell and Red Hat have ongoing claims against SCO...
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Linux devices
Linux-based devices or Linux devices are computer appliances that are powered by the Linux kernel and possibly other parts of the Linux operating system. They are often minimalistic and purpose-built, thus may be environmentally friendly and create less electronic waste per unit...
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Desktop Linux
Desktop Linux, also called Linux on the desktop, refers to specialized Linux distributions with features designed for desktop personal computer users. These features include a graphical user interface and personal use applications. Some Linux distributions have targeted the desktop role specifically, while others include all the software available for the platform. In that case, the user will be given the choice to select either a "desktop" or "server" type when the operating system is installed...
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Linux User Group
A Linux User Group or Linux Users' Group (LUG) or GNU/Linux User Group (GLUG) is a private, generally non-profit or not-for-profit organization that provides support and/or education for Linux users, particularly for inexperienced users. The term commonly refers to local groups that meet in person, but is also used to refer to online support groups that may have members spread over a very wide area and which do not organize, or which are not based around, physical meetings. Many LUGs encompass FreeBSD and other free Unix-based operating systems...
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Free-software community
The free-software community is an informal term that refers to the users and developers of free software as well as supporters of the free-software movement. The movement is sometimes referred to as the open-source software community or a subset thereof. The Linux community is a subset of the free-software community...
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Linux distribution
A Linux distribution is a member of the family of Unix-like operating systems built on top of the Linux kernel. Such distributions (often called distros for short) are Operating systems including a large collection of software applications such as word processors, spreadsheets, media players, and database applications. The operating system will consist of the Linux kernel and, usually, a set of libraries and utilities from the GNU Project, with graphics support from the X Window System...
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List of Linux adopters
Linux adopters are organizations and individuals who have moved from other operating systems to Linux. Although Linux's status as a mainstream operating system is relatively recent, it is in use in many different environments, including government, education, home, business and scientific institutions...
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Linux adoption
Linux adoption refers to new use of the Linux computer operating system by homes, organizations, companies, and governments, while Linux migration refers to the change from using other operating systems to using Linux...
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History of Linux
The History of Linux began in 1991 with the commencement of a personal project by a Finnish student, Linus Torvalds, to create a new operating system kernel.
Since then the resulting Linux kernel has been marked by constant growth throughout its history. Since the initial release of its source code in 1991, it has grown from a small number of C files under a license prohibiting commercial distribution to its state in 2009 of over 370 megabytes of source under the GNU General Public License...
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Linux (article from Wikipedia)
Linux (play /ˈlɪnəks/ lin-əks, also pronounced /ˈlɪnʊks/ lin-uuks) is a Unix-like computer operating system assembled under the model of free and open source software development and distribution. The defining component of any Linux system is the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released October 5, 1991 by Linus Torvalds. Linux system distributions may vary in many details of system operation, configuration, and software package selections. Linux runs on a wide variety of computer hardware, including mobile phones, tablet computers, network routers, televisions, video game consoles, desktop computers, mainframes and supercomputers. Linux is a leading server operating system, and runs the 10 fastest supercomputers in the world...
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