this post was submitted on 02 Sep 2023
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Linux
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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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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So much to unpack here.
GNU is not a Linux variant. It is a set of programs and shared libraries.
ISO 9660 has nothing to do with compression. Just calling it ISO isn't a good idea for an intro class like that because it is a set of MANY standards. They should have put a little side blurb and called it ISO 9660 in the table.
tar is an archive tool. It has no compression.
Why no mention of compression algorithms algorithms vs archive tools?
Why not have different compression algorithms and their tradeoffs?
ETA: jar files are just zip files for Java libs/programs. You can open them with zip file tools.
GNU is not a set of programs or libraries, it's an operating system.
GNU packages is what you are referring to. But GNU itself is the name of the OS.
It was intended to be an OS and is if you use the Hurd kernel. In practice, Hurd isn't really used, so it is just a bunch of programs and libraries. I guess it can go either way.
Agree. GNU Hurd is the OS. GNU Utils is a bunch of libre utilities that replicates the function of the UNIX utilities.