this post was submitted on 26 Jun 2024
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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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Quite the opposite.
GNU Hurd was a microkernel, using lots of cutting edge research, and necessitating a lot of additional complexity in userspace. This complexity also made it very difficult to get good performance.
Linux, on the other hand, was just a bog standard Unix monolithic kernel. Once they got a libc working on it, most existing Unix userspace, including the GNU userspace, was easy to port.
Linux won because it was simple, not elaborate.
Ok, interesting, thanks for the correction. Do you think rephrasing my statement and stating Linus's kernel is more adaptive would be more accurate?
Maybe.
Linux won because it worked. Hurd was stuck in research and development hell. They never were able to catch up.