Linux

48053 readers

769 users here now

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.

Rules

Posts must be relevant to operating systems running the Linux kernel. GNU/Linux or otherwise.
No misinformation
No NSFW content
No hate speech, bigotry, etc

Related Communities

Community icon by Alpár-Etele Méder, licensed under CC BY 3.0

founded 5 years ago

MODERATORS

[email protected]

127

What is the /opt directory? (self.linux)

submitted 8 months ago by AlexPewMaster to c/[email protected]

42 comments fedilink hide all child comments

I've seen a lot of self-hosted software wanting to store their data in /opt, is there any reason why?

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

[–] [email protected] 8 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

Here's an example of how I have used it in the past (following the guidance in the other post).

I did a lot of Java development. Ubuntu has a package for OpenJDK which I installed, but I also need specific (and often multiple) versions not included by the package manager. So I would download a tarball and extract them to /opt/java-x.y.z/. Then for the version I considered my "current" I created a symlink at /opt/java to point to the version I wanted to use.