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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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Why is Debian the way it is? (blog.liw.fi)

submitted 1 year ago by pnutzh4x0r@lemmy.ndlug.org to c/linux@lemmy.ml

38 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Debian is a large, complex operating system, and a huge open source project. It’s thirty years old now. To many people, some of its aspects are weird. Most such things have a good reason, but it can be hard to find out what it is. This is an attempt to answer some such questions, without being a detailed history of the project.

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[–] 0x0@programming.dev 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

And it’s 100% community based - no corporations messing in here.

I'm pretty sure Canonical has a say regardless. If it was community based they wouldn't've changed the init system single-sidedly; or would've gone the way of the Gentoo and given users choice on which init to use. Debian's been weird in the last few years. A distro that once boasted about running in many architectures has been constantly dropping non-mainstream ones... etc, etc.

[–] danielfgom@lemmy.world 12 points 1 year ago (1 children)

To have a say they would have to sit on the board. No idea if they do or not. They do have to contribute back to Debian with code improvements but as far as I know they don't have any say over the direction.

I suspect it's lack of hands that resulted in them dropping some support. They are pretty stretched as it is.

From what I've read from other comments, the move to systemd was pretty much decided by the entire dev community because it made things easier. Debian was apparently slower to adopt it but saw where the concensus was and went with that.

Anyway, if they are ever compromised there are other community distros

[–] 0x0@programming.dev 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

From what I’ve read from other comments, the move to systemd was pretty much decided by the entire dev community because it made things easier. Debian was apparently slower to adopt it but saw where the concensus was and went with that.

Give the mailing list archives of the time some reading, the decision was definitely not consensual. I'm glad gentoo, slackware and, later devuan did not take the easy way out. Being few (their site lists ~1100) as an argument, well.. dunno, fairly understandable maybe.

What do you mean by compromised?

[–] danielfgom@lemmy.world 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Where do I find the archives? That would be interesting to read.

By compromised I mean that somehow some corporate entity started dictating their decisions, decisions not in favour of Libre principles and against the community

[–] 0x0@programming.dev 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

https://lists.debian.org/ i think they changed in Jessie.

[–] danielfgom@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago

Thanks 👍