this post was submitted on 20 Dec 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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[–] tsonfeir@lemm.ee 8 points 11 months ago (23 children)

We need fewer distros and more focus on things that matter.

[–] TheOneCurly@lemmy.theonecurly.page 5 points 11 months ago (4 children)

I disagree. Each distro is a user of a thousand different open source systems. When a distro developer integrates gnome, systemd, bluez, or whatever other system they're finding, reporting, and possibly fixing bugs that end users might miss. Other than arch users, who else is compiling these things from scratch and really digging into the documentation?

[–] aodhsishaj@lemmy.world 6 points 11 months ago

Us weird debian testing users.

[–] khorovodoved@lemm.ee 4 points 11 months ago

Gentoo users? Void users?

[–] tsonfeir@lemm.ee 3 points 11 months ago

They’d still be doing that.

[–] vanderbilt@beehaw.org 2 points 11 months ago

That kinda is his point. A distro maintainer patching and distributing a thousand packages is duplicitous. Especially when the only real difference to the user is the DE. Putting those efforts upstream is a better use of resources. I develop software, and I’m not going to test a million different distros especially when the difference between Ubuntu and Zorin is a DE and some additional packages. It makes Linux users very mad, but the reality is that they are too fractured to support every distro they use equally.

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