Linux

“ More compilation album than operating system, it was comprised of a hacker medley of greatest hits: everything from GCC, GDB, and glibc (the GNU Project's newly developed C Library) to X (a Unix-based graphic user interface developed by MIT's Laboratory for Computer Science) to BSD-developed tools such as BIND (the Berkeley Internet Naming Daemon, which lets users substitute easy-to-remember Internet domain names for numeric IP addresses) and TCP/IP. The arch's capstone, of course, was the Linux kernel—itself a bored-out, super-charged version of Minix. ”

“ Sure, PCs were more powerful, but in commoditizing the PC marketplace with its chips, Intel had created a situation in which proprietary software vendors now held the power. For every new user won over to the free software cause via Linux, hundreds, perhaps thousands, were booting up Microsoft Windows for the first time. ”

“ Linux, which was and continues to be developed through the open source model of software development [6] , also is an operating system. [7] It can be run on a PC as an alternative to Windows, although the extent to which it is so used is limited. [8] Linux is more widely used on servers. [9]
Computer Code “ [C] omputers come down to one basic premise: They operate with a series of on and off switches, using two digits in the binary (base 2) number system—0 (for off) and 1 (for on) .” ”

“ The chief executive officer was Robert Young, the former Linux Journal editor who in 1994 had put the question to Linus Torvalds, asking whether he had any regrets about putting the kernel under the GPL. To Young, Torvalds' response had a "profound" impact on his own view toward Linux. Instead of looking for a way to corner the GNU/Linux market via traditional software tactics, Young began to consider what might happen if a company adopted the same approach as Debian—i.e., building an operating system completely out of free software parts. ”

“ Stallman responds, eyes immediately zeroing in on mine. "The Linux kernel is just a small part of the operating system. Many of the software programs that make up the operating system you call Linux were not developed by Linus Torvalds at all. They were created by GNU Project volunteers, putting in their own personal time so that users might have a free operating system like the one we have today. To not acknowledge the contribution of those programmers is both impolite and a misrepresentation of history. ”

“ Linux is what GNU aimed to be, and it relies on the GNU toolset. But the Free Software Foundation didn't produce the kernel to go with that toolset until 1999, which was too late. Other, similar efforts like FreeBSD and NetBSD have been technically successful but never caught fire the way Linux has; as this is written in 2000, Linux is seriously challenging Microsoft's OS dominance. It has already captured 31% of the Internet-server market and 25% of general business servers. ”

“ Linux is loaded by a program called LILO, or LInux LOader. LILO can also load other operating systems and ask you which system you’d like to load.
The first thing that happens when you turn on an Intel PC is that the BIOS executes. BIOS stands for Basic Input Output System. It’s a program permanently stored in the computer on read-only chips. It performs some minimal tests and then looks for a floppy disk in the first disk drive. If it finds one, it looks for a “boot sector” on that disk and starts executing code from it, if there is any. ”

“ Today, GNU/Linux plays a dominant role in Internet servers and among ISPs, in academia, among computer hobbyists, and in computer science research. Debian GNU/Linux has brought the power of Free Software to everything from laptops to flights aboard the Space Shuttle. As I write this, companies the world over are experiencing the joy and benefits that are Free Software. ”

“ What if Red Hat took the same approach with GNU/Linux?
"In the western scientific tradition we stand on the shoulders of giants," says Young, echoing both Torvalds and Sir Isaac Newton before him. "In business, this translates to not having to reinvent wheels as we go along. The beauty of [the GPL] model is you put your code into the public domain.9 If you're an independent software vendor and you're trying to build some application and you need a modem-dialer, well, why reinvent modem dialers? You can just steal PPP off of Red Hat Linux and use that as the core of your modem-dialing tool. ”

“ The best way to learn about almost any computer program is by using it. Most people find that reading a book without using the program isn’t beneficial. The best way to learn about Unix and GNU/Linux is by using them. Use GNU/Linux for everything you can. Feel free to experiment!
Debian isn’t as intuitively obvious as some other operating systems. You will probably end up reading at least the first few chapters of this book. GNU/Linux’s power and complexity make it difficult to approach at first, but far more rewarding in the long run. ”

“ At a bare minimum, GNU/Linux needs one partition for itself. You can have a single partition containing the entire operating system, applications, and your personal files. Most people choose to give GNU/Linux more than the minimum number of partitions, however. ”

“ Even companies that once laughed it off as software socialism have come around to recognize the benefits. Linux, the Unix-like kernel developed by Finnish college student Linus Torvalds in 1991, is licensed under the GPL, as are many of the world's most popular programming tools: GNU Emacs, the GNU Debugger, the GNU C Compiler, etc. Together, these tools form the components of a free software operating system developed, nurtured, and owned by the worldwide hacker community. ”

“ In the hacker world, forks are an interesting phenomenon. Although the hacker ethic permits a programmer to do anything he wants with a given program's source code, most hackers prefer to pour their innovations into a central source-code file or "tree" to ensure compatibility with other people's programs. To fork glibc this early in the development of Linux would have meant losing the potential input of hundreds, even thousands, of Linux developers. It would also mean growing incompatibility between Linux and the GNU system that Stallman and the GNU team still hoped to develop. ”

“ Although it would take a few years to be recognized by Stallman, the explosiveness of Linux development conjured flashbacks of Emacs. This time around, however, the innovation triggering the explosion wasn't a software hack like Control-R but the novelty of running a Unix-like system on the PC architecture. The motives may have been different, but the end result certainly fit the ethical specifications: a fully functional operating system composed entirely of free software. ”

“ This sets Linux to be the bootable partition—the one that will be loaded from the hard disk.
Note that multiple operating system booting on a single machine is still something of a black art. This book does not even attempt to document the various boot managers, which vary by architecture and even by sub-architecture. You should see your boot manager’s documentation for more information. Remember: When working with the boot manager, you can never be too careful. ”

“ At first, Stallman says he considered the forks to be a product of sour grapes. In contrast to the fast and informal dynamics of the Linux-kernel team, GNU source-code maintainers tended to be slower and more circumspect in making changes that might affect a program's long-term viability. They also were unafraid of harshly critiquing other people's code. Over time, however, Stallman began to sense that there was an underlying lack of awareness of the GNU Project and its objectives when reading Linux developers' emails. ”

“ As we mentioned earlier in section 1.1, the design of Debian GNU/Linux comes from the Unix operating system. Unlike common desktop operating systems such as DOS, Windows, and MacOS, GNU/Linux is usually found on large servers and multiuser systems.
This means that Debian has features those other operating systems lack. It allows a large number of people to use the same computer at once, as long as each user has his or her own terminal. [2] To permit many users to work at once, Debian must allow many programs and applications to run simultaneously. ”

“ Linux user groups frequently run these. Computer users are invited to bring their machines to have Linux installed on their machines. The idea is to get them painlessly over the biggest hump in migrating to Linux, which is initially installing and configuring it for the user's machine. ”

“ It’s a bad thing to just press the power switch when you’re done using the computer. It is also bad to reboot the machine (with the Reset button) without first taking proper precautions. The Linux kernel, in order to improve performance, has a disk cache. This means it temporarily stores information meant for permanent storage in RAM. Because memory is thousands of times faster than a disk, this makes many file operations move more quickly. Periodically, the information Linux has in memory is actually written to the disk. ”

“ An older computer running Windows 95 might be sluggish and expensive to maintain. But replace Windows with the free Linux system, and it can feel like new again. Free Geek breathes new life into computer equipment that probably would otherwise end up in a landfill. ”

“ To mount a filesystem, we want to tell Linux to associate whatever filesystem it finds on a particular device with a particular mount point. In the process, we might have to tell Linux what kind of filesystem to look for.
10.2.2 Example: Mounting a CD-ROM
As a simple demonstration, we’ll go through mounting a CD-ROM, such as the one you may have used to install Debian. You’ll need to be root to do this, so be careful; whenever you’re root, you have the power to manipulate the whole system, not just your own files. Also, these commands assume there’s a CD in your drive ”

“ If you already have an operating system on your system (Windows 95, Windows NT, DOS, etc.) and you want to install Debian GNU/Linux on the same disk, you will probably need to repartition the disk. In general, changing a partition that already has a filesystem on it will destroy any information in that filesystem. Therefore, you should always make backups before doing any repartitioning. Using the analogy of the house, you would probably want to move all the furniture out of the way before moving a wall or you risk destroying your furniture. ”

“ It also fundamentally undermines the independent commercial software sector because it effectively makes it impossible to distribute software on a basis where recipients pay for the product rather than just the cost of distribution.4 The mutual success of GNU/ Linux, the amalgamated operating system built around the GPL-protected Linux kernel, and Windows over the last 10 years reveals the wisdom of both perspectives. Nevertheless, the battle for momentum is an important one in the software industry. ”

“ With very little funding, the GNU/Linux system has become a significant player in many major markets, from Internet servers to embedded devices. Our GUI desktop projects have astounded the software industry by going from zero to being comparable with or superior to others in only 4 years. ”

“ Most people feel that a swap partition is also a necessity, although this isn’t strictly true. “Swap” is scratch space for an operating system, which allows the system to use disk storage as “virtual memory” in addition to physical memory. Putting swap on a separate partition allows Linux to make much more efficient use of it. It is possible to force Linux to use a regular file as swap, but this is not recommended.
The only real drawback to using more partitions is that it is often difficult to know in advance what your needs will be. ”

“ Anyone using Linux for Proofreading? I am attempting to slowly move my work to Xubuntu. The current problem is how to define and use the keyboard to compose rarely used ligatures etc., without having to revert to the characters list at the bottom of the page. When proofreading in Windows, I use the memorized ANSI keycode combinations with Alt+Numpad, as well as custom Wiki edit buttons for the most frequently used characters. ”

“ Integrating GCC improved the performance of Linux. It also raised issues. Although the GPL's "viral" powers didn't apply to the Linux kernel, Torvalds' willingness to borrow GCC for the purposes of his own free software operating system indicated a certain obligation to let other users borrow back. ”

“ The installation procedure can wipe out all of the data on a hard disk! The programs used in installation are quite reliable and most have seen years of use; still, a false move can cost you. Even after backing up, be careful and think about your answers and actions. Two minutes of thinking can save hours of unnecessary work.
Debian makes it possible to have both Debian GNU/Linux and another operating system installed on the same system. If you plan to use this option, make sure that you have on hand the original CD-ROM or floppies of the other installed operating systems. ”

“ If you catch a newspaper or magazine abusing the work `hacker', write them and straigten them out (this appendix includes a model letter) .
* If you're a techie or computer hobbyist, get involved with one of the free Unixes. Toss out that lame Microsoft OS, or confine it to one disk partition and put Linux or FreeBSD or NetBSD on the other one. And the next time your friend or boss is thinking about some commercial software `solution' that costs more than it's worth, be ready to blow the competition away with free software running over a free Unix. ”