Talk:Linux/Archive 26

pronunciation
The edit page includes the comment "While /ˈlɪnʊks/ is Torvalds' pronunciation, /ˈlɪnəks/ is by far the most common pronunciation among English speakers and Wikipedia uses the most common pronunciation."


 * I disagree. While that may be the most common pronunciation in the United States, more people pronounce the "u" all over the world making that a minority pronunciation. In fact, very few people have ever heard of Linux in the US, small compared to the rest of the world, that it is unfair to prescribe their pronunciation as standard. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 222.127.211.89 (talk) 03:28, 11 June 2009 (UTC)


 * "lyn-ucks" is used a bit more in the UK but its about 60% vs 40% in terms of usage against "Line-ucks" in mainland europe the first one seems to be used much much more —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.16.153.191 (talk) 10:30, 12 June 2009 (UTC)


 * This is all original research - to change anything you need references as per WP:V. - Ahunt (talk) 12:06, 12 June 2009 (UTC)

The post that started this paragraph violated Neutral Point of View, I think, by representing the opinion it reflects as fact while failing to support it with any references. I think the statement about "original research" violates Wikipedia's requirement for verifiability. A rule I read (somewhere on Wikipedia) states that Wikipedia content is not supposed to be based on original research -- that it must be someone else's research -- but this point is moot.

For this article, the only thing that should matter is Linus' pronunciation, since there is a recording made by the the inventor. No doubt, this sub-heading was started by someone (222.127.211.89) who didn't know this. Linus' pronunciation should be definitive, in any case. Here is a link to the voice recording he made and a photo of him: http://www.jx90.com/linux.html. Kernel.package (talk) 05:53, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

history
The history section is not that good ...

It seems to imply that for linux to use bash and such, i'd have to be GPL'd. As far as I know, that is not true ... Would someone more knowledgeable please comment ? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Cold Light (talk • contribs) 07:23, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

Do you mean "it'd", "I'd", or someting else? Mike92591 (talk) 19:30, 6 October 2008 (UTC)


 * That's a legitimate question, GPL tools can be used even in Windows. I re-wrote that paragraph, hope this is OK. man with one red shoe (talk) 20:35, 6 October 2008 (UTC)


 * I believe the issue with the GPL would be to do with linking parts of the GNU C library and things like that. Running the GNU user utilities like bash does not require a kernel that is compatible with the GPL. -- Borb (talk) 22:23, 15 October 2008 (UTC)


 * I think there's some truth to that, but that doesn't necessary require a GPL kernel, doesn't BSD use GNU C library? Besides, in the reference provided Linus quote is "The Linux copyright will change: I've had a couple of requests to make it compatible with the GNU copyleft, removing the “you may not distribute it for money” condition. I agree. [...]" I tried to keep it like that without going too deep into why the compatibility was requested: to satisfy GPL or to make it possible to distribute the agregate for money. I prefer not to interpret the reason, just to present the clear fact: "Linux switched to GPL" man with one red shoe (talk) 22:53, 15 October 2008 (UTC)


 * It should be mentioned that all this complexity of which we speak pertains to developers and distributors, not end users. This discussion is irrelevant for the average user.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.18.236.220 (talk) 02:32, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

Image in paragraph "server and supercomputers"
The abovementioned picture is called "Wikipedia's server with Linux". I see no evidence that this picture has something to do or is depicting wikipedia's servers. That may be my fault, though. Cheers, --77.186.152.227 (talk) 19:53, 9 October 2008 (UTC)


 * Well the servers are labeled "Linux", but the image info doesn't seem to indicate that they belong to Wikipedia. - Ahunt (talk) 20:06, 9 October 2008 (UTC)


 * Actually the cited source claims that the image is from 2000, which fits with the time VA Linux made servers, but not well with Wikipedia. I think it's safe to assume it's not Wikipedia's servers. --Alvestrand (talk) 12:39, 10 October 2008 (UTC)


 * Perhaps of interest Wikipedia is currently switching all its servers to Ubuntu server edition from a mix of Fedora and Red Hat. ref - Ahunt (talk) 13:05, 10 October 2008 (UTC)


 * Given the above info, I have fixed the caption to make it more general. - Ahunt (talk) 13:08, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

Requested move
Discussion moved to /Name, and section header changed to respect templated link from Requested moves. --Alvestrand (talk) 20:16, 15 October 2008 (UTC)

What is this article about?
It seems that this article is losing its focus. What is it actually about? It's not about the Linux kernel, because there is another article for that. What then? Every operating system that currently uses the Linux kernel? And every combination of those? (ie. "Linux distributions"). Is this article supposed to cover everything that people call Linux? Here is a list of all the things people might call Linux:
 * The Linux kernel
 * A GNU/Linux distribution (eg. Debian GNU/Linux)
 * The operating system of a mobile phone (eg. Android)
 * The operating system of other embedded devices like routers (eg. DD-WRT)

I think that is just too much to cover in one article. Debian GNU/Linux is so different to Android, and equally to DD-WRT. The only thing all of these things have in common is the Linux kernel. So it seems this article is about anything and everything that uses Linux, apart from Linux itself! The problem is that the general public seem to call anything that uses the Linux kernel, "Linux". "Linux distribution" is used pretty consistently to refer to a GNU/Linux distribution, though.

I would like to suggest that this page is disambiguated. This came up before in the talks about the name of the page. As it stands, neither "Linux" nor "GNU/Linux" are the correct names for the content on this page. Instead I think the content needs to be split into different pages: Linux kernel (already exists), Linux distribution (aka GNU/Linux distribution, but the former is most common) and Android (very significant now).

The page Embedded_Linux already exists, and while I'm not too sure about the content it shows that the disambiguation is already happening. At this rate we're just going to end up with a lot of redundancy unless this page is disambiguated. I think the suggestion was to turn it into a summary style article. I think this would be much better than the jack of all trades article it is trying to be now. -- Borb (talk) 22:55, 15 October 2008 (UTC)
 * I too want the answer to this question. - Josh (talk | contribs) 17:58, 5 November 2008 (UTC)


 * I think that people claim this this is about the gerneric OS that uses Linux as its kernel. I personally think that this page should not exist as it is, the information should be split to "Linux kernel", "Linux distribution" and "Embedded Linux". "Linux" should probably redirect to "Linux distribution" since that's the most common use of the term. There should be a dab link on Linux distribution that links to kernel article. man with one red shoe (talk) 19:49, 5 November 2008 (UTC)


 * 6 months ago I would have agreed with the redirect to Linux Distribution, but now with the rising popularity of things like Android, Linux Distribution being the most common use is under threat. I stick with complete disambiguation or a summary style article (which the current article is leaning towards anyway, it just needs a diet). -- Borb (talk) 22:11, 5 November 2008 (UTC)


 * If people want info about Android they are more likely to search for "Android" not for "Linux" man with one red shoe (talk) 00:10, 6 November 2008 (UTC)


 * Sure, if they are looking for info about Android. But they might read somewhere that Android uses Linux and then look up "Linux" on Wikipedia, the redirection to "Linux distribution" is wrong in that case and quite confusing. Maybe the standard "Linux redirects here, for the kernel used by ... see Linux kernel" header will be ok to avoid confusion, though. -- Borb (talk) 17:21, 7 November 2008 (UTC)


 * If they read that is based on Linux and arrive to this page they will have a chance to read about Linux use in embedded devices here: Linux, there's also a dab link to Linux kernel on top of the page. -- man with one red shoe 17:36, 7 November 2008 (UTC)


 * This article should be only about Linux. The Monolith kernel a.k.a Operating System called Linux. Not about GNU/Linux development platform or Android software platform, because both use the Linux OS. This article makes resumption that Linux is just like a microkernel. The history part is important but it should be actually arrage again about what belongs where. Currently this article is mixing lots of different things what does not belong to Linux article. We should slice this article for Linux (the kernel / operating system) and GNU project (GNU development tools used to develop Linux and other System applications etc) Golftheman (talk) 17:42, 23 November 2008 (UTC)


 * "This article makes resumption that Linux is just like a microkernel" Actually, interestingly, Linus Torvalds considers UNIX to be a microkernel ie. everything that can reasonably be expected to be in the kernel is, and everything else is out. He considers Minix etc. to be "taking it too far". Therefore he does consider GNU/Linux to be the name of the OS and Linux the microkernel, but then later says that he doesn't think the system should be called GNU. The distinction between micro and monolothic kernel seems to be a huge grey area.


 * Anyway, back on topic, I agree that Linux and GNU should be separate. GNU already has an article. However, they are very intertwined, most Linux systems use GNU and most GNU systems use Linux (and neither would work without the other). So then the possibility of a GNU/Linux article raises it's head again... And since people will be opposed to calling that GNU/Linux (rather, Linux) then we're back to the current situation. I'm not really sure what to suggest. -- Borb (talk) 21:12, 23 November 2008 (UTC)


 * Ps. Linus makes the microkernel statement in this speech: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WVTWCPoUt8w He says it in the second half of the video during questions, but I recommend listening to the whole speech because it's quite interesting and fun. -- Borb (talk) 21:15, 23 November 2008 (UTC)

I agree, this article should be about the kernel, Linux. This is very confusing. Please somebody do fix it! 85.131.31.100 (talk) 17:54, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

About screenshots
Who said that php and mysql is a part of Linux ecosystem? Who put the gnome mockups as screenshots of gnome 2.0? Looks like school noob tried to tell people about Linux. Please, make the article "about Linux", not about related things. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Redchrom (talk • contribs) 05:59, 18 October 2008 (UTC)

History section again
I don't know why, but the History section had seriously devolved from something containing a lot of useful and interesting details about the History of this thing called Linux, into this, which was completely opaque, uninformative, over-sectioned, and directionless.

Folks, at some point you have to let go of the "OMG IT'S NOT A KERNEL" and "OMG IT'S NOT GNU" and focus on writing a good, interesting, informative article. Think about it from the perspective of showing the article to your barely-computer-literate mother. Would she understand? If you take out the historical context behind why Linux was created, then the History section itself becomes completely meaningless. Linking to a separate History of Linux article and leaving it at that isn't enough -- you still need to tell the story.

I've restored the History section to as it stood about a month ago. If you (and by you, I mainly mean User:Gronky, who is responsible for most of the edits here) believe that the History section should be short, uninformative and over-sectioned, please explain why here on the talk page.

Also, there seems to be some recent disagreement as to whether a "Year of the Linux desktop" section belongs here. I don't think it does. This might be an interesting topic to cover in a couple of sentences in the "Market share and uptake" section further down, but it's not vital to explaining the history of the operating system itself.  Warren -talk- 22:49, 18 October 2008 (UTC)
 * I don't understand why you reverted a month worth of work on the history section. I don't like the variant you support there are many issues, but take for example Minix there's probably more info on something not directly relevant to Linux than there's on Minix own article. Not to mention that there are lots of factoids in the history about intentions of Linus or Stallman that have no place in an encyclopedia, we should promote facts not factoids. man with one red shoe (talk) 23:07, 18 October 2008 (UTC)


 * First of all, don't single out Gronky like that. S/He really had little to do with the resent changes to the history section (no disrespect to Gronky). As something with a main article, I think it should get to the point in a reasonable length. So yes, I do think it should be short. For the "over-sectioned" property, sectioning it like that has it's advantages. One being that there are less ways to get the idea that GNU isn't being credited. Mike92591 (talk) 23:32, 18 October 2008 (UTC)


 * Why does the History section begin with the creation of the Linux kernel? Stallman declared his intent to create a free Unix-like system eight years earlier. Is there a reason why the history is not in chronological order? Sjmcd (talk) 03:21, 19 October 2008 (UTC)


 * Because it's pre-creation history is covered better in History of Linux. Mike92591 (talk) 03:49, 19 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Because not everybody subscribes to the idea that Linux kernel was added to GNU tools to create an OS, the majority consider that GNU tools were added to Linux kernel to create an OS (especially considering that Linux worked first with Minix userland) thus the history is presented starting with the core, the kernel, not when the compiler or things like "ls", "grep", "less", etc were written. Of course you can have different opinions, feel free to push them here, that's what Wikipedia is for, right? man with one red shoe (talk) 04:44, 19 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Obviously you are forgetting one tiny thing: gcc. Linus Torvalds has said that without gcc Linux wouldn't have been possible. And he has also said that if the GNU kernel was available he wouldn't have started Linux. The history of "Linux" definitely starts with GNU (and Minix).


 * Besides all of this combined with what I posted above (which nobody seems to have anything to say about) means that this is quickly becoming one of the worst articles on Wikipedia. We really need to sort this out, people. -- Borb (talk) 18:18, 19 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Obviously I didn't forget the compiler since I mentioned it just above your post, please be kind to read the post before you answer. Also, please tell me which other Operating System history starts with the compiler? man with one red shoe (talk) 18:38, 19 October 2008 (UTC)
 * I apologise for not noticing that you wrote "the compiler". And all UNIX and UNIX-like systems include a compiler collection which can compile the whole system. You seem to think that these things (compiler, ls, grep etc.) are just accessories but they are essential parts of a UNIX or UNIX-like operating system. If you're going to talk about "Linux" as being a complete UNIX-like then the history starts with the first piece of UNIX that was written. -- Borb (talk) 20:48, 19 October 2008 (UTC)
 * I'm sorry - but not all Unixen include a compiler-collection, thats a seperate add-on. And there is no guarantee that it could compile the whole system. (which in fact in most cases is completely impossible to check, since most people/organizations/companies have the amount of cash and backing that is required to get a source licence). --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 20:56, 19 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Well it seems a C compiler is not part UNIX, but a fortran-77 compiler is. Anyway, even if gcc isn't required to form a UNIX-like OS, the other parts of GNU are. Therefore "Linux" (in the sense of a whole OS) was started before the kernel was. -- Borb (talk) 22:12, 19 October 2008 (UTC)
 * GCC wasn't really needed, code generated by a non-free compiler from free code is still free. Regardless, the system in its practical form really started around 1992. The rest isn't all that important and is better covered in History of Linux. Mike92591 (talk) 22:46, 19 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Isn't all that important? Are you serious? You think that the rest of UNIX would have just magically appeared as a kernel existed? Andrew Tanenbaum said this once "It took them two years. But they produced not only the kernel, but the C compiler, shell, and ALL the UNIX utilities. This is far more work than just making a kernel. It is likely that the kernel took less than a man-year." Which means he estimates the kernel to be only 1/6 of a complete UNIX system. If you think the other stuff does not matter than you're clearly very mistaken. -- Borb (talk) 00:14, 20 October 2008 (UTC)
 * He isn't talking about Linux - but Coherent (and in a quite different environment). And you are (deliberately?) implying that the C compiler is a necessary component of the OS. I'm sorry - but it isn't. As Mike above says - Linus' could've used a commercial compiler (if he had access to one), and the OS would still be the same. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 00:47, 20 October 2008 (UTC)
 * I know he's not talking about Linux and I'm not talking about a C compiler either. I'm talking about "the rest" ie. the other programs that are required by UNIX other than the kernel. I quote Tanenbaum because he says that "the rest" probably takes a lot longer to produce than the kernel. And besides, I think Linux does actually rely on gcc because a) it uses gcc C extensions and b) Linus ported gcc to run on Linux so that Linux could compile itself (ie. be self hosted). He couldn't have done that with a proprietary compiler. -- Borb (talk) 02:09, 20 October 2008 (UTC)
 * The C compiler was probably the one that took the most time in the Coherent timeline - and its not required in an OS. Linus could have done it with a proprietary compiler - since Intel at the time made a compiler that was OS independent. (they probably still do) --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 00:34, 21 October 2008 (UTC)
 * The non-kernel components are important but their little histories aren't important enough for the main article. IMHO, It makes more sense to cut to the chase. Mike92591 (talk) 20:45, 20 October 2008 (UTC)
 * the kernel is equally important to the userland tools. Both would be worthless without the other. I dont buy that GNU had everything but a kernel, nor do i buy that kernel could possible be 'the most important thing in an OS, you cant forget X11, UNIX foundations, and the massive userland that at least now exists. Stop bickering and make a decent article Scientus (talk) 10:54, 26 December 2008 (UTC)
 * That's easier said than done :). I'd also like to point out that a kernel is useful without userland components (after all, the userland components are built on top of the kernel). More to the point, this section should just be a brief of history and, what some are proposing just seems to add information better put somewhere else. Mike92591 (talk) 20:04, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

More of the same
We're still about 4k short of where we were before the history was rewritten (both literally and figuratively, so to speak), and I can't actually see what benefit this rewrite had.

The old version started with UNIX and included a reasonable level of detail on MINIX, both of which were very important predecessors of the system. WP:SUMMARY provides guidelines on how much of a section to leave when creating sub-articles - it says to leave about a third of the length of the split section in the summary article, not as little as one can get away with.

In addition, the entire Programming section seems to have vanished, and we seem to have gained the questionable image: GNU Linux.png, which doesn't appear to be of any established notability and comes from a site which uses Wikipedia as a source. As I don't see any rationale for these changes, I've restored the sections in question from where we were at the end of September. Edits should be discussed in detail before this is so heavily changed in future. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 11:15, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Year of Linux
The section disappeared. I think it was notable enough to let it include.--Kozuch (talk) 17:34, 21 October 2008 (UTC)


 * It duplicated the same section in Desktop Linux. - Ahunt (talk) 17:40, 21 October 2008 (UTC)

Linking "GNU/Linux" in the intro
This should be removed again. Firstly, wikilinks should not be bolded in the article body. Secondly, the whole point of the lede is to act as a summary of the article: it's is implied that anything mentioned in the lede will be covered in more detail in the article body, and the table of contents makes it simple to find the section in question. As this link does not help to build the web by linking to other articles, I believe it should be removed again. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 16:10, 7 November 2008 (UTC)


 * Good points. Done. man with one red shoe (talk) 16:49, 7 November 2008 (UTC)


 * I agree. Self links can be confusing.  swa  q  16:52, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

Linux distribution
Since I see that Grandscribe has been changing most of the references from "Linux" to "Linux distributions" (which I support because it makes sense where he did) I started to wonder how is this article about something else than Linux distribution article? Why couldn't they be merged? Any strong argument against? man with one red shoe 09:10, 6 January 2009 (UTC)
 * My take is that this article is a summary article on Linux in general, where subarticles such as Linux kernel, Linux distribution etc. are summarized. For indepth coverage of various subjects - you go to the subarticles. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 17:09, 6 January 2009 (UTC)
 * I agree - that was the intent of this article - an overview of Linux to tie together the related articles. It shouldn't be merged into Linux distributions and Grandscribe's changes should be reverted. - Ahunt (talk) 17:14, 6 January 2009 (UTC)
 * I hadn't seen the changes made. Now i have, i find several of them rather problematic, as they seem to indicate that (for instance) a linux system is the same as a linux distribution. This change: "Today Linux is used in numerous domains, from embedded systems to supercomputers," => "Today Linux distributions are used in numerous domains, from embedded systems to supercomputers," makes no sense at all. Since its rather seldom that its a distribution that runs on either of the two. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 17:37, 6 January 2009 (UTC)
 * I have reverted those changes. The accuracy of those statements as amended needs to be debated along with the point made above by User:man with one red shoe that these changes really alter the aim of this article from talking about Linux in general to Linux distributions, which is a different subject altogether. - Ahunt (talk) 20:46, 6 January 2009 (UTC)


 * What makes no sense is the unnecessary confusion that is created in readers minds. Any careful examination of the paragraphs will reveal that the word Linux is overused. Sometimes as much as once per sentence in a careless and very imprecise way. For example in some paragraphs the text clearly refers to various different components that are not part of the kernel yet they are referred as "Linux". The overuse of the word Linux misleads by being completely inaccurate. A first time or novice reader is left wondering if what is being explained is part of the kernel or not? It also leads readers to imagine that the full operating system is a unity as if it was a single product when in fact it is the result of the combination of many different and completely independent software packages and projects that are not necessarily related with the development of that part of the system that is the kernel. That is the program that is apropriately known as Linux.

Much of the text covered in this article does refer to what is a Linux distribution. If you sincerely want to make Wikipedia a reliable and trustworthy source you would give it a great service by beginning to write more precise and objective texts for the articles like this one. --Grandscribe (talk) 21:38, 6 January 2009 (UTC)
 * There is probably a lot of improvements that can be made to the article. I disagree that generally calling Linux systems distributions is an improvement - in fact i consider it the opposite. A distribution is something that you install from - not the system that you run. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 23:31, 6 January 2009 (UTC)


 * We will work on that then. Point by point. A good way to start making improvements to this article is by avoiding the use of confusing over generalizations and over simplifications.--Grandscribe (talk) 08:27, 7 January 2009 (UTC)


 * I think the problem is between this three articles, Linux, Linux kernel and Linux distribution. This article (Linux) is about a generic term (as it says in the first line) that refers to GNU/Linux, but the kernel it self is named Linux, so there is a problem between the article Linux and Linux kernel. I propose that this article should redirect to Linux (disambiguation) and merge the content between Linux distribution and Linux kernel. --KDesk (talk) 19:37, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Articles for deletion/Knopperdisk
Would any editors here have an opinion if Wiki should retain knowledge of this small Linux based OS ? Power.corrupts (talk) 14:51, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

Put a screenshot higher up?
The first time I heard about Linux, I looked up this page and went away thinking that it was just a bunch of lines on a black screen. I think it would help fix a lot of misconceptions if we could put a screenshot of, say, the default Ubuntu installation, towards the top of the page. The first screenshot of a Linux distro is halfway down the page, and even half of that is Vista.

If nobody objects, I'll be bold... 116.232.244.113 (talk) 09:29, 7 February 2009 (UTC)


 * There is no screenshot of Linux what would include graphical interface. The Linux OS does not have anykind interface unless you want to see the kernel panic on textline. The problem is that the linux OS does not include any parts of the gnu software or projects like kde and gnome. The linux kernel is exactly the same thing as the OS. Most people has hard time to understand that and they believe falsely that there should be somekind graphical environment to be shown. check this out and then check this too if the iron logic did not lighten why Linux kernel is OS alone It is just sad the GNU propaganda gets trought. 62.165.184.109 (talk) 19:14, 4 August 2009 (UTC)


 * Well, that would be a great explanation for what's on the Linux kernel article, but this one is a bit broader in scope. Yworo (talk) 19:16, 4 August 2009 (UTC)