Re: Linux isn't an operating system

Steve VanDevender (stevev@efn.org)
Wed, 6 Mar 1996 11:31:54 -0800


Richard Stallman writes:
> I would expect that most of the people who speak of "the Linux
> operating system" think of this as just a minor lack of precision.

Actually, I think you are using a somewhat unconventional definition of
"operating system" that you have expanded to fit your argument. I have
a book on my shelf called _Operating Systems: Design and Implementation=
_
(the Tannenbaum Minix book). It talks about operating system kernel
design, not about utility programs. It talks about major operating
system components: process management, memory management, interprocess
communication, the filesystem. It does not talk about ls and cat and
grep as being fundamental operating system components.

As most people understand the term, Linux as just a kernel is an
operating system. While it would not be very useful without the GNU
utilities, the GNU utilities by most people's understanding and use of
the term "operating system" are not part of the operating system.

> But aside from being unfair (which by itself would not be worth
> fussing about), it also tends to split the community and thus
> discourage communication and cooperation. When the people who use
> what is essentially the GNU system think of themselves as "Linux
> users", and not as "GNU users", often they don't see a reason
> cooperate with the people who maintain the GNU software. This leads
> to version-skew and unnecessary incompatibility.

I think that you see a division where none exists. There are literally
dozens of Unix and Unix-like systems out there that use the GNU tools,
even as their primary system utilities.=A0 They think of themselves as
SunOS users, and NextStep users, and FreeBSD users, and Ultrix users,
and so on. This doesn't seem to have hurt the development of the GNU
tools so far, even though they do not call their systems SunOS-based
GNU, or NextStep-based GNU, or FreeBSD-based GNU, or Ultrix-based GNU.
They are not finding excuses to not cooperate with the GNU developers,
and I haven't seen any indication that Linux users are any less likely
to cooperate.=A0 In fact, I think that by the very nature of Linux its
users are more likely to cooperate -- they are more primary dependent o=
n
the GNU tools, unlike users of most of those other operating systems,
and they are more likely to buy into the premises of the GNU General
Public License.

If there is some reason you feel that Linux users are not cooperating
with the GNU project to the same extent that users of other operating
systems are, please tell us about it.

> One way to help unify the community, and gently encourage more
> cooperation, is to use the term "Linux-based GNU system" to
> describe these systems more accurately.

Then by the same reasoning I encourage you to also help unify the
community by going to, say, comp.sys.sun, and asking people to use the
terms "SunOS-based GNU system" and "Solaris-based GNU system" if they
use the GNU tools as the primary system utilities on those operating
systems.