About Linux

I remember well the first time I tried to install Linux. It didn't last long, and I just didn't know what I was doing. I ended up switching back to Windows because it was what I was familiar with, and looking back, I was simply trying to do things that I just didn't understand.

If you are interested in Linux but just don't know where to start, you are in the right place. In this post, I will give an in-depth, but simple explanation about Linux and some basic Linux concepts, and tell you what makes it different from the other operating systems.

To start, I will explain what Linux is. Linux is by definition: A third party open source operating system. Paraphrasing, Linux is an operating system that is free to use, and rights for editing it are open. This means that any developer that thinks that something about Linux should be different takes a shot at it, and creates his own unique version of Linux. This unique rendition of what was formerly just Linux is now a 'distribution', or distro, of Linux.

There are many distros of Linux, and each distro has many things about it that are different from each other. There are two distros though, that had a big impact on the early history of the evolution of Linux. In 1992, Peter MacDonald created a distro of Linux called SLS (Softlanding Linux System) that had more additions packaged with it than many other Linux distros at that time. Once SLS started becoming big, many modifications and fixes were made to it, and it soon developed into what is now known as Slackware Linux. Simultaneously, Ian Murdock became impatient with SLS, and decided to begin development of the now popular distro, Debian. From Debian came perhaps the most well known and most used distro today: Ubuntu. And I'm bound to say you've probably heard of it.

If you were to take a look at the original Linux that all these distros are building off of, odds are, you wouldn’t see much. And out of all that you saw, you probably wouldn’t find much of it very useful. You see, all these distros have several parts to them, with only one of those parts being linux. Linux itself is very bare, and contains only the necessary processes that a computer needs to run. For the average computer user, this environment is not very ideal.

The structure of the average Linux distro goes something like this:

The concept of a GUI is simple. A GUI (graphical user interface) is everything you can click on. Any movement of you mouse, the selecting of windows, and any open program you see is all part of the GUI.

To give you an idea of what a GUI isn’t, open a terminal on a linux machine or even a mac, or open a command prompt in windows. Text, and space to type more text. And when you press enter, it gives you even more text. This is called a shell environment. You type a command and the computer does exactly what you tell it to, and sometimes, it even reports back to you, and tells you what it did. This is the heart of Linux, and as you get more used to using Linux, you will probably get a little more familiar with this environment as you journey deeper. But for now, we’ll keep things simple.

Because desktop environments (a common name for GUIs) are separate from the heart of the operating system, many distros come with variations that simply have a different a desktop environment. And just like distros, every desktop environment has a different feel. As you may have gathered, in the world of Linux, there isn’t a default distro, or a default desktop environment. There are much more options than that to choose from. Being able to choose what distro and desktop environment you use on your computer gives you more control than any other non-Linux operating system. Customizability and control are reasons many people prefer Linux. While other operating systems like most control to be kept within the operating system, Linux likes control to be given to the user.

And there you have it; a simple explanation of what Linux is, a brief history of distros, and what makes it unique from all the other operating systems out there. I hope the information covered will help you get started as you venture in this curious world we call Linux. May your adventure rock!