Happy 25th Anniversary Linux!

    Happy 25th Anniversary Linux!

    Happy 25th Anniversary Linux!


    Last Updated: 25 Aug 2016 at 10:14

    On 25th August 1991 Linus Torvalds, a student at Department of Computer Science in University of Helsinki Finland sent this message to fellow geeks and Minix enthusiasts on USENET:

    Linus Torvalds 25-AUG-1991 said:
    Hello everybody out there using minix -

    I'm doing a (free) operating system (just a hobby, won't be big and professional like gnu) for 386(486) AT clones. This has been brewing since april, and is starting to get ready. I'd like any feedback on things people like/dislike in minix, as my OS resembles it somewhat (same physical layout of the file-system (due to practical reasons) among other things).

    I've currently ported bash(1.08) and gcc(1.40), and things seem to work. This implies that I'll get something practical within a few months, and I'd like to know what features most people would want. Any suggestions are welcome, but I won't promise I'll implement them

    Linus
    Fast forward 25 years: Almost 1.4 billion Android devices today are using a Linux fork, almost all smart TVs use Linux. Super computers, servers and so on. Infrastructure of sites like Facebook is running on Linux servers.

    Happy Birthday Linux!\

    Happy 25th Anniversary Linux!-25-years-linux-app-developer-magazine.jpg
    Kari's Avatar Posted By: Kari
    25 Aug 2016


  1. Posts : 1,778
    Windows 10 Pro,
       #1

    Thanks, I just copied that post over to another forum that I hang around at.
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  2. Posts : 17,661
    Windows 10 Pro
    Thread Starter
       #2

    Makes me smile every time I read those infamous words of Linus:

    ...just a hobby, won't be big and professional...
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  3. Posts : 22,740
    Windows 10 Home x64
       #3

    LOL.. well it is a big anniversary..
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  4. Posts : 11,247
    Windows / Linux : Arch Linux
       #4

    Kari said:
    Makes me smile every time I read those infamous words of Linus:
    Hi there
    Didn't a well known Mr Gates make some remark about 640K Ram would be big enough for any computer around the same time !!!

    I know we're on a Windows Forum but some of the stuff running both commercially and domestically would be inconceivable without Linux - especially things like media servers / big fast databases, stock exchange transactions and zillions of other stuff.

    Was it really as long as 25 years ago -- must be getting older than I thought. !!

    Cheers
    jimbo
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  5. Posts : 15,028
    Windows 10 IoT
       #5

    I have a hand full of those devices here at home. Most of my Raspberry Pi's are running Raspbian which I believe is a port of Debian. A free open source OS can spawn a lot of creativity. I dare say a lot or devices like the Raspberry Pi just wouldn't be there without Linux.
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  6.    #6

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  7. Posts : 1,983
    Windows 10 x86 14383 Insider Pro and Core 10240
       #7

    jimbo45 said:
    Hi there
    Didn't a well known Mr Gates make some remark about 640K Ram would be big enough for any computer around the same time !!!

    I know we're on a Windows Forum but some of the stuff running both commercially and domestically would be inconceivable without Linux - especially things like media servers / big fast databases, stock exchange transactions and zillions of other stuff.

    Was it really as long as 25 years ago -- must be getting older than I thought. !!

    Cheers
    jimbo
    It must have been a bit earlier when Bill's remark was made, because 26 years ago, on May 22nd 1990, Windows 3.0 was released, needing 1 MB for standard mode, and 2 MB for Enhanced mode, and it crashed a lot.

    1MB SIMMS were rather expensive then. I remember going out to a client in 1993 to upgrade 2 PCs, with over £800 worth of memory sticks in my jacket pocket.
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  8. Posts : 807
    Win10x64 v2004 latest build fast ring
       #8

    jimbo45 said:
    Hi there
    Didn't a well known Mr Gates make some remark about 640K Ram would be big enough for any computer around the same time !!!

    I know we're on a Windows Forum but some of the stuff running both commercially and domestically would be inconceivable without Linux - especially things like media servers / big fast databases, stock exchange transactions and zillions of other stuff.

    Was it really as long as 25 years ago -- must be getting older than I thought. !!

    Cheers
    jimbo
    Yes, Gates also said at the same time that preemptive, reentrant multitasking wasn't possible with less than two megs of ram--at exactly the same time I owned my first Amiga and was doing preemptive, reentrant multitasking in 512K of system ram... Gates didn't like talking about more advanced OSes... Microsoft didn't begin to catch up to Workbench's PMT until Win95--and that was strictly cooperative multitasking--same thing that Apple used--which was/is strictly single-tasking in reality. Amiga Workbench exec was 10-15 years ahead of Windows in some respects--especially PMT.

    Linux is actually a misnomer because there is no "Linux" in the sense that there is a Windows or an OS X, etc. There is a "Linux kernel" but that's it, really. Linux has a multitude of faces/versions--it's highly fragmented. Linux software that runs on one distribution won't run on another, etc. Not the same thing at all, imo. Plus--it is anything but "free"--IBM charges out of the yin-yang for its Linux distributions--Red Hat, ditto. End users might snag a copy of a distribution somewhere for free, but they are such a tiny user group that it doesn't make any difference--commercial versions of Linux by the various companies that roll their own can cost appreciably more than Windows roll outs in many cases, and is how the Linux companies stay solvent financially.

    This is not to knock Linux at all
    --but I think it's important to note that there is no single version of Linux that people use--but I guess Debian might come the closest. Linux has great value in that companies can roll their own custom versions for specific workplace applications--whereas Windows is pretty much one-size-fits-all, etc. Windows claim-to-fame, however, is backwards application compatibility. I remember in the show trial in the US of the very political DoJ vs. Microsoft debacle, that Microsoft pointed out to judge Jackson that it was fairly hard for Microsoft to have an OS monopoly when OSes by SUN, Apple and Linux derivatives existed and brought in tens of Billions of dollars for their parent companies...! Judge Jackson actually sneered at that--demonstrating how thoroughly brainwashed this non-techie judge was by the anti-Microsoft forces running rampant in his courtroom (with all kinds of wild and crazy goofball sentiments not much more advanced over "Gates is 666"...) Linux certainly has always been a huge Enterprise competitor to Microsoft (despite Jackson's ignorance), and the rise of Google and Firefox and others has proven the DoJ's assessment of Internet Explorer back then was all wet--completely wrong....Just some memories of Linux I thought to share on this "anniversary" of the kernel...!
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  9. Posts : 11,247
    Windows / Linux : Arch Linux
       #9

    Hi there

    Remember the OS/2 that both IBM and Ms worked on in collaboration --whichever way you cut it at the time OS/2 was streets ahead of the fledglingg Windows -- but a bit of a "pissing contest" between Ms (the upstart) and the mega big blue (IBM) probably set back the development of decent OS'es for PC's by a generation or more.

    IBM was great for corporates but regarded individual users as a "waste of time". Ms took the other route - so unfortunately you had really hideous Windows systems that weren't robust enough for serious commercial networks (Window NT for example a total abomination that almost nothing would run on) or commercial stuff that was just priced out of this world for individual users.

    Linux filled the gap in spite of the obvious problems of no central distribution point - but it's survived in the commercial area and people can use it very successfully on desktops or as home NAS and home servers.

    If only Ms and IBM had continued to co-operate who knows what sort of OS would we have now --it took ms YEARS to get back from the OS/2 splat to to making a robust OS - but even today networking still is a problem with windows !!!. OS/2 and Linux never had those problems - networking was an integral part of the OS and worked from the outset.

    Cheers
    jimbo
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