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What Is Linux?

This post will explain what Linux is, what it is not, and why it’s popular.

I got this idea from reading a few different articles and realizing a few huge things that were completely wrong in regards to what Linux is, and how it got to be a household name (even if you don’t have it as a computer you probably use it somehow or know of it).

So What is Linux?

Linux is a kernel, for those non-technical people that is the brain of an operating system that connects the software with the hardware. Why is this important? This is because it isn’t a complete operating system which means a lot of things can use it, without using other components. For example: a lot of the Linux desktop is considered GNU/Linux.

In order to better understand how this happened; we should understand why this happened. In 1991 Linus Torvalds created Linux. Why? This was because he became obsessed with a UNIX system known as Minix. He couldn’t get access to the source code, so he decided to make Linux completely from scratch. At the same time GNU(GNU is Not Unix) was trying to make their own operating system as well. They had issues with the kernel, and because Linus created a kernel not a full system it allowed both GNU and Linux to co-exist and create a thing they both wanted.