Linux:WhatIs
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Contents |
Introduction
Well, it may seem silly to discuss this topic. But it's a fact that people keep asking me "so what's better - Linux or Windows?" - and everytime I have to answer the same: "well dude, you can't compare this two..". We'll try to reveal this in here..
The term "Linux"
It's well described in Linux at Wikipedia. The word "Linux" does not refer to an entire system, it just refers to the Kernel (which can be downloaded from kernel.org). The kernel is the only part that originated from Linus Torvals, the only thing that is defined by the word "Linux".
The community
Open source
We all heard about open source, Linux and all this. First: open source is not only Linux. Linux is open source. Open source just refers to the fact that the originating source code of the product is open to anyone so he/she can make modifications or just look how it's done. This can be a big advantage. With Windows, one has no idea what is happening "behind the scenes".
All people working on open source believe the same: If we all work on software and we all share our knowledge, others can profit from that, what in the end brings benefits to all of us. I know this can sould really utopious, but that's really the idea behind it ;-) If we want to realize a new project, we can access a lot of existing code and re-use this code if we can. Or we can get inspired by the ways others developers realized a specific thing - that's the way I mean "profit" - I don't refer to money.
Licensing
There are many licenses out there that can cover open source software, but the most popular is the GNU GPL. Several years ago, GNU released another license with a less strict set of limitations, the LGPL. In the last time, also license modells from Creative Commons got popular, but not for software.
The GPL gives the user "freedom", where the part "free" doesn't say anything in regards to money. "Free" in this context does only mean, that every user should be granted free access to the source code of the product and not only the binary form. The GPL does also give the freedom to alter (modify) the source, but one has to re-release the changes to the community. Neverthless, one can charge "as much as necessary" and sell a GPL'ed product, that isn't limited by the GPL - as long the user has free access to the originating source code.
Comparison Linux Vs. Windows
So we now know that if we talk about "Linux", we just refer to the kernel - a little file that mostly is about 2MB. In Windows, the kernel is found as KERNEL32.DLL in the SYSTEM32 directory. So if you want to directly compare "Linux and Windows", you'll have to compare "bzImage Vs. KERNEL32.DLL" ;-)
Needless to say that an operating system consists of more than one file :-) In the case of Windows, nearly every file in c:\WINDOWS are system files which are needed to operate properly.
This is the point where we come to Distributions. Every Linux distribution is different and is made for a particular user scope, meaning that one distribution is better suited for beginners, others are better for office use, others for mobile use, and so on. Distros like SuSE, RedHat (Fedora), Debian or Gentoo are good examples of good working distros, but they can differ extremely in the way of composition. If you need more information on that, check the Distributions page ;-)
There is no "Linux 7.0"
No joke: Last year a co-worker asked me something about Linux and I re-asked: "Well, which Linux do you use?" and he told me "I'm using Linux 7.0". And I was impressed about the seriousity in what that sentence was spoken - it really seemed to be his answer to my question. "But the latest Linux release is 2.4.20, how can you have 7.0??" was my post-question. After ten minutes of discussion I found out that he meant "SuSE 7.0" - "aaaah, OK!!". Once and for all: There is no "Linux 7.0"!! ;-)
Well, maybe one day there will be a Linux 7.0, but that will take a long time.. ;-)
Conclusion
You can't compare Linux and Windows, you only could compare "SuSE Linux 8.0 Vs. Windows XP", that would be a fair comparison. You really will get crushed in a conversation with an advanced Linux user if you directly compare "Linux and Windows", so you better memorize that fact to be prepared ;-)
