this post was submitted on 25 Aug 2023
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Linux

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Linux is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991 by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged in a Linux distribution (or distro for short).

Distributions include the Linux kernel and supporting system software and libraries, many of which are provided by the GNU Project. Many Linux distributions use the word "Linux" in their name, but the Free Software Foundation uses the name GNU/Linux to emphasize the importance of GNU software, causing some controversy.

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Happy birthday πŸŽŠπŸŽ‰ GNU/Linux.

Today GNU/Linux is 32 years old.

It was thankfully released to the public on August 25th, 1991 by Linus Torvalds when he was only 21 years old student.

What a lovely journey 🀍

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[–] [email protected] 155 points 1 year ago (3 children)

Well, Linux is 32 years old; GNU goes back to 1984, and Unix all the way back to 1970! The history of this OS is much older than Linus Torvalds's involvement; he "only" created and maintains the most popular kernel.

But yes, happy birthday to Linux. Many thousands have contributed to making this operating system what it is today and they all have my utmost thanks for it.

[–] [email protected] 77 points 1 year ago (2 children)

It is a happy coincidence that the evening before the 1970s began, at 4pm Pacific, they decided to invent UNIX.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

I think it's a joke about how UNIX timestamps work. They count milliseconds from January 1st 1970, 00:00:00 UTC, which is 4pm the day before in PST. So the happy coincidence is that they invented UNIX at the very millisecond when its clock starts.

There, ruined the joke.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

Oh right, the UNIX epoch actually starts when UNIX was invented

Somehow, I didn't expect that...

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago

The world didn't exist before 1970.

[–] [email protected] 38 points 1 year ago

My brain gets numb when I start thinking about all the branches that have come from Unix... and the branches from those branches and so on.

[–] [email protected] -2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Are you sure unix will be created in the year 3.843063914 E+5636(1970!)

How would anything even survive 3.843063914 E+5636 years after the end of the universe to make unix

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago

They misspoke: Hurd will be usable in year 1970!