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What is Linux?

Linux is an operating system. An operating system is the basic set of programs and utilities that make your computer run. Some other common operating systems are Unix (and its variants BSD, AIX, Solaris, HPUX, and others); DOS; Microsoft Windows; Amiga; and Mac OS. If you're interested in learning about some not-so-common operating systems, take a look here and here.

Linux is Free Software. Now, just because it's Free, doesn't necessarily mean it's free. Think "free" as in "free speech," not "free beer," as we in the Free Software/Open Source community like to say. In a nutshell, software that is free as in speech, like Linux, is distributed along with its source code so that anyone who receives it is free to make changes and redistribute it. So, not only is it ok to make copies of Linux and give them to your friends, it's also fine to tweak a few lines of the source code while you're at it -- as long as you also freely provide your modified source code to everyone else. To learn more about free software and the major software license it is distributed under, called the General Public License (GPL), go here. In addition to the GPL, there are many other software licenses that allow you to modify the source code. The Open Source Initiative approves these licenses and keeps a current list of them.

Linux is not owned by anyone. One misconception many first-time Linux.com readers have is that this site, Linux.com, is similar to Microsoft.com, which is owned and controlled by the company that produces the Windows operating system.

Not so!

No one company or individual "owns" Linux, which was developed, and is still being improved, by thousands of corporate-supported and volunteer programmers all over the world. Not even Linus Torvalds, who started the Linux ball rolling in 1991, "owns" Linux.

(However, the trademark "Linux" is owned by Linus Torvalds, so if you call something "Linux" it had better be Linux, not something else.)

How to get Linux: When you "get Linux" you are usually getting a "Linux distribution" that contains not only the basic Linux operating system, but also programs that enhance it in many ways. Anyone who wants to put together his or her own Linux distribution is free to do so, and we know of more than 200 different Linux distributions that fill special "niche" purposes. But we advise new users to stick with one of the five or six most popular general-purpose Linux distributions until they know a little about what Linux can and can't do.

You can get Linux from a number of online software repositories, including the official Web sites for each distribution. For example, at www.linux-mandrake.com you'll find the Mandrake distribution; at www.redhat.com you'll find Red Hat Linux.

It helps to have a fast connection and a CD burner so you can quickly download an .ISO image of the distribution and burn it onto a CD. You then can load the bootable installation programs that lead you, step by step, through the process of getting Linux on your computer.

If you don't have a CD burner, you'll be better off if you buy a CD pre-loaded with the distribution (or distributions) of your choice. The more popular distributions are available in many computer stores and directly from each distribution's publisher. They sell full boxed sets of CDs or DVDs that come complete with a fancy user manual and official technical support. The average price is $25 to $80 USD. The convenience of a distribution on CDs, including manuals, generally makes your first installation so much easier that it is well worth the money, and even if you pay full retail price for a Linux distribution you will still get an incredible value.

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