TheImpressiveXI'd like to interject for a moment...
mwguyThis is great.
Flyberius [comrade/them]Man. I remember taking the CompTIA exams back in the day.
Yeah, it’s misleading but technically still correct. GNU/Linux is a variant of an OS using the linux kernel.
Nobody gives .arj any love anymore. It’s even current. 🤷
Arrrrrrrj matey
These textbooks are trash and written by morons. When I was in college one of the required books said very clearly that sleep and hibernate are exactly the same thing. It said that both suspended to RAM and hibernate was just some lower power version of sleep. It was even a question on an exam that I got wrong for some reason. I argued with the professor about it and proved to him thats not the case by taking one of the lab computers, hibernating it, physically taking the ram out and swapping it with another computer and resuming into the same state on power on. He said “Well thats what it says in the textbook so I have to mark it wrong”
It really highlights that there are probably a lot of other inaccuracies that I didn’t notice. This is the standard of education nowadays.
what kind of prof is that?
In my country, the vast majority.
Here professors are so underpaid, that anyone with an IQ above 75 is doing something else.
notsofunnycommentWhere is that?
uisAmerica or post-soviet
I went to college early 2000s. The textbook said something along the lines of “The fastest RAM is 100 MHz”.
DDR was still relatively new then. I took a clipping of an ad showing higher speeds, and he literally claimed I faked the printed ad …
AeonFelisMissed opportunity to amend and reprint the textbook every time a faster RAM was launched and force all the students to buy the new edition.
KroninJThat’s messed up. When this kind of thing happened when I was in school the instructor would mark both answers as correct since the book did state it. I highly appreciated that.
This is why I never bothered learning anything computer-related in school.
When I was a young 'un we learnt a lot of this basic stuff just by being interested in computers and using them. So I guess this textbook is for people who want a job in IT but aren’t motivated enough to actually use computers? Seems like a bad formula for a career.
Hot SaucermanI mean, it’s technically correct? The G does stand for GNU, and GNU tools can be used to build Linux.
No basically all Linux uses gnu Coreurils as a foundation and is therefore best called gnu+Linux. There’s a great RMS rant about this , it’s what the title is referring to.
And the next time RMS invent Linux, he can call it whatever he wants…
Calling it now, 2024 will be the year of the Hurd desktop.
They should make a new version of Linux from scratch where all you get is the Linux source code and you write the compiler and core utils yourself. Now that would be Linux.
Aren’t their embedded systems that run the Linux kernel without the core-utils (maybe with busybox instead) and would therefore be non-gnu linux variants?
Yep, Alpine Linux does this as well.
Yeah these would be called NonGNU/Linux or Busybox/Linux.
GNU is the name of the operating system. GNU packages like glibc and gcc can be used for an operating system. Gzip is a GNU package.
No, that’s a big confusion.
I hate the RMS rant about how you’re supposed to say “GNU/Linux”, but here we’re talking about a GNU package that can be used without Linux. It’s on FreeBSD and even macOS.
SpaceCowboyIt just goes to show how important it is to come up with a good name. Recursive acronyms are clever and all, but if no one likes saying it they aren’t going to. T
NaNHigh probability it is not fixed. This is the typical level of CompTIA quality I’ve encountered.
FaizalR@TheImpressiveX I’m still confused about GNU/ Linux thing.
NeilLinux is simply the kernel. GNU is the operating system (these days not so much, some would argue).
Hurd is an alternative kernel developed by the GNU project that you could replace the Linux kernel with, just as an example.
@Neil Thank you. I hope that I can remember this.
The whole concept of claiming that GNU is the actual OS never made much sense to me. Like yeah, glibc and coreutils are very major components, but so is the init system, and the package manager, and the WM, and the DE… I don’t really understand why RMS draws the line at GNU arbitrarily other than to stroke his own ego. Following his underlying logic, shouldn’t I call my system Plasma/KWin/pacman/systemd/GNU/Linux?
None of this is directed at you btw, it’s just something that always springs to mind for me whenever this topic comes up.
Because what you mentioned is ahistorical and based off reactionary history by bad actors.
Rms draws the line a GNU because GNU stands for a free operating system, which is what the GNU project is aiming towards. If this were purely a discussion about technicality, then we would be wise to let the matter drop, but that’s not whats at stake here.
shouldn’t I call my system Plasma/KWin/pacman/systemd/GNU/Linux?
You can, you literally can and it would be better that way to accurately describe what operating system you’re running. The shortest possible name is GNU, but that would be unfair to the contribution made by the linux foundation and the fact that multiple kernel projects do exist: so the name is GNU/Linux.
His essays on the topic which are publicaly accessible from the GNU website do discuss this.
other than to stroke his own ego
Rest assured that rms does not doing this out of ego tripping. Maybe you should tease Linus Torvalds for calling his kernel linux and the ENTIRE operating system linux. Torvalds is a multimillionaire who has used an apple M1 laptop. Stallman has never budged on libre software and directs his own life by his own stated principles. Call Rms stubborn, but never call him egotistical.
None of this is directed at you btw, it’s just something that always springs to mind for me whenever this topic comes up.
Please read Free Software, Free Society by Richard M Stallman so that this doesn’t have to keep springing up anymore. There are very few “linux” comm members who have read the foundational literature in full so I hope you do take my advice.
Here’s a link to the book:
Free Software, Free Society, Third Edition - Richard M. Stallman, 2015 (PDF)
I was preparing to search for it and your comment ! Thanks lol
GNU is a project whose goal is to create a free operating system.
Way back in the dark ages when commercial UNIX was relevant, it was common to install various GNU utilities to get a better user experience or get things like a C compiler without having to pay tons of money for it.
The kernel part of the project didn’t work out, so the de facto purpose of the GNU project morphed into creating better utilities and libraries for other operating systems.
When the Linux kernel came around, the GNU software was the base of system. That’s why RMS insists on the GNU/Linux thing.
Things like the window system and desktop environment aren’t really considered part of the OS by folks like RMS (and me, for that matter). It’s probably an age thing - used to be there was a “core” system and various add-ons. The core system is the OS in our world view.
I’d just like to interject for a moment. What you’re refering to as Linux, is in fact, GNU/Linux, or as I’ve recently taken to calling it, GNU plus Linux. Linux is not an operating system unto itself, but rather another free component of a fully functioning GNU system made useful by the GNU corelibs, shell utilities and vital system components comprising a full OS as defined by POSIX.
Many computer users run a modified version of the GNU system every day, without realizing it. Through a peculiar turn of events, the version of GNU which is widely used today is often called Linux, and many of its users are not aware that it is basically the GNU system, developed by the GNU Project.
There really is a Linux, and these people are using it, but it is just a part of the system they use. Linux is the kernel: the program in the system that allocates the machine’s resources to the other programs that you run. The kernel is an essential part of an operating system, but useless by itself; it can only function in the context of a complete operating system. Linux is normally used in combination with the GNU operating system: the whole system is basically GNU with Linux added, or GNU/Linux. All the so-called Linux distributions are really distributions of GNU/Linux!
Literally please stop posting this copypasta. I know you “linux” users only have like 4 jokes but this is just outdated and also false.
Ehh… Not really incredibly outdated? I mean most Linux systems with a few exceptions (looking at you Alpine) use gnu software in them, and it is a somewhat fair argument to say that a kernel isn’t an entire operating system and other factors should be considered. Also why the quotation marks? It is a Linux joke, and if you don’t like our humor than you can just kinda… Ignore it? I mean it’s not like someone has you chained to a chair, forced to only look at linuxmemes.
First of all, this copypasta has never been said by anyone at the FSF or from the GNU project. People falsly attribute it to rms even though he has already made his thoughts clear on the matter. It’s just misinformation and a bastardized take on the naming discussion.
I mean most Linux systems with a few exceptions (looking at you Alpine) use gnu software in them
It’s not “GNU software in a linux system”, again, GNU is the name of the operating system. GNU packages were developed for that operating system. Alpine is not GNU, it is a NonGNU/Busybox + Linux operating system mainly targeted for embedded devices. Linux is not a GNU package, but was liberated by Torvalds to be included in the GNU operating system which we now refer to completely as GNU/Linux.
and it is a somewhat fair argument to say that a kernel isn’t an entire operating system and other factors should be considered
Such as the freedom of software writers and computer users. Calling the operating system “Linux” is taking away (even if not by intent) the very principle of freedom of the GNU operating system. It isn’t “somewhat fair”, far too many people who use Free software do not understand it entirely and thus are vulnerable to closing their hands from further liberation.
Also why the quotation marks? It is a Linux joke, and if you don’t like our humor than you can just kinda… Ignore it?
If “Linux humor” is repeating the same 5 or so jokes and endless banter about the same topics then it isn’t productive. Especially if that humor is just spreading misinformation in service of a cheap gag made by others. I’m just calling it out when I see it because I’m done giving a lot of yall the benefit of the doubt anymore.
So any time someone posts the “I’d just like to interject for a moment…” speech, we should now copy and paste the “First of all, this copypasta has never been said…” speech in response, thus making the meme a) longer, b) interactive, c) technically correct?
Yeah, it is kinda funny how pissed he got at me.
darcyid like to interject for a moment. what your referring to as gnu, is actually linux/gnu, or as ive taken to calling it, linux + gnu
GNU Not... Linux
OwenEverbindeDamn it, it’s now GNL and we have to rewrite all the textbooks!
At this point RMS should seriously consider changing the name to GNL.
Might as well make it ANL since the first letter is arbitrary 😹
ANaL. ANaL Not a Linux.
rotopenguinHas anybody mentioned yet that tar isn’t even a “compression format”?
Isn’t it like common knowledge or something?
The textbook in the photo calls TAR and “archive format,” which it is.
It’s just an uncompressed archive format.
The page doesn’t say it is. It says it’s an archive format.
olenkoIt says archive not compression.
xigoiTable 9.7 Compression Formats
Well, neither is iso…
Sorry CompTIa is fucking garbage. In all my years at faangs, startups, Silicon Valley ycombinators, mid west tech, have I ever hired or worked with someone who has comptia certs.
Is it a good start to level 1 help desk at a hospital? Maybe. But I feel like it’s a fucking scheme where the time to learn any language instead would make you leagues better. Or study and get Cisco certs instead for neteng.
So much to unpack here.
GNU is not a Linux variant. It is a set of programs and shared libraries.
ISO 9660 has nothing to do with compression. Just calling it ISO isn’t a good idea for an intro class like that because it is a set of MANY standards. They should have put a little side blurb and called it ISO 9660 in the table.
tar is an archive tool. It has no compression.
Why no mention of compression algorithms algorithms vs archive tools?
Why not have different compression algorithms and their tradeoffs?
AatubeJust calling it ISO isn’t a good idea for an intro class like that because it is a set of MANY standards. They should have put a little side blurb and called it ISO 9660 in the table.
This is the only thing here I disagree with. The table is quite clearly putting extensions on the left and intro classes do not need to know about the International Organization for Standardization.
GNU is not a set of programs or libraries, it’s an operating system.
GNU packages is what you are referring to. But GNU itself is the name of the OS.
It was intended to be an OS and is if you use the Hurd kernel. In practice, Hurd isn’t really used, so it is just a bunch of programs and libraries. I guess it can go either way.