this post was submitted on 27 Aug 2024
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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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The codenames for every major Debian release are named after characters from Pixar's Toy Story franchise. Debian's unstable release is fittingly named after Sid, an unstable character from the Toy Story movies.

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[–] superkret@feddit.org 107 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (45 children)

I love the Linux world's tradition of less serious names, in general.

I guess when the OS is free, you don't need to get the marketing people involved as much.
The kernel was almost named Freax. Then there's GNU, Slackware, KDE which was originally the Kool Desktop Environment, The GIMP (released 1 year after Pulp Fiction), ...
It's often due to the devs creating it as a hobby project and giving it a light-hearted name to show it's nothing professional or important - and then it becomes important later.

My favorite right now is RebeccaBlackOS, which is the only current distro built around Wayland's reference compositor Weston, showcasing all the capabilities Wayland has.
Unlike Hannah Montana Linux, it has no Rebecca Black theming at all. It's just called that because the dev is a fan of hers.

[–] UnfortunateShort@lemmy.world 35 points 2 months ago (20 children)

I find it kinda sad that KDE is attempting to stop it's series of K-puns. I suspect that some app names are/were intentionally bad. Like Kcalc instead of Kalculator? Kome on...

[–] superkret@feddit.org 25 points 2 months ago (19 children)

Their app names were one of the main reasons I disliked KDE for a long time.
It's just objectively impractible when half the software installed on your pc starts with the same letter.
But Gnome and Xfce aren't any better in that regard.

[–] bitfucker@programming.dev 2 points 2 months ago (1 children)

I never understood this argument. Why does having common first letter bad? If you mean subjectively then sure, it may not be for everyone, but objectively?

[–] Hule@lemmy.world 7 points 2 months ago (2 children)

Because if you want to start them by typing their names, autocomplete kicks in later.

[–] UnfortunateShort@lemmy.world 4 points 2 months ago

There's a solution for that tho: Tags. If you have sane (default) tags, you type 'terminal' and konsole pops up. And I feel like KDE mostly has that.

[–] saigot@lemmy.ca 1 points 2 months ago

I think it can be helpful to separate "built in" gui tools with everything else, having them all under one letter accomplishes that.

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