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   翠星石 (suiseiseki@freesoftwareextremist.com)'s status on Monday, 17-Aug-2026 01:59:10 JST 翠星石

   in reply to

   • Tina H
   @tina @nyquildotorg Alpine is a GNU/Linux distro.
   
   The claim that Alpine does not use GNU coreutils is false - Alpine is designed to use GNU coreutils, except there is a cut down installer without coreutils just to be edgy (the user goes and installs coreutils later).
   
   All of such false claims are dependent on the user thinking it's; "all Linux" and not actually looking at it and realizing it's GNU/Linux.
   
   https://www.alpinelinux.org/downloads/
   >GnuPG signatures right there on the installation page.
   Looks pretty GNU to me, but lets keep going.
   
   >"Just enough to get you started. Network connection is required."
   It's clear that the standard install image is just enough to get you started for the install of any of the missing GNU packages.
   
   7z l alpine-standard-3.23.0-x86_64.iso
   boot/grub
   boot/grub/efi.img
   
   There's the GNU GRUB OS - it's clearly GNU/Linux, but lets keep going.
   
   cd apks/x86_64
   ls gnutls-3.8.11-r0.apk libunistring-1.4.1-r0.apk ncurses-terminfo-base-6.5_p20251123-r0.apk wget-1.25.0-r2.apk gmp-6.3.0-r4.apk libncursesw-6.5_p20251123-r0.apk libidn2-2.3.8-r0.apk
   
   That's a lot of GNU packages for something not GNU and that's ignoring the GNU dependencies for all the other packages.
   
   
   But there's an "Extended" install image as well; "Most common used packages included. Suitable for routers and servers." - which seems to in fact be what you would use if you don't want pretty much nothing to be included, just to be edgy.
   
   cd apks/x86_64
   
   Just in one pass I found;
   ls coreutils-9.8-r1.apk coreutils-env-9.8-r1.apk coreutils-fmt-9.8-r1.apk coreutils-sha512sum-9.8-r1.apk gdbm-1.26-r0.apk gmp-6.3.0-r4.apk gnutls-3.8.11-r0.apk grub-2.12-r8.apk grub-bios-2.12-r8.apk grub-efi-2.12-r8.apk libgcc-15.2.0-r2.apk libidn2-2.3.8-r0.apk libncursesw-6.5_p20251123-r0.apk ncurses-terminfo-6.5_p20251123-r0.apk ncurses-terminfo-base-6.5_p20251123-r0.apk parted-3.6-r2.apk readline-8.3.1-r0.apk tar-1.35-r4.apk wget-1.25.0-r2.apk
   
   Yes, that's right, Alpine GNU/Linux ships GNU coreutils, GNU grub, GNU ncurses, GMP, libgcc, GNU libidn2, GNU parted, GNU readline, GNU tar and GNU wget by default!
   
   All the other packages look very similar to what comes with the default install of a typical GNU/Linux, a lot of proprietary software is included too.
   
   (There's even Quagga there, which is an interesting choice and well that is still GNU code, as it was forked from GNU zebra).
   
   Therefore Alpine is a GNU/Linux distro (with the only large change seemingly being musl instead of glibc - while GNU coreutils is used and even the GNU GRUB OS is used), although there is a barebones BusyBox/Linux installer just to be edgy (but of course still has GNU in it).
   • Embed this notice
     Tina H (tina@mastodon.babb.no)'s status on Monday, 17-Aug-2026 01:59:12 JST Tina H

     @nyquildotorg Tangent, yes, but p'nally I wish people would STOP referring to, for example, AlpineLinux as "GNU/Linux" ....