Conversation

Notices

1. Embed this notice
   Seirdy (seirdy@pleroma.envs.net)'s status on Sunday, 11-Dec-2022 10:58:10 JST Seirdy

   New #blog post: The limited utility of the phrase “GNU/Linux”

   Every now and then a fossbro tries to incorrect my terminology and insist I say “GNU/Linux” instead of “Linux”. I wrote this to save myself some time. Instead of engaging with the fossbro, I can just paste this link and wrap up the conversation while they read.

   Excerpt:

   “A specter is haunting the Linux community. Where lies productive discourse about operating systems, there also lies a danger. For the longer such discourse lasts, the greater the risk that the discourse shall be interrupted by The Interjection: an abomination brandished by a raging fossbro determined to contribute absolutely nothing to the discussion. The standard fossbro interjection begins:

   ‘I’d just like to interject for a moment. What you’re referring 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.’

   Sensible retorts, such as “Nobody asked you”, “Please leave us alone”, and “Sir, this is a Wendy’s” are useless defenses. Nay, the greatest weapon against misguided pedantry is pedantry itself.

   Let’s talk about why not to use the term “GNU/Linux”.

   • Embed this notice
     Alexandre Oliva (lxo@gnusocial.net)'s status on Sunday, 11-Dec-2022 10:57:53 JST Alexandre Oliva

     in reply to

     • lunacb
     let's put it this way: Linus credited GNU in early announcements of Linux, saying a kernel alone gets you nowhere. Yggdrasil Linux/GNU/X11 was one of the earliest commercial distros. Debian GNU/Linux was founded in response to a call for volunteers shortly thereafter, and it was supported by the FSF for years.
     credit was given early on and, when not given, requested and justified since early on. any claims of the opposite are misrepresentations at best (and alas often lies). hostility in response to the requests was also high from early on. they and we knew that it would be bad for our movement for user freedom if users didn't realize the system they were using had been made for their freedom. credit is hardly the issue. it has been quite a battle for minds all these years. if you support and enjoy user freedom, I hope you will understand the importance of promoting the only system developed specifically for this cause, rather than only the kernel that is not even freedom-respecting, but that is often misrepresented as such. thanks,
     翠星石 likes this.
   • Embed this notice
     lunacb (lunacb@tilde.zone)'s status on Sunday, 11-Dec-2022 10:58:00 JST lunacb

     in reply to

     • グレェ「grey」

     @byterhymer RMS is the original fossbro!

     I wasn't around back before the turn of the millennia so I wouldn't know much about what happened then, that's even funnier though if they only tried to claim credit later

     @Seirdy

     翠星石 repeated this.
   • Embed this notice
     グレェ「grey」 (byterhymer@mastodon.social)'s status on Sunday, 11-Dec-2022 10:58:08 JST グレェ「grey」

     in reply to

     • lunacb

     @lunacb Yeah, basically. Though I am LOLing at the idea of referring to RMS as a "fossbro".

     RMS's insistence on usage goes back to at least 2000 with this friggin thing: https://www.gnu.org/gnu/why-gnu-linux.html

     Prior to that, it was extremely uncommon to hear anyone utter or write GNU/Linux as far as I recall? Just "Linux".

     I also never recall hearing GNU/IRIX uttered even if maybe peeps ran gcc on IRIX?

     Debian GNU/kFreeBSD (FreeBSD kernel, GNU userland) exists & I still know no one who uses it.

     @Seirdy

   • Embed this notice
     lunacb (lunacb@tilde.zone)'s status on Sunday, 11-Dec-2022 10:58:09 JST lunacb

     in reply to

     @Seirdy Yeah, the term basically exists because RMS likes getting credit for things, as far as I can tell. There isn't an argument for it in modern linuxes. As for what's a GNU/linux as people use the term, I think it's basically synonymous with "linux distribution" (or meta-distribution), maybe with the added specification that it should contain primarily free software or separate free and non-free into different repositories.

     I like "linux distributions" or just "linux" better.

   • Embed this notice
     翠星石 (suiseiseki@freesoftwareextremist.com)'s status on Sunday, 11-Dec-2022 13:17:18 JST 翠星石

     in reply to

     • lunacb
     @Seirdy >Every now and then a fossbro tries to incorrect my terminology
     You seem to be confusing free software enjoyers with proprietary software lovers ("FOSS").
     
     It's likely that copypasta posters are probably "fossbros", as they should know it's incorrect: https://www.gnu.org/gnu/incorrect-quotation.html
     
     You really should call it GNU or systemd, as whatever kernel is in use is usually irrelevant.
     
     
     “I use Linux as my operating system,” I state proudly to the unkempt, bearded man. He swivels around in his desk chair with a devilish gleam in his eyes, ready to mansplain with extreme precision. “Actually,” he says with a grin, “Linux is only a kernel. You likely use GNU+Linux.” I don’t miss a beat and reply with a smirk, “I use Alpine, a distro that doesn’t include the GNU coreutils, or any other GNU code. It’s Linux, but it’s not GNU+Linux.”
     
     The grin enhanced on the man's face: "GNU is not just a set of coreutils and tools although we wrote those, GNU is a whole OS. Alpine attempts to replace GNU with BusyBox (licensed under the GNU General Public License v2), so that makes it BusyBox/Linux, but even then, it's common to install GNU bash and other GNU software so you can have a properly usable computer. Additionally, if you were to follow the compile time dependency tree, you'd find lots of GNU everywhere. Sure Linux is used as the kernel, but that's mostly irrelevant. For example, while GNU/Hurd is still is development, most software written for GNU/Linux just works after compiling without needing any changes, even though the kernel is completely different."
     
     With a sickly wheeze, the last of my life was ejected from my body. I lay on the floor, cold and limp - he mansplained me to death.
     
     
     @lunacb >Yeah, the term basically exists because RMS likes getting credit for things, as far as I can tell.
     It isn't about credit.
     
     The naming exists because there are so many users of GNU who have never heard of GNU and think it's just "Linux" and "open source": https://www.gnu.org/gnu/gnu-users-never-heard-of-gnu.en.html
     If rms wanted credit, he would say to call it Stallmanx.
     Just GNU is a correct name, but rms says GNU+Linux as he wants to give credit to Linux: https://www.gnu.org/gnu/gnu-linux-faq.html#nokernel
     
     >There isn't an argument for it in modern linuxes.
     The kernel Linux doesn't even work by itself, see here if you don't believe be: https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git/tree/init/main.c#n1569
     Therefore, calling an OS "Linux" will always be incorrect unless Linux is turned into an OS.
     Feel free to prove me wrong with a source the same quality as mine.
     
     >I think it's basically synonymous with "linux distribution"
     A Linux distribution would be a distribution of the kernel, Linux.
     I like this distribution of the kernel, Linux: https://www.fsfla.org/ikiwiki/selibre/linux-libre/
     
     >RMS is the original fossbro!
     rms does free software and not anything related to "open source": https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point.html
   • Embed this notice
     SuperDicq (superdicq@minidisc.tokyo)'s status on Monday, 12-Dec-2022 16:24:34 JST SuperDicq

     in reply to

     @Seirdy@pleroma.envs.net The term "GNU/Linux" isn't about utility of objective truth about which packages are included or hany lines of code are contributed. I say GNU/Linux to promote the ideas of the GNU project and get people interested in software freedom.

     Alexandre Oliva likes this.
   • Embed this notice
     翠星石 (suiseiseki@freesoftwareextremist.com)'s status on Monday, 12-Dec-2022 18:12:00 JST 翠星石

     in reply to

     • lunacb
     @lunacb >the average "gnu/linux" installation is hardly just gnu and linux though, right? I'd say the gnu part is usually the minority, actually.
     It depends. The highest tier of GNU/Linux is all GNU software with GNU Linux-libre - it's almost all GNU.
     Linux still is the minority compared to GNU still on average systems.
     If you want to call it systemd/X11/libreoffice/chromium/GNU/Linux, go ahead.
     
     >If you were to take most people's linuxes and remove everything that isn't gnu or linux, it probably wouldn't even boot, and it definitely wouldn't be a practical for anything people would expect of a modern operating system.
     Please immediately cease referring to the GNU OS as "Linux".
     
     On the OS's I use, you could remove all the non-GNU software, aside from the init and the computer will still boot and provide most of that I expect from an OS (everything is just a bootloader for emacs).
     Meanwhile if you were to remove GNU, you'd have a far inferior experience (Alpine BusyBox/Linux really sucks until you install GNU for example).
     
     On Guix, if you were to delete everything non-GNU (it uses GNU Shepard as the init and GNU Linux-libre), it'll boot just fine really and maybe you wouldn't even notice if you're a based emacs in the tty user (like rms).
   • Embed this notice
     lunacb (lunacb@tilde.zone)'s status on Monday, 12-Dec-2022 18:12:01 JST lunacb

     in reply to

     • 翠星石

     @Suiseiseki @Seirdy the average "gnu/linux" installation is hardly just gnu and linux though, right? I'd say the gnu part is usually the minority, actually.

     If you were to take most people's linuxes and remove everything that isn't gnu or linux, it probably wouldn't even boot, and it definitely wouldn't be a practical for anything people would expect of a modern operating system.

     I liked the roleplay of the bearded man btw