Operating System Design/Case Studies/Linux

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Linux is an operating system based around a free/open source monolithic kernel (which is evolving towards a modular kernel) originally developed by Linus Torvalds and released under the GPL.

The kernel was initially developed in 1991 on Linus's 80386 computer though it now supports many more architectures.

Linus originally started the project as an updated replacement for Minix which was written by Andrew S. Tanenbaum to use as an example for an operating system design and implementation course. Many Linux distributions combine the kernel with many of the GNU utilities.

The current series of stable kernels is 2.6.x and Linus has stated it is unlikely there will be an unstable kernel series again.

External links Wikipedia Article

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