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Resources to learn about history of linux (sh.itjust.works)
submitted 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) by snowraven@sh.itjust.works to c/linux@lemmy.ml
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I have always been a history enthusiast. Unfortunately, I don't know much about history in the context of computers. I am therefore interested in learning more about significant events and people like Richard stallman and all the related events such as Windows refund day. I am interested to read and explore the timeline, I suppose a book would be ideal but any good resource such as a youtube series would be great too.

Update: I am happy to recieve such wide variety of resources to explore, I hope this post might help someone who is interested in FOSS history in the future too.

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[-] pnutzh4x0r@lemmy.ndlug.org 18 points 1 year ago

I can recommend the book Hackers: Heroes of the Computer Revolution, which I've read multiple times. I can also recommend Linus' autobiography Just For Fun.

You can also consider The Cathedral and the Bazaar... though ESR can be a bit much.

That said, here are some random articles I've saved that you might be interested in:

[-] some_guy@lemmy.sdf.org 4 points 1 year ago

Cuckoo’s Egg is a hacker true-crime from the 80s. Sorry no link. Lunch break.

[-] shertson@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago

There were some good pieces on Groklaw back in the day about the history of unix and Linux.

[-] addie@feddit.uk 2 points 1 year ago

Can also recommend Just For Fun - that Finnish sense of humour doesn't come across well, and while he's good with English he certainly isn't Shakespeare, but it does fly by.

History of Linux, abridged: Linus was using Minix on his own PC while at University, but was a bit fed up with its networking capabilities, so he'd written a toy operating system for a couple of his classes. While experimenting with adding features to it, he deleted his Minix partition by accident. Might as well continue with the one he'd written, since it was almost capable enough to be a daily driver. Publish the source, get a few collaborators in to add in the features that they found most useful, repeat. Boom.

[-] PanaX@lemmy.ml 14 points 1 year ago

It's certainly older but Revolution OS is pretty thorough.

[-] Adanisi@lemmy.zip 8 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

One thing I found annoying in that was Torvalds saying something along the lines of "think of Stallman as the philosopher and me as the engineer". Yes, Stallman can be thought of as a "philosopher" but he is also an "engineer", he wrote a hell of a lot of code for GNU, which wouldn't exist without him anyways. It just seems like downplaying how important he was for the rise of this system.

Overall I think it's good, though.

[-] WeirdGoesPro@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 1 year ago

I think that has more to do with Stallman having a reputation for being a dick than anything else—people don’t like to give a lot of credit to people they don’t like very much.

I’ve never met Stallman though, so I can’t say what he’s like personally—I’m just going off what I read from bigger nerds than me.

[-] MonkCanatella@sh.itjust.works 2 points 1 year ago

He's said some really sus shit and been accused of sexual harassment by several people. https://selamjie.medium.com/remove-richard-stallman-appendix-a-a7e41e784f88. Even more sus is stallman's multiple, passionate, defenses of pedophilia, and the very lukewarm walking back.

Don't know of anything like that against Linus, at all.

[-] ngn@lemy.lol 1 points 1 year ago

open source ppl likes shitting on free software ppl so yeah

[-] pnutzh4x0r@lemmy.ndlug.org 2 points 1 year ago

Great video. Our Linux Users Group will watch it every few years... it's amazing to see how much has changed in 20 years.

[-] pgp@sh.itjust.works 9 points 1 year ago

I know you want to go deeper, but here's a nice summary of linux's early history: https://lwn.net/Articles/928581/

[-] Twig@sopuli.xyz 4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Just For Fun by Linus Torvalds is a good source. Very readable.

[-] Adanisi@lemmy.zip 4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Read the GNU Manifesto. https://www.gnu.org/gnu/manifesto.html

I think it gives a pretty good insight to what was going through Stallman's mind when he kickstarted the GNU project and the software freedom movement. There are also footnotes added later to clarify some things (like the use of "free")

This page might also be interesting to you. https://www.gnu.org/gnu/gnu.html#gnu-history

There's also a biography turned autobiography of Stallman. I think it's called Free as in Freedom 2.0.

[-] online@lemmy.ml 3 points 1 year ago

Check these out:

[-] AlmightySnoo@lemmy.world 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

This old film by AT&T about UNIX is also very good and gives you a good idea of the OS/software landscape at the time: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tc4ROCJYbm0

[-] PipedLinkBot@feddit.rocks 5 points 1 year ago

Here is an alternative Piped link(s):

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[-] Adanisi@lemmy.zip 1 points 1 year ago

Good bot.

[-] nyl@lemmy.opensupply.space 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

GNU has interviews and more clarifying all the way back to MIT AI lab, lisp machines the printers proprietary code triggering free software movement, etc.

Linux just happened because GNU hand't developed a proper kernel yet; Linus wrote that himself on an mail to the Linux Kernel or Minix mailing list IIRC.

[-] LordKitsuna@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago

the git history tree for the Linux kernel

[-] fmstrat@lemmy.nowsci.com 2 points 1 year ago

Doesn't go back far enough

[-] snowraven@sh.itjust.works 1 points 1 year ago

Lol that's a pretty fun idea actually- just to see the commits evolve over time. I know there are over 1 million commits but yeah when you think about it all of them pretty much document the state of kernel at that time.

this post was submitted on 16 Oct 2023
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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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