this post was submitted on 22 Feb 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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Didnt it get fucked once? Also what did fedora do lately? Seriously asking.
No, they only fucked CentOS, and they made RHEL proprietary last year. Since Ubuntu's decline, Fedora basically took it's place. It's very stable but not extremely outdated, has great security, always supports the newest technologies like Flatpak, Wayland, Pipewire, etc., has good Desktop spins and constantly innovates. The next Fedora KDE release will even completely drop support for X11, which is a good step because it forces developers to adopt Wayland. They also have pretty good immutable spins like Silverblue, Kinoite and others. Other cool distros like Nobara and uBlue are also built on top of Fedora.
Its not really proprietary. Developers get the code, and everyone that gets the binaries also gets the code. Thats GPL compliant.
To quote Software Freedom Conservancy:
To quote both of you “nevertheless complies with the GPL and other standard copyleft terms”.
Were you trying to prove his point?
As shocking as this might be, I think he's agreeing, and offering supplimentary proof
Obviously they comply with the GPL, otherwise they would get sued. But Red Hat acts exactly like a proprietary software company. That's what the quote is trying to say.
Devs get the code but can't redistribute it, so it's proprietary code
They can look at it and change it, so it is not secret.
That's not enough. Still proprietary
@Dehydrated but something something proprietary! waa!
/s
I know that it's a joke, but find me a distro that doesn't include any proprietary blobs.
@Dehydrated this is my pet peeve everytime i try to discuss anything about linux someone interrupts me about how SOME COMPONENT is proprietary
like yeah, the keyboard on the laptop is proprietary, so are all the ICs, come on...
All the hardware is proprietary. The CPU, the ME in the CPU, the chipset on the mainboard, the BIOS, the RAM and SSD controllers, the TPM and everything else. Even the damn battery controller hardware and software are proprietary. It really doesn't matter though.
@Dehydrated the car i drive to work is entirely proprietary!
but yeah, open source is awesome but not using something useful/good because of its license is just kinda shooting yourself in the foot IMO
exactly
You mean besides Fedora?
No, because Fedora DOES include proprietary blobs (for a good reason)
Really? Which ones?
Intel/AMD CPU microcode
Wait, you object to their feely-distributable firmware updates? Seriously? Without those, your CPU is vulnerable to exploits and known hacks.
Did you read my previous comment? I spscifically said:
It sucks a lot.
It's not that big of a deal
I mean we have a monolithic kernel, with every single line of code running as root, that contains proprietary garbage. Thats even worse than Windows if you ask me, where you can see the drivers processes, which means they are seperate processes.
I will soon compile my own kernel, because I dont really feel good with running such a bloated piece of bad code on my standard intel laptop.
https://www.gnu.org/distros/free-distros.en.html
There used to be a Linux just called Red Hat Linux. It was run by Red Hat obviously but a community built up around it.
Fedora was literally created by RedHat and staffed to be the “community” distro. They did this so that they could be “corporate” with Red Hat Linux ( now called Red Hat Enterprise Linux ).
I find it funny when people say that Red Hat is going to try to take away the community in Fedora and use their corporate behaviour in RHEL as an example. They literally created them both. The whole point of Fedora is to be community driven.
Fedora is a lot like RHEL in most ways but absolutely not a competitor to it. More of a testing ground. This is all by design.
Where things went wrong for them is that somebody created a bug for bug clone of RHEL. The story was that the clone would be a “community” but that is bonkers because ( by definition ) the clone cannot deviate from RHEL. It cannot innovate. It cannot modify or contribute code ( not even fix bugs ). So, it was just a zero cost version of RHEL. The whole reason for creating Fedora was to prevent that.
Anyway, Red Hat likes Fedora and WANTS it to be “free” and anybody that understands the history knows why.
In fact, the problem is somewhat that Fedora is not allowed to get too corporate. You will notice that Fedora is one of the staunchest distros with regards to including potentially patented codecs and such for example.