[ale] Time to stir the pot

[Michael Trausch]

On 01/04/2012 07:54 PM, Vernard Martin wrote:
> The problem with GNU/Linux is that it assumes that there is nothing else
> of real import in the system that isn't GNU or the Linux kernel. And
> that is more ludicrous than anything else.

That's not really true either, though; the operating system stops where
application libraries and programs begin.  I would consider the
coreutils and the C library to be parts of the operating system, for
example, but I would not consider Firefox as part of the operating system.

Certain things which are always used as system tools (e.g., rsync, sudo)
I would say occupy a grey area between operating system and application.

But things like "ls" and "cp", the shell, the C library, and utilities
specific to the kernel (e.g., mdadm or the LVM tools) are solidly what I
would call part of the operating system.  They aren't the kernel, but
their job is to give the user an interface to those things that the
kernel works with at a relatively low level.  Firefox, OTOH, is an
application in that it only works with the kernel as a side effect of
doing its primary job, which is to help you browse the web.

If we added every application to the list, then we'd have something that
held no real meaning.  "GNU/Linux" is at least meaningful, because we
know by seeing that that it is a system running the Linux kernel with
the GNU operating system utilities.  Obviously we can also safely assume
that there are Linux-specific utilities that are installed on the
system, otherwise there would be little point.

Saying "Linux" is ambiguous, though, because it refers only to the
kernel.  Other systems say different things to be unambiguous, for
example, "Android" refers to a system that uses Linux coupled with a
heavily customized userland that is definitely not GNU, right from the
start with the C library and up.

An application that is written to run on "GNU/Linux" is therefore not
necessarily portable to "Android", and vice versa.

	--- Mike

-- 
A man who reasons deliberately, manages it better after studying Logic
than he could before, if he is sincere about it and has common sense.
                                   --- Carveth Read, “Logic”

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