Linux is one of the greatest efforts achieved in Free Software since Emacs, the text editor. It's worldwide used from large companies to simple computer hobbyists on their homes.
Linux is a proof that the UNIX operating System is no longer for those who are using big machines, creating 3-D animation and rendering and, possibly, network administrators. With Linux, you can really have the power of the UNIX operating system in your fingertips, and, as the time passes by and you become more familiar with Linux, you'll find that UNIX is the one true operating system, not just MS-DOS, PC-DOS or MacOS, but UNIX is the key to all computer knowledge in the world.
Linux is a clone of the UNIX operating system that runs on most x86-based platforms (386, 486, Pentium (MMX), Pentium Pro and Pentium II are included into this). People around the world are installing Linux on their home systems, large companies (such as Corel) have it already as a web-server operating system, and even people are installing it on their own offices only for personal productivity.
All of this sounds just great, but the greatest (and most important) thing of all is tha Linux is . No price to pay, no licenses, just free software!.
People who work with Linux (such as me) owe this particular achievement to a man who had the goal to bring UNIX into everyone of us: Linus Torvalds. He developed this OS in the University of Helsinki, in Finland, almost 7 years ago, with the help of lots of hackers across the Internet, and has special and particular abilities, such as updating the kernel, add more commands, add program packages, and lots of more features.
If you've worked on UNIX for a while, then you might know that there are 2 main versions of UNIX. BSD, developed by Bell Labs, and SystemV (System-Five), developed by AT&T. Well, Linux doesn't use any code from SystemV, so it's independent.
Linux was originally raised from MINIX, a small clone of UNIX
developed by Andy Tanenbaum, and it began as a hobby project, but
Torvalds got more involved into it and, on October 5, 1991, he
declared version 0.02 the first "official" version.
Version 0.02 was able to run bash
(GNU Bourne Again Shell. If you don't know what a shell is, don't
worry, we'll take care of that in a minute) and gcc
(GNU C compiler), but only was a basic kernel and a Floppy-drive
controller.
Linux grew 7 years to became into a real operating system, capable to run all kinds of shells, games, utilities, and the world renowned X Window System
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