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Why Should You Learn About Linux

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16 views

Why Should You Learn About Linux

Uploaded by

Vam Valou
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Why Should You Learn about Linux?

Linux is a critical technology for IT professionals to understand.

Linux is in widespread use, worldwide. Internet users interact with Linux applications and
web server systems daily, by browsing the World Wide Web and using e-commerce sites to
buy and sell products.

Linux is in use for much more than the internet. Linux manages point-of-sale systems and the
world's stock markets, powers smart TVs and in-flight entertainment systems, and runs most
of the top 500 supercomputers in the world. Linux provides the core technologies that power
the cloud revolution and the tools to build the latest generations of container-based
microservices applications, software-based storage technologies, and big data solutions.

In the modern data center, Linux and Microsoft Windows are the predominant operating
systems. Linux use continues to expand in enterprise, cloud, and device spaces. Due to its
widespread adoption, you have many reasons to learn Linux:

 A Windows user needs to interoperate with Linux systems and applications.


 In application development, Linux commonly hosts the application and its runtime.
 In cloud computing, both private and public cloud instances use Linux as the operating
system.
 Mobile applications and Internet of Things (IoT) devices commonly run on Linux.
 When looking for new IT career opportunities, Linux skills are in high demand.

What Makes Linux Great?

If someone asks you "What makes Linux great?", then you have many answers to pick from:

 Linux is open source software.


Being open source means that you can see all of how a program or system works. You
can also experiment with changes and share them freely for others to use. The open
source model means that improvements are easier to make, enabling faster innovation.
 Linux provides a command-line interface (CLI) for easy access and powerful
scripting.
Linux is built around a basic design philosophy that users can perform all
administration tasks from the CLI. It enables easier automation, deployment, and
provisioning, and simplifies both local and remote system administration. Unlike
many other operating systems, these capabilities were in the architecture from the
start, and result in ease of use and stability.
 Linux is a modular operating system that is designed to easily replace or remove
components.
System components can be upgraded and updated when needed. A Linux system can
be a general-purpose development workstation or a purposefully minimized software
appliance.

What Is Open Source Software?

Open source software is software with source code that anyone can use, study, modify, and
share.
Source code is the set of human-readable instructions that are used to make a program. Code
might be in interpretive form, such as a script, or compiled into a binary executable that the
computer runs directly. Source code becomes copyrighted when created, and the copyright
holder controls the terms under which the software can be copied, adapted, and distributed.
Users can use the software according to its software license.

Some software uses "proprietary" or "closed source" source code that only the originating
person, team, or organization can see, or change, or distribute. Proprietary licenses typically
restrict the user to running the program, and provide limited or no access to the source.

Open source software is different. When a copyright holder provides software under an open
source license, they grant the user the right to run the program and to view, modify, compile,
and redistribute the source to others, royalty-free. Open source licensing promotes
collaboration, sharing, transparency, and rapid innovation, because it encourages more people
to modify and improve the software and to share enhancements more widely.

Open source software can still be provided for commercial use. Open source is a critical part
of many organizations' commercial operations. Some open source licenses allow code to be
reused in proprietary products. Anyone can sell open source code, but open source licensing
generally allows the customer to redistribute the source code. Open source vendors such as
Red Hat provide commercial support for deploying, managing, and building solutions that are
based on open source products.

Open source has many benefits for the user:

 Control: See what the code does and improve it.


 Training: Learn from real-world code and develop more applications that are useful.
 Security: Inspect sensitive code, and fix it even without the original developers' help.
 Stability: Rely on code that can survive the loss of the original developer.

What Is a Linux Distribution?

A Linux distribution is an installable operating system that is constructed from a Linux kernel
and that supports user programs and libraries. A complete Linux system is developed by
multiple independent development communities that work cooperatively on individual
components. A distribution provides an easy method to install and manage a working Linux
system.

In 1991, graduate student Linus Torvalds developed a UNIX-like kernel that he named Linux,
and licensed it as open source software under the GPL. The kernel is the core of the operating
system and manages hardware, memory, and the scheduling of running programs. The Linux
kernel is supplemented with other open source software, including utilities and programs from
the GNU Project, a graphical interface from MIT's X Window System. The Linux kernel also
includes other open source components, such as the Sendmail mail server and the Apache
HTTP web server, to become a complete open source UNIX-like operating system.

A major challenge for Linux users is to assemble all these software pieces from many sources.
Early Linux developers provided a distribution of prebuilt and tested tools that users could
download and install to quickly implement Linux systems.
Many Linux distributions exist, each with differing goals and support criteria. Generally,
distributions have some common characteristics:

 Distributions consist of a Linux kernel and support user-space programs.


 Distributions can be small and single-purpose, or can include thousands of open
source programs.
 Distributions provide a means to install and update the software and its components.
 The distribution provider supports the software, and ideally, participates in the
development community.

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