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What IS an operating system ? According to my (old) dictionary of IT (circa 1984) operating system In computing, a software programming package that controls the operation of user programs. Operating Systems may typically perform the supervision of input output operations, allocation of storage, sequencing of user programs etc.. OK simplistic admittedly ... but basically this is what the linux kernel does :- resource management (memory / hardware) job / task scheduling library management etc.... But we do need to Add file systems management Ext2/3 Reiserfs UFS DOS/FAT/NTFS...... (insert favourite supported file system format here) Then you need utilities (Ahh GNU) ls more ping ? less df dd find awk gcc (very important) then more sophisticated utilities that could arguably be applications :- emacs (GNU first offering i think) vi then onto GUI's GNOME (GNU i think) KDE (definitely not GNU) then other "production" apps Apache (not GNU) Mysql (not GNU) OpenOffice (not GNU) So which one of these is NOT part of your operating system ? For me none of them (that is I use and need them all equally although I have a preference to GNOME over KDE but thats my own preference ). So my point ...... The second I use any GNU tool / app / code (some) people say I should call it GNU/Linux and to a point I can accept that. However..... If I use Apache or MySQL or OpenOffice I don't hear anyone from the Apache team or the MySQL team or the OpenOffice team suggesting that I should call my operating system Apache/Linux or MySQL/Linux or OpenOffice/Linux. So come on lets be reasonable about these things. I don't want to end up having to explain to someone why they should call the operating system they use Apache/MySql/OpenOffice/Linux...... Life's just too short ;-) Therefore...... If someone calls it linux good... If someone calls it gnu/linux great .... However ... if someone is over critical of someone else because they don't call it what they think it should be called (and we get to the point of a "school playground spat" .... well lets just say its not what I would call community spirit :-( . By all means put forward your reasons for preferring one definition over another (GNU and linux is after all about freedom) but lets not get personal. In Conclusion .... 1. I think we should all appreciate the great work of the GNU team. 2. I don't think anyone should be forced to call it GNU/Linux if they don't want to. (that works the other way around too). 3. At the end of the day we are all using the same software and we all think it great stuff right ? 4. I will not be offended by anyone who refers to this group as DCLUG, DCGLUG or any other derivative they feel comfortable with. Im from (D)evon you maybe from (C)ornwall we are all (G)NU and (L)inux (U)sers and we form a (G)roup. Tom. -- The Mailing List for the Devon & Cornwall LUG Mail majordomo@xxxxxxxxxxxx with "unsubscribe list" in the message body to unsubscribe.