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Joined: Jan 13, 2009
Posts: 1
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Posted Jan 13, 2009 at 12:19:02 AM
Subject: Linux Cost :S
Simple question, Just to let all other users know why. Why is Linux free ? (When Xp/Vista Costs Around £70) Why is they so many types of Linux ? Thanks, James
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Rubberman
Joined Jul 30, 2007
Posts: 944
Location:40 miles west of Chicago

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Posted: Jan 13, 2009 2:52:31 AM
Subject: Linux Cost :S
There are two major reasons why Linux is free (as in speech). 1. Is Linus Torvalds who designed and built (and still codes and manages) the Linux kernel. He wanted a free Unix system to work/play with. 2. Is Richard Stallman and the Free Software Foundation (FSF) which he founded. He has been the most vocal and influential proponent of free software. Richard, who was the original author of the Emacs text editing system and the FSF formed GNU.org to develop and distribute free software such as emacs, the GNU compiler series (gcc, gdb, et al), and many other tools and sub-systems that go into what we know as Linux. So, the reason Linux is free is that the developers of the Linux kernel and all the related systems wanted it to be so. There are so many version of Linux because with all this free software, people are easily able to modify it for their own purposes. Some have tailored Linux for image processing, audio composing and mixing, video authoring and editing, scientific and engineering tasks, embedded and real-time systems, and high-security systems for the NSA. Because of the GNU licenses, all these versions have to provide the source code as well. What a plethora of goodies! Enjoy!

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Shashank Sharma
Joined Jan 01, 1970
Posts: 1657
Location:New Delhi, India

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Posted: Jan 13, 2009 12:42:24 PM
Subject: Linux Cost :S
These links should further clarify. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU_General_Public_License http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linux http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_software Cheers!

Coauthor of Beginning Fedora: From Novice to Professional published by Apress.

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