this post was submitted on 04 Aug 2023
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Linux
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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Linux is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991 by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged in a Linux distribution (or distro for short).
Distributions include the Linux kernel and supporting system software and libraries, many of which are provided by the GNU Project. Many Linux distributions use the word "Linux" in their name, but the Free Software Foundation uses the name GNU/Linux to emphasize the importance of GNU software, causing some controversy.
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Yes! Depending on how much time you want to spend figuring things out... there is a learning curve, but the documentation is quite extensive. And you do learn a lot about Linux by diving in. The compile times aren't really an issue today if you have decent hardware- I run it at home and on all of my servers (some of them not very powerful). You can do other things while it's compiling.
It's great if you want to customize everything and learn how your system works, or are interested in optimizing everything for your specific CPU architecture. There are a few pitfalls (especially when learning), but I've generally been able to learn how to fix any issues as they arise.
Also, the package availability is great. If you can't find something in the gentoo repository or in an overlay, you can usually find its dependencies and build it yourself.