With that recent post about chrome os not counting as a distro of linux. It does bring a good question, what is a distro of linux?

If Linux is just a kernel then android and chrome os are Linux. Bur no really considers android a distro of linux. So linux is more then a kernel.

KDE say that neon is not a distro but doesn’t really why neon is not but kubuntu is.

  • UnfortunateShort@lemmy.world
    1·
    1 year ago

    Chrome OS is 100% a distro by induction, because Gentoo is a distro and Chrome OS is based on Gentoo.

    As for Android: I’d say it is a distro, but most people think of desktop or server OSs when they talk about distros these days. Obviously it’s neither of these.

    KDE Neon is a testing vehicle for new KDE software. The devs don’t consider it a distro because it’s not meant to distribute anything. It’s for testing and they don’t (have to) beyond that. So this has nothing to do with how this OS behaves, looks or whatever.

  • monk@lemmy.unboiled.info
    1·
    1 year ago

    If it distributes Linux, it’s a distro. Thus ChromeOS, Android, Windows are all Linux distros.

    If you have a different definition, best you can do with it is go brighten up some lawyer’s day, I guess.

      • monk@lemmy.unboiled.info
        0·
        1 year ago

        Windows distributes Linux, through its repositories, ergo Windows a Linux distribution.

        What does it do with it then – acts as a hypervisor or sings its source aloud backwards – is an orthogonal question.

  • js10@reddthat.com
    0·
    1 year ago

    Does Android really even use the Linux Kernel anymore? I thought they forked it about 15 years ago and at this point it has diverged so much its not even really the Linux kernel anymore.

  • Mateo@lemmy.zip
    0·
    1 year ago

    My understanding is that is has to have a certain level of the GNU core utilities in combination with the Kernel but yeah not really, it’s hard to define, maybe the use of a package manager? Definitely nothing to do with GUI, probably a philosophy in mind, not sure at all to be honest.

    • duncesplayed@lemmy.oneEnglish
      1·
      1 year ago

      It is hard. We had Chimera Linux posted here yesterday, which has no GNU code at all. None of the early Linux distributions had package managers. The best I can tell, “pms” (package management system) written for Bogus Linux in 1993 was the earliest, but package management didn’t hit the mainstream until at least 1995. Slackware didn’t get a package manager until the mid-2000s. But we still all consider them distributions. (Right?)