Is it true that the name comes from the recursive, “Gnu’s Not Unix”?
Yes.
Yet people still refer to GNU/Linux as a unix system.
That’s mostly because of certain standards followed by all the *nix systems, and it started with Unix…
Really it’s a POSIX-compliant system.
Fun fact: RMS came up with the name POSIX.
I’ve gotten a TON of value out of GPL’d and Gnu projects.
Here’s to another 40.
The article mentions that Hurd is also a recursive acronym, but doesn’t go into any more details.
After looking it up on Wikipedia, I see why not:
It’s time [to] explain the meaning of “Hurd”. “Hurd” stands for “Hird of Unix-Replacing Daemons”. And, then, “Hird” stands for “Hurd of Interfaces Representing Depth”. We have here, to my knowledge, the first software to be named by a pair of mutually recursive acronyms.
